The Obviousness Illusion
What feels obvious to you may be revolutionary to someone else
The Obviousness Illusion is Derek Sivers' insight that every person's unique combination of experiences, knowledge, and perspective makes their ordinary thoughts potentially extraordinary to others. Creators consistently undervalue their own ideas because those ideas emerge naturally from their existing mental models—they feel effortless and obvious. But this feeling of obviousness is an illusion created by the curse of knowledge: once you understand something, it is nearly impossible to remember what it felt like not to understand it. The practical consequence is that enormous amounts of valuable insight go unshared because their creators dismiss them as too basic. Sivers argues that hit songwriters often consider their biggest songs stupid and not worth recording, that John Coltrane likely found his jazz innovations obvious, and that Richard Feynman probably felt his physics insights were self-evident. We are clearly terrible judges of our own creations, and the solution is simple: share your work and let the world decide its value rather than pre-filtering based on your own biased assessment.
- Everybody's ideas seem obvious to them—that does not make them obvious to others.
- We are clearly bad judges of our own creations.
- Hit creators often think their best work is their most obvious and least impressive.
- The world benefits more from your shared 'obvious' ideas than from your hidden 'perfect' ones.
- Recognize the obviousness bias in yourselfNotice when you dismiss your own ideas, insights, or knowledge as too basic to share. Pay attention to the internal narrative that says 'everyone already knows this' or 'this is too simple to be valuable.' This dismissal is the obviousness illusion at work. Your unique combination of experiences has given you knowledge that feels effortless to you but would require significant effort for others to acquire. The very fact that something is obvious to you is evidence of deep internalized understanding, not evidence of its lack of value.Pro tipKeep a log of ideas you almost did not share. Review it monthly and notice how many of those 'obvious' ideas received positive responses.
- Share without pre-filteringCommit to sharing your ideas, insights, and work publicly without applying the obviousness filter. This means publishing the blog post you think is too basic, giving the presentation you think everyone has heard before, and offering the advice you think is too straightforward. Let the audience determine value rather than pre-filtering based on your internal sense of originality. The creative process should end with publication, not with self-censorship. This does not mean sharing everything indiscriminately—it means not letting 'this seems too obvious' be a reason for withholding.Pro tipStart with low-stakes channels: a tweet, a short blog post, a conversation with a colleague. Build evidence that your 'obvious' ideas have value.WarningDo not confuse this with sharing without effort. The ideas themselves may be obvious, but clear communication still requires craft.
- Let the world be the judgeAfter sharing, observe the response without attachment to outcome. Some ideas will resonate powerfully; others will not. The key insight is that you cannot predict which ideas will strike others as brilliant—your own sense of their quality is systematically miscalibrated. Track which of your shared ideas generate the most engagement, questions, and gratitude. Over time, you will develop a better sense of where your unique perspective creates the most value for others, and that pattern will likely surprise you by highlighting ideas you considered least impressive.Pro tipThe ideas that generate the most 'I never thought of it that way' responses are usually the ones that felt most obvious to you.
Sivers notes that hit songwriters often admit their most successful songs were ones they considered stupid or not worth recording. The songs that felt too simple, too obvious, or too unsophisticated to the creator turned out to be the ones that resonated most powerfully with audiences. The creator's internal quality assessment was precisely inverted from the market's response.
Sivers regularly felt humbled by other creators' work, thinking 'I never would have thought of that—it is genius.' He continued sharing his own 'ordinary' thoughts through his blog. One day, a reader emailed him using the exact same words about his work. This mirror experience revealed that the feeling of inadequacy about one's own ideas is universal among creators, and that others experience the same sense of revelation about your work that you experience about theirs.
Sivers wrote this essay after a personal experience that crystallized the concept. As a successful entrepreneur and musician, he regularly consumed the work of others and felt humbled by their brilliance. He would think, 'I never would have thought of that. How do they even come up with that? It's genius!' Meanwhile, he continued sharing his own thoughts, which felt ordinary and unremarkable to him. One day, someone emailed him using the exact same words: 'I never would have thought of that. How did you even come up with that? It's genius!' The symmetry was striking. Sivers realized that the feeling of inadequacy he experienced when viewing others' work was precisely the feeling others experienced when viewing his. The essay, published in 2010, became one of the most shared pieces on creative confidence and has been cited by thousands of creators as the push they needed to start sharing their work.