The Magic of Creativity
Magicians are very creative people. They make you see and believe impossible by using simple things in innovative ways. Everybody can have that magic of creativity. Creativity is not a quality you are born with as many people think. It is something that is discovered, honed and improved upon through real work for a period of time.
Creativity is not reserved for Poets, Artists or Writers. Everybody has some level of creativity. Finding solutions for every single problem which is small or big requires a certain level of creativity. Even if you copy other solutions, it requires a little bit of personal touch to make it work.
Creativity does increase with experience. A study conducted at Carnegie Mellon University found that most famous art and inventions are made by persons who at least spend a decade of work in that field. In any creative endeavor, you have to give yourself permission to create junk. There is no way around it. Even a genius like Mozart had to work for at least ten years before he produced something that became popular.
Creativity flourishes when you are comfortable and doing little to no work. Like when you are taking shower, having a cup of coffee in the street corner café or during a weekend getaway. Taking mind out of stress full thoughts gives a creative boost to your rocket imagination.
Scientific inventions are not made in laboratories. Scientific inventions are made by people who are brave enough to imagine the impossibilities and then used the laboratories to test their hypothesis. Sometimes it will take a very long time to prove the hypothesis like Einstein’s general theory of relativity which took 100 years to prove. Many hypotheses are not yet proven or disproven. We don’t have technological capabilities to do that. That is the power of creativity.
Sometime you will have pieces of creative thoughts which do not solve the complete puzzle. Park those thoughts by noting it down. These may be required as small pieces of the puzzle to glue together when you have your bigger thought. You cannot forget your most creative thoughts. It will keep coming back to you. Creativity is like connecting dots to draw a picture. Dots are already present. But you have to decide which dots to connect to draw a beautiful picture which does not exist before. Very few people can have original thoughts like drawing a picture on a blank paper.
“Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it. It seems obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize things.” — Steve Jobs
To have the magic of creativity first you have to enter the world of imagination. Imagination and creativity are tightly coupled together. imagination is thinking of something that is not present, while creativity is doing something meaningful with your imagination.
There are abundant of creative geniuses available in the world. In fact, there could be one or two creative geniuses available at your home. Your kids are those creative geniuses because they can enter their world of imagination in the snap of a finger. Little princess in our home thinks Cars can fly when required and she can teleport during a video call. Below picture was drawn by my daughter.
“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up” — Picasso
Remember we also had the same level of imagination when we were kids. What happened then, we have grown. When we grow, we acquire knowledge. You may argue how acquiring knowledge reduces creativity. Instead of using the gained knowledge as a tool to being better human beings of greater creativity. We are building knowledge as a wall around us. Not brave enough to break the walls and see what is on the other side of the wall.
When Einstein read Newton’s works and gained knowledge. He did not simply sit inside that wall of knowledge. He broke the wall and challenged his Hero Newton by proposing his theory of general relativity and thrown out a direct challenge to Isaac Newton, whose theory of gravity had defined our understanding of the universe since 1687. Einstein argued that Newton was wrong about what the force of gravity actually moves. And he was right about that.
How some people are more creative than others?
They break rules.
Breaking rules mean is not ignoring traffic laws. It is breaking the constraints you have around your imagination. You can find solutions by thinking. But, Greater solutions can only be found by thinking out of the box. Thinking out of the box means approaching the problem in a new innovative way. Moving further from the problem and seeing in a different dimension. Entirely re-building the thing where the problem will not occur first place so you don’t have to solve it. Initially, Nasa was struggling to invent pen with pressurized ink cartridges to use in space. They completely avoided the problem by deciding to use a pencil.
“Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.” ― Picasso
Most of the pushback we get by being innovative — whether from management, colleagues, or our own brains — comes with a simple phrase: “That’s how we have always done it.” We are hardwired to resist change, especially when what we have been doing has been working okay, if not spectacular. If you suppress your creativity for a long time you become dumb. You should find ways to give life to your creativity. Don’t be a follower of the existing mess. Be a leader and find ways to implement changes which makes a positive impact. Even if you are good at your field but did not improve continuously then after a while you will be stranded in the past and find others overtake you in skills.
People who believe skills are fixed often fail when they face the first barrier. If you don’t think you can improve, you don’t try. Conversely, people who believe that skills are improvable are likelier to improve them. Eventually, they will cross the barrier and have greater success in life.
When the quantity of work done is given more importance then slowly but surely quality goes out of the window. But when you give importance to quality with the continuous improvement then surely quantity increases many times in the long run. Because when you are relaxed, you have chances of coming with out of box solutions for the problems. This will be a win-win situation for both the company and the employee.
The left side of the brain is responsible for controlling the right side of the body. It also performs tasks that have to do with logic, such as in science and mathematics. On the other hand, the right hemisphere coordinates the left side of the body and performs tasks that have to do with creativity and the arts. When you are in stress full situations like nearing project deadlines, Left side of the brain takes control and does definite calculations to take you out of the situation. When you are relaxing with friends, Right side of the creative brain takes control making fun, cracking jokes. When you are able to use both sides of the brain together more. You will become a better thinker. To make it happen first you should believe in your creative ability and allow to make some mess.
Initially, Creative people have more chance of failure than others. But later their success will have a greater impact. You can have greater success only if you don’t afraid of small failures. Whenever you are afraid of taking that chance remember that even top geniuses lived in this world faced many failures before their great success. They are successful only because they did not afraid to take that chance. If SpaceX stopped launching rockets after a few early botched attempts, then Space industry might remain the same like 50 years before. Elon Musk took that chance and now managed to do things that seemed audacious and highly unlikely. If you are afraid of battles then you cannot win the war. Give wings to your mind and fly high.