Challenge is a Good Thing
“My paintings don’t feel complete until they hit a wall,” explained Mark Whetli, an artist from Maine.
“What does that mean?” I thought to myself. “Was this some sort of artist lingo I was not informed about?”
Perceiving my confusion, Mark continued without me even having to follow up with a question. “This may not make a lot of sense, especially coming from someone who has been painting for longer than you have been alive. What I’m trying to portray to you is that each and every one of my projects require a crisis, a point where everything gets cloudy and seems to fall apart, if you will. After I hit this wall, I have to completely rethink the project and allow it to have a rebirth. My best works are the ones that have undergone a crisis in a significant way.”
“Hmm, yes.” I hesitated, still unsure of whether I understood what he was saying. “Could you give me an example?” I asked.
“Yes, of course. I’ll tell you a story of when I was about your age. I was working on a still life at the time and had just graduated [from art school]. So at this point, I knew what I was doing with painting, but for some reason this painting still just felt super static. And I couldn’t figure out for the life of me how to fix the static-ness. At the time I was with someone who loved collecting kitsch things. One such kitsch thing she had recently brought back was a green frog planter.”
Mark continued, “I hit a point where I told myself that this painting couldn’t get any worse, even if I put this kitsch frog planter in it.” So what did Mark do? He incorporated the frog planter in his painting. And guess what? This painting is still, to date, one of his best pieces. As Mark puts it, the rebirth of the painting through the inclusion of the frog planter taught him that in order to be successful, “art, or any other creative pursuit, for the matter, has to include something antithetical.” The frog, in this case, was not only what enabled him to overcome the challenge of a once static painting, but it is what made the piece itself more challenging, because it made it much more complex.
“Creativity isn’t being afraid to fail.” — Edwin Land (Scientist and inventor).
While this anecdote describes only one creative’s experience, embracing challenge like Mark Whetli does throughout his creative process is something that fosters the development of creativity. Many other creatives have similar stories about facing challenge at various points during the creative process.
For another artist, Carrie Scanga, this element of challenge materializes in the ideation part of the the creative process. “Everything is a struggle when it comes to creativity,” she explains. “It’s like ringing that last drop of water out from a wet towel, and it’s usually only at that last drop of water that I actually come up with a good idea.” She compares the challenge she faces with inspiration to that of her husband, a designer: “His creativity comes to him really easily. It’s like a fountain that just keeps flowing. He can just put his cup underneath it and just get [creativity].” Despite this challenge that Carrie faces, it does not make her less creative or less successful; rather, it boosts her craft. Why?
Challenges inspire better thinking — and it’s precisely this better thinking that leads creatives to alter the status quo. As humans, our brains are always trying to maximize efficiency and use the least amount of energy possible. Because of this, unless we are forced to, we don’t actually think much; our brain finds shortcuts to avoid expending the energy it does while we think. Jonah Lehrer, an author with a background in neuroscience, explains that our creativity activity actually benefits from constraints: “The imagination is unleashed by constraints. You break out of the box by stepping into shackles.”
Psychologists also claim that when you are challenged you see the world differently, because you dedicate your mental energy to being as resourceful as possible. Creative people know that challenge should not be a reason to limit or abandon their work. In fact, the opposite is true. Some of the world’s most creative and innovative people are those who leverage challenges to push themselves further. In the case of Mark Whetli, for example, he has experienced challenge so many times throughout his career, that now he knows that a piece won’t be successful unless he faces a challenge throughout the process. So embrace the challenges; take them all in — they’ll boost your creative juices. For further reading about the importance of challenge, check out the article below.
For more information, please contact me at sfd9@georgetown.edu. To read more, you can purchase my book, “When Birds Swim” on Amazon in paperback or Kindle.
