Though creativity isn’t a prerogative of supreme beings, the Homo sapiens is riding the wave of evolution, thanks to human ability and appetite for innovation, and the emergence of great machines, and harnessing of energies, which have transformed the face of Earth. It’s a revelation. Yet, one cannot be sure whether this transformation will help the human race, or cause its downfall.
For better, or worse, our future is now closely tied to human creativity. The inference is obvious: the outcome of it all will be determined in large measure, both wholly and substantially, by our own dreams and our struggles to make them real.
Creativity is the cultural equivalent of the process of genetic changes that result in biological evolution, below the threshold of consciousness. It’s just the opposite of cultural evolution. To understand creativity is, therefore, not within the framework of straight-line thinking; or, studying individuals who seem most responsible for a novel idea, or a new thing. The spark is always necessary; because, without air and wood there would be no flame.
It is wrong to accept the popular belief that creativity is some sort of mental activity, or insight, that occurs inside the heads of some special people. Rather, it is a spin-off that develops by way of interaction between a person’s thoughts and their socio-cultural context.
Creativity is a much confused, misunderstood word. It is also used to cover too much ground. It is actually a trinity, so to say, that may rightfully be called — brilliant, personally creative, and creative. What about the genii? A genius is a person who is brilliant and creative at the same time.
Creative persons differ from one another in a variety of ways, but in one respect they seem to have a common thing: they all love what they do, not with the hope of achieving fame, or making money, but for the opportunity creativity nurtures — to do work they enjoy doing. Most of our creative fellow beings would readily agree that they do what they do primarily because it’s fun.
Age is no yardstick to measuring one’s relationship with creativity. But, creativity has got something more to do with physical and cognitive capacities, habits, or personal traits, relationships, and so on. It also takes the domain of the word, ‘creative urge’ — of something that is released by style, a joyful responsibility. It places as much emphasis on convergent and divergent thinking, and the primal idea, or instinct, of choosing a special domain for oneself.
But, there could be a few dangers. You could do away with them if your domain relates to extremes. As Dr Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, PhD, the noted psychologist, contends: “As you learn to operate within a domain, your life is certainly going to be more creative. It may, of course, not be something that would be recorded in history books, but it’d sure be something that denotes that you live, and lead, a full and creative life.”
