Be Open
Creativity springs from the openness to novelty. While this may seem rather self-explanatory, given that the basic premise of creativity is to create something new, the process of testing out new theories, methods, or activities is crucial to generating creative insights. Take art, for example, and think about some of the most famous artistic pieces you know… Why are they so famous? It’s usually because they are extremely innovative in some way, shape, or form. Even though music, art, and movies have been around for quite a while, the ones that tend to stand out are the ones that were open to doing something that had never been done before.
When the Beatles started experimenting with tape loops and new instruments, their music took a turn, making them more famous than ever before. The beat writer Jack Kerouac truly distinguished himself when he started toying with and twisting literary conventions. Pablo Picasso is remembered as one of the 20th century’s most influential artists, not because he painted like all of his fellow artists, but rather because he readily experimented with abstract painting, eventually becoming one of the principal leaders of the Cubist movement.
I could offer countless other examples, but you get the gist. There exists scientific proof of why opening to experimentation and new experiences is linked to creativity. The act of exploration (whether physical or mental) is linked to the neurotransmitter dopamine, a chemical in the brain that transmits signals and is connected to feelings of pleasure, as well as addiction. Dopamine also plays a role in motivation and learning, helping facilitate “psychological plasticity,” or one’s ability to engage flexibly with new material, which is useful in the exploration process. The drive for exploration is a key component of creativity. For more on this neuroscience, check out this article:
Being open to novelty leads to serendipity that results in some of the most creative ideas. The novelist Amy Tan recounts a time when she drove with her friends to a non-touristy location with numerous valleys, where at one point she found herself walking along a beach.
As she was walking, she came across a man stacking objects neatly on top of each other without any glue. When Amy asked him how it was possible for him to do this without any glue, the man responded, “Well, I guess with everything in life, there’s a place of balance.” Much to her surprise, this sense of balance was exactly the meaning of the story she was writing at that point. Thus by mere coincidence and openness to chatting with this stranger on the beach, Amy had come across the meaning of her most creative endeavor, which she herself had been previously unable to pinpoint. The simple act of being open-minded can result in the very experiences from which creativity springs.
