Shakespeare had the same 26 letters in the alphabet that we all do. It’s what you do with them that matters.
—Lou Holtz
A blank piece of paper is God's way of telling us how hard it is to be God.
—Sidney Sheldon
Original (adj.)
- present or existing from the beginning.
- created personally, never before seen.
- Not derived from something else; fresh and unusual.
The dictionary makes “original” sound noble, even heroic. No wonder writers worship at its altar.
We picture conjuring something nobody has ever imagined, then dropping the mic while a stunned world stands up and applauds.
In practice, pursuing originality puts your creativity in a coma.
Aim for perfect originality and you will spend most of your writing time second-guessing and deleting perfectly good paragraphs. The blank page loves to bully anyone who shows up armed only with the intent to “Be unique.”
The Myth of the Untouched Snowfield
There are just under 200,000 English words in common use. The English language is like Everest: majestic from afar, but overcrowded and messy up close. Whatever mountain you hope to plant your flag on, someone has climbed a nearby peak already.
Readers don’t reward you for staking out new territory, but for solving a problem they have right now. That means meeting them on familiar ground and lighting the path better than the last guide did.
Derek Thompson touched on this in Hit Makers:
“Most consumers are simultaneously neophilic, curious to discover new things, and deeply neophobic, afraid of anything that is too new. The best hit makers are gifted at creating moments of meaning by marrying new and old, anxiety and understanding. They are architects of familiar surprises.”
Picasso got it half-right: good artists copy, but great artists curate. Copying is mindless mimicry. Curation is mindful remixing: sifting what already resonates, discarding the fluff, and recombining the rest so it hits harder.
Curation ≠ Plagiarism
Remixing scares authors who equate it with theft. But literary history says otherwise:
- James Clear’s Atomic Habits refines BJ Fogg’s behavioral-science research into pocket-sized wisdom for busy readers
- Ryan Holiday’s The Obstacle Is the Way re-packages Stoic philosophy for modern entrepreneurs
- George Lucas’s Star Wars welds Kurosawa’s samurai films to Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey.
Each work feels fresh, yet each is built from sturdy, borrowed scaffolding. The creator’s craft lies in choosing what to keep, what to trim, and where to tilt the spotlight
The Three-Layer Remix Stack
- Timeless Need
- Start with a human desire that never expires: health, status, love, freedom, meaning. Books serving these hungers get another printing every decade.
- Proven Pattern
- The existing frame readers already trust: a bestseller, a classic study, a beloved parable. Patterns lower cognitive friction; they whisper, “You’ve walked part of this road before. Keep going”
- Personal Angle
- Now inject one twist that only you can offer—your case study, metaphor, anecdote, or data set. This is where the voice lives, but it’s the third layer, not the foundation.
A Practical Test: The “Jenga” Question
Load your draft into a mental Jenga tower. Remove one borrowed idea at a time.
If the structure collapses when you yank your twist, great, you’ve added real value.
If it stays upright, you may still be copying, not curating.
When Remixing Becomes Art
An effective remix does at least one of three things:
- Translates a dense idea into clear language (Freakonomics turns academic economics into dinner-table stories)
- Specializes a broad principle for a tight niche (The Mom Test applies customer-development theory to small startups).
- Hybridizes two domains that rarely meet (Naval Ravikant’s Almanack merges wealth creation with Eastern philosophy).
Hit two out of three and readers will share the book for you.
The Roadmap for Authors
- Build a Swipe File
- Collect passages, frameworks, and anecdotes that punch you in the gut. A robust swipe file is the writer’s equivalent of compound interest.
- Write in Public
- Tweets, newsletter snippets, podcast riffs—treat them as A/B tests. Signals of resonance tell you which bricks belong in the final structure and which are ornamental
- Ship the Minimum Symphonic Version
- Think of your book as a playlist, not a debut album. Arrange existing hits, add two unreleased tracks, and press play. You can remaster later editions once the crowd starts singing along. Get the EP out and the album will follow.
Originality pursued directly creates block; originality achieved through smart remixing creates books people press into friends’ hands.
Stop hunting for untouched snowfields. Walk the trodden trail with a keen eye and a sharper machete. Readers will remember who showed them the path, not who walked it first.