Becoming A Creative System In A Derivative World

I learned what systems actually are, and how mission-driven creators can become one

How do you define yourself within the broader creative world?

This is a question I started asking myself after I read Thinking in Systems, by Donella Meadows. I picked it up expecting to skim through something technical. Instead, I ended up rethinking how I view creativity, work, and my identity as a creator.

The book unpacks the basics of how systems operate, what they are, how they behave, etc. It’s very interesting in its own right, and systems thinking itself is an inherently valuable perspective to know.

But the real insight isn’t just in the mechanics. It’s in the lens it gives you.

Systems thinking changes how you interpret problems. For me, it showed me how to move through chaos with structure.

In a time where everything feels uncertain, I feel like creators need that kind of anchor.

Creative uncertainty in the age of AI

We're living in the golden age of the creator economy. Modern tools, platforms, and algorithms gave millions the power to build and broadcast.

At first, it felt freeing.

Now it feels crowded.

Not to mention the arrival of generative AI. GenAI didn’t just add more voices. It introduced a type of voice that doesn’t rest, doesn’t tire, doesn’t doubt. If AI can write, design, and produce in seconds, where does that leave you? What does your role become?

This anxiety shows up quietly.

You hesitate to post. You scrap drafts because “someone already said it,” and feel like you’re playing catch-up in a race you didn’t sign up for. You sit in front of your laptop, staring into empty space, thinking: Is there still a need for what I create?

You are not just a content creator

"Content creator" sounds harmless. But in practice, it's become a box. It assumes your job is to feed platforms, grow your metrics, and stay visible. It turns a personal mission into a marketing function.

You start to believe that to matter, you must:

• Hack algorithms to stay relevant

• Outpace automation to not be left behind

• Grow your audience to monetize

For me, labeling yourself a content creator turns you into a gear inside the creator economy machine. It's no longer a description of what you love. It becomes an assignment of what you're supposed to do.

But what do you actually create? For whom? Why? Ask someone who identifies as a "content creator," and they'll mostly tell you something like, "I make lifestyle videos" or "I write blogs."

A content creator has become a static role.

And in a time where everything creation-related is in flux, you need a more dynamic, living definition.

I want to refer to myself as a creative system.

I'm not a brand asset. I'm not here to keep timelines warm.

I'm a creative system, as organic as the water cycle, as fine-tuned as the astronomical rules that make our planet move. I have my own internal processes. I relate to other systems with a purpose. I work toward a meaningful goal.

You are a creative system

Let’s break down what this actually looks like.

The Creator

This view sees output as identity. If you post, you're valid. If you don’t, you’re falling behind. Success is measured by views. Failure is personal.

This version of the creator constantly looks outward. Trends lead the way. Metrics become the mirror. Rest feels dangerous.

It’s a fragile way to exist.

The Creative System

This version sees identity as a complex, ever-evolving living network. As a functioning system, you grow through everything you do, and it shows up in the evolution of your thinking. Wins and losses don’t define you—they feed your system.

A creative system doesn’t just produce. It gathers, reflects, relates, adapts, and sees creation as a cycle.

When you shift into this mode, your work stops being reactive.

You gain clarity.

Your creative choices align with your goals.

You stop asking, “What should I make next?” and start asking, “How will I grow this time? What is ready to bud out, what is still developing?” You interact with the world, but you’re not controlled by it. Like a plant sucking up nutrients from the ground, you use everything at your disposal to feed your system.

Like any system, you have core components that function together.

5 Core components of a creative system

I’m adapting the definition of a system from systems thinking—the discipline of seeing wholes, feedback loops, and interconnected parts. In this lens, a system is a set of elements organized to serve a purpose. It's dynamic. It adapts. It maintains itself through structure.

That’s the lens I want you to see your creativity through.

1. Stock: what your system contains

In systems thinking, stock refers to any accumulation of resources. It's what the system "contains." The water in the lake, the trees in the forest, the nutrients in the trees.

For us, creative systems, our stock is ideas. It's our reservoir of thoughts, experiences, insights, beliefs, and questions we’ve gathered. It’s not "content," but the very stuff that makes us human. Ideas are our lived experiences broken down into their core parts, like how organic material turns to core nutrients in compost.

Your stock might include:

• Old voice memos

• Memories from the past

• Unforgotten family recipes

• Cultural stories that you keep coming back to

• Your learnings from your industry, life experience, past relationships

The deeper the stock, the richer the output.

2. Inflows: how you gain new stock

This is how the stock gets inside the system. This is the river that leads to the lake, the roots that take nutrients into the body of the tree, the admission office of a university.

For you, inflows are however you take on new ideas. It's:

• Reading books

• Talking to new people

• Experiencing new things

Healthy inflows keep your system fresh.

If all your input comes from shallow social media garbage, you’ll produce surface-level thoughts. If your inputs come from real life, long-form thinking, deep listening, you’ll have richer material to work with.

3. Outflows: how ideas flow out of you

This is how stock moves from the system into the outer world, often another system. From the lake, another river might lead to the sea, or water seeps through the ground and feeds the trees (another system).

Outflows for creative systems is how we bring our ideas out into the world, into another system.

It's what you make. Not just content, but pieces of you, coming from your rich stock. It's your:

• Books

• Articles

• Products

• Workshops

• Frameworks

• Community ideas

The key is this: great outflow doesn’t come from pressure. It comes from well-timed overflow. You take what’s in your stock, refine it through your mission, and release it in ways that serve others.

You’re not squeezing out content, but letting built-up insight move outward.

4. Relationships: how everything relates

In systems, elements relate to each other and to other systems. For you, this includes:

• Your internal setup: how your ideas, processes, tools, and rhythms interact

• Your external setup: collaborators, platforms, AI tools, mentors, audience

You don’t create in isolation. You’re in constant feedback with others and with your own work. Recognizing these relationships helps you tune your system—not force it.

5. Goal: the entire purpose of your system

Every system has a purpose, every human needs a direction. Without one, it falls apart. A system without a clear purpose can’t organize its elements or adapt when conditions change. It fragments, spins in circles.

Purpose is the axis everything rotates around.

You need one too.

This is why a mission is the core component of the Write10x philosophy. A mission isn’t a niche. It’s a compass. It tells you what matters, what to ignore, and what to double down on.

You need a big mission to create with clarity. Not just to make things, but to know why you’re making them at all, and to know it's going to be worth it.

Without it, you lose the meaning behind your work and get burned out.

Every trend becomes a temptation, every metric a verdict.

With a goal, you know exactly why you’re here.

Where does AI fit?

AI isn’t the enemy -- not even the threat. Misuse is the threat.

Used wisely, AI becomes a powerful part of your system. But it should never become the system itself. Here are some ways AI can fit into the creative system.

Improving inflow

Let AI help clean your creative garage. Use it to:

• Cluster old ideas

• Extract recurring themes

• Categorize notes or highlight patterns

This frees up your mind to think, not just store.

Enhancing your stock

When integrated well, AI helps you think in ways you hadn’t considered.

AI can weave in knowledge from sources you haven’t encountered. It can challenge your assumptions, ask better questions, or uncover contradictions you’ve grown blind to.

Used right, AI becomes a cognitive mirror, sharpening your judgement. You, as the system, still set the overall goal of the system. You bring your conviction that what you're doing benefits your mission.

Speeding up outflow

Use it as scaffolding, not replacement.

AI accelerates—but your mission must direct. By using AI mindfully, you gain more creative control, not less. You decide which ideas move forward. You choose what stays in draft and what becomes public. You steer the tone, shape the argument, preserve the soul.

You become the director of your own, more efficient creative system. AI, when treated as a tool and not a substitute, allows you to stay in the zone longer, bypass creative bottlenecks, and hold the integrity of your work with less fatigue.

But only if you remain present. Only if you remember that AI works for you, not the other way around.

Case study: Julius from Gratefully Well

Julius had a message. Forty years in the medical field gave him stories, insights, a deep care for people’s well-being. But when he tried to share it, he felt stuck. He didn't know how to bring his ideas forward, and wasn't willing to spend the years in trial and error.

He needed new tools and ways of thinking. Working together, we turned him into a creative system.

His stock was richer than he realized. Decades of personal and professional experience. Notes from thousands of patients, reflections from his own healing, and deep scienific knowledge of the medical industry.

His inflows shifted. Instead of simply passively consuming information, he started to pay more attention. He took in not just the information, but the structure, flow, and overall effect of the piece he was consuming. He became more mindful of how he added new ideas into his head.

His outflows became intentional. He published soulful essays grounded in his stock, not fleeting content. He launched reflection prompts for his list. Right now, he's shortlisting for his first workshop for Gratefully Well.

His relationships deepened. He reached out to audiences and fellow creators, invited conversations.

His goal crystallized: Help people take conscious responsibility for their holistic health.

When he became a creative system, he was able to align all his elements and processes with his mission.

Redefine yourself in a chaotic world

You don’t need to define yourself by how much you can post, how many followers you can gain, or how efficiently you can mimic what's trending. You need to see yourself as a complex, creative system that functions with purpose.

It doesn’t solve “everything.” But it helped me see myself more clearly.

A content creator is just another aspirant in a billion-dollar economy. A creative system, on the other hand, is an ever-evolving, ever-growing entity working towards a goal, valuable in its own right.

Content creators come and go. But a creative system adapts. It grows stronger with time, becoming antifragile.

Once you adopt this perspective, you begin to refine, realign, and expand—regardless of what the industry is doing.

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P.S. If this perspective resonates, I wrote an entire guide to help you apply it: Authentic AI.

It's for creators who want to create a system with AI without losing their voice, values, or vision. Think of it as a companion to this article: part philosophy, part practical playbook. Check it out if you're ready to turn systems thinking into creative practice.