Creativity is intelligence having fun.
-Albert Einstein
My mother was an artist and so my brother and I were brought up in a home where creativity was valued from an early age. We used to play with clay and LEGOs for hours at the kitchen table while listening to Neil Diamond, Elton John, and Carly Simon. There were no deadlines, text messages, obligations, or meetings — just the pure joy of being in the moment, alone with our imagination.
My mom always encouraged our creativity, even though my brother had much more natural-born talent than I did. I was “the writer” and he was “the artist.” Those labels stuck with us, and we both eventually turned those talents into professions.
At an early age, I also discovered a love of music and dance, often donning a pink tutu and twirling around our living room, a plump sugarplum fairy with curly hair who was fully immersed in her own world of magic, music, and glitter. I performed for my parent’s friends, too young to be stifled by self-consciousness and doubt.
Even at our prim and proper English grade school, creativity and playtime was sacred. There were always colorful projects to work on, games to play, and toys to discover.
Yet somewhere along the way, all of that faded. By the time I was in junior high school, the hours I…
