I am Cammi Pham, and I am a fraud.
I thought about confessing. I got scared.
But I cannot hide this anymore.
Today, I have to tell you the truth.
Nothing, I do is original.
I am a fraud.
I steal ideas. I steal knowledge, and I make them mine.
People give me credit, and I do nothing to change their minds.
I am a fraud, and I am proud of it.
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iPod wasn’t the first MP3 player, it is the best.
YouTube wasn’t the first video sharing site, it is the biggest.
Facebook wasn’t the first social network, it is the most popular one.
Google wasn’t the first search engine. Now googling is a verb.
All the biggest innovations were built on top of other ideas.
Nothing is original. They are all improved versions.
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Why do we tell everyone to be original, and kill their creativity?
Children learn by copying. They don’t try to be original.
That is how children learn how to crawl, walk, run and talk.
They copied others, and they are more creative than any of us.
As we grow older, everyone tells us to be original. That is the right thing to do. Copying is bad. In school, you get punished for copying.
We lock ourselves in the “be original” box. We forget how to think like children.
We try to be original. We fail and give up. We stay being the broken copied versions.
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Nobody told us, it is okay to copy, because everyone try to be original.
But nothing is original.
We need to revert time, and think like when we were children. We need to be so good at copying ideas and grow out of them. At the end, we will find a way to make them even better.
Don’t try to be an original, be the improved copied version.
I was born an original, and I want to die being a copy…an improved copy.
I am a fraud, and I am proud of it.
P.S. If you know anyone who is an original, let me know. I want to meet him.
Cammi Pham (@cammipham) is a digital marketer by day at ThinkRenegade, writer by night, unlearner 24/7. Cammi lives by her personal motto, “Learn, Unlearn, Relearn.”
Email: hi@cammipham.com