Do We All Have Creativity?

What is creativity? That one has a myriad of definitions if you ask around, but I think the answer is really simple. Creativity is taking a unique thought and implementing it to obtain something of value. To have innovative thoughts and ideas, but not act on them means you are imaginative, not creative. If you create something that has no context, function, behavior, or structure, then you have created something of no value, thus propelling that something into the useless piece of trash bin.

So, creativity is the process as a whole, but not any one component. Using a set of tools in a unique and innovative way to implement an idea to some value can be called creative, but only after the process is successful.

We often think of creativity being restricted to the Arts and business community, but this is wrong. Creative solutions can be found in simple, mundane tasks that require no complex math or intricate set of operational rules. If one's car breaks down at 4 a.m. in a bad neighborhood and they have only one call on their cell phone, they must find a creative way to satisfy a value that equals getting home safe and sound. To use that phone call to call time and temperature would be using the call just to satisfy itself. But, If that person called home and got the answering person to call roadside assistance AND the police, the stranded motorist just creatively used the one phone call to provide the value of security and delivery.

This video is a very creative way to define creativity.

Enjoy!

Unfortunately, the human race has been putting the smack down on creativity for over two hundred years. More by design than by pure luck, the concept an implementation of public schools paralleled the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. We began putting the teachings of arts and other right brain creative studies lower in the hierarchy what we saw was important for our children to learn. We wanted a society to use knowledge over and over again, that was already proved After all, the Industrial Revolution was built on the idea of repeated processes to obtain repeated results, so why not raise our children to think the same way?

Another way we hinder the ability to nurture creativity is the sheer evil and vile connotation we give to making a mistake. At times, there is so much attention made to the mistake that we miss the path we traveled to make that mistake. It is along that path where we will find the nuggets of almost worked. If we can learn that on the way to success, mistakes are numerous, lessons are bountiful and there is only one success, we can open our right brain more....go out on that limb where the fun begins.

What does all this mean to me? It means that in twenty-five years, our society will still be led by people who were raised with these restrictions. This means that creativity will be further diluted and maybe things like real solutions to economic woes, or national health care will be copies of solutions uses over and over. But, I think the process can be arrested if we realize that we adults are fill the children with blinder type thinking and let the think freely.

I also believe that anyone can gain creativity back, given the proper exercises and education.

Ken Robinson is a real treat to listen to as he intelligently states his case that supports the notion that schools are killing creativity.

Enjoy!

Do we all have creativity? So we are coming back to this. First we looked at what creativity is, and then saw how creativity has become the sacrificial lamb for the Industrial Revolution. Now we want to know if we all had creativity to lose in the first place. I say yes, and I have seen creativity come from the oddest places and have been impressed. Backyard mechanics figuring out how to remove a distributor from a Ford Pinto, by loosening one motor mount and jacking the engine up on one side. Figuring out how to move a heavy machine tool across a tiled floor by using the same methods the Egyptians used to move the huge blocks used to build the pyramids, but being innovative with the tools at hand. In both instances, imaginative and unique thought were put into action to produce a value laden result.

We still need to answer if we can re-learn how to be creative. The answer to that is most definitely, yes. There are literally thousands of exercises, programs, and seminars available that teach us how to take our right brain back, massage it and use in conjunction with the left brain to achieve creative success through innovative processing of ideas.

Brainstorming and listing are two of the most popular exercises used. Brainstorming is a natural because no two people have the exact same experiences and thoughts when ideas are put in front of them. Listing of thoughts generated around a need to fulfill is a powerful exercise because many times we will create ideas based on certain thoughts, sub-Ideas if you will.

The time is ripe for restructuring our beliefs about creativity. The world's economy is in the tank and the Industrial complex seems to be shrinking, putting our race in a dire need of innovative concepts that become viable mechanisms that will propel us onto the next level of measured success.

This video tells us we need to remember everything we were taught on how to learn and do just the opposite.

Enjoy!