Curiosity Is the Last Competitive Edge
The more I create, the more I realise curiosity isn’t just a switch I flip when I need it. It’s a way of moving through the world.
Not always those obsessive deep dives (though I still fall into them sometimes), but something gentler. Just being awake. Eyes open, ears tuned in, mouth closed now and then. Willing to take things in without needing to use them right away.
That steady, always-on curiosity? It’s one of the most valuable tools I have.
Curiosity is a slow compounder
Most of the stuff I notice never leads anywhere. A line in a book. The way someone’s dressed. A quirky bit of packaging in a corner shop. It just hangs around, loose, un-filed, until one day, it doesn’t.
It’s like wandering a city with no map or agenda. Just soaking it all up, a café sign here, a crack in a wall there, a piece of graffiti that lingers in your mind longer than it should.
Maybe you stop for coffee and end up chatting with a stranger. Turns out they’ve lived three lives: writer, banker, Ayurvedic healer (yes this person exists!). Now you have the opportunity to see the world for a fleeting moment through their lens. Something you never could’ve Googled.
That’s what curiosity does. It doesn’t chase answers. It’s present. It lets the world hand you things. Most of it won’t lead to anything obvious. But some of it lingers. And when you sit down to make something, it’s there, not always clearly, but baked into the fabric.
And honestly? The less you force it, the better it works.
Depth is useful, but lightness matters too
Sometimes you need to go deep. Follow the thread. Pull it apart to see what’s underneath. But I’ve learned not to overvalue that intense focus. There’s just as much creative weight in the light stuff.
A glance. A sound. A detail you barely clock in the moment, but can’t quite shake later.
If you’re constantly trying to “get something” out of everything, you miss that. You steamroll right over the subtle stuff, the stuff that ends up making your work feel alive.
You need both. The deep dives and the soft touches. You have to let things in before you know what they’re for.
Humility is baked into this
To move through the world curiously, you’ve got to admit you don’t know everything. That you’re probably missing things. That your first idea might be your laziest one.
It’s a quiet kind of humility, not the showy, self-deprecating type. Just a steady willingness to keep learning, even when you’ve been at it for a while.
That mindset helps me stay open. Helps me notice more. Helps me make better work, not because I’m grinding harder, but because I’m seeing differently.
This matters more than ever
AI’s fast, and deeply impressive. But it doesn’t wander through a market and fall in love with how the morning light hits a row of textiles. It doesn’t wonder how someone made a niche idea work against the odds. It doesn’t ask what a wetsuit would look like if it were designed by a wizard.
But you do. That’s your edge.
So don’t wait for a brief, or a deadline, or some manufactured moment of “inspiration.” Stay open. Stay present. Pay attention, even when there’s nothing to make.
That quiet, ambient curiosity you carry around? That’s what turns output into intentional work, the kind that actually means something.
