When the mind is a vacuum, ideas will flow in
Recently a reader of this Substack reached out thanking me for my writing. Along with the kind regards, this reader shared a passage from Rick Rubin’s just released book—I’ve included the passage below. The reader thought the passage would interest me given my recent posts about changing our aerification and topdressing approach. I would very much agree; the passage resonated with my thinking.
Rick Rubin is a legendary music producer, who’s worked with an amazing array of artists. Reading this passage made me want to get my hands on his book, which I have done, both in hardcover and audio form. If you’re looking for a memoir on Rubin’s incredible career, this is not it. The book is more of a long-form meditation on the creative process. If you’ve got 13 minutes, I recommend his recent interview with 60 Minutes.
In the early pages/minutes of the book, Rubin speaks of the vacuum created by eliminating distractions, and how when not distracted, ideas readily flow into one’s mind. It’s well documented that I have made walking a key component of time on the golf course. When walking the golf course, I mostly keep my mind free of distraction. My friend Paul MacCormack, the Mindful Superintendent, has suggested it’s almost a meditative state–I don’t disagree. In this state I often find my greatest challenge to be capturing all the ideas that flow into my head.
I have a good friend, who told me that before we had met he’d heard about this superintendent in Minnesota who walked everywhere. He didn’t believe it was possible, but decided to try it and has never looked back. We’ve talked about our affinity for walking and how it has made us better at our jobs. I might imagine, although we’ve never vocalized it, part of our enjoyment is the freedom of thought naturally brought about by walking, the vacuum it creates in our mind, and the ideas that fill the void.
Rubin goes on to mention that ideas are constantly being recycled from one person to the next. Someone’s great idea is picked up by someone else, filtered through a new mind, then passed along to others. Walking the golf course was not my original idea; I heard about it from another good friend, PGA Tour agronomist Thomas Bastis. Thomas used to walk everywhere when he was golf course superintendent at the Cal Club in San Francisco.
Ideas are everywhere, but can sometimes be elusive. Throwing away the rules, trying something new and freeing the mind of distraction are certain to allow an infinite number of ideas to flow.