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The Source of Creativity
Does it come from within or without us?
Many years ago at one of those interminable work conferences with a three line whip on attendance, the facilitator asked us to put up our hands if we considered ourselves as being creative. No one responded. Although I was into creative writing, my hand stayed firmly down. Okay, it was partially because no one else put their hand up and to be the only one felt a tad pretentious. But it wasn’t just that. Despite my writing aspirations, I didn’t see myself as creative. It sounded too grandiose. No doubt, I wasn’t alone.
Things have moved on and in our digital age of endemic social media, we have a whole new army of ‘creatives.’ Anyone who produces something for someone somewhere, such as the proliferation of YouTubers, is creative.
In many ways I applaud how the word has become expanded and democratised to embrace a wider group of people. It has pricked the pomposity and whiff of high art, and all the stuff that remains inaccessible to many. Creativity is no longer for elites who don’t need to graft for a living.
Creativity, in it’s widest sense, ranges further than the sphere of art and aesthetics. It is the choices we make in constructing our world, it is a stimulating conversation, it is in the rhythms of the day, it is a way of perceiving and paying…
