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Demystifying Creativity

May 10, 2017 by Joycelyn Campbell 2 Comments

Each day, we create thoughts, ideas, meals, impressions, relationships, goals, deals, situations, and objects of all types, shapes, and sizes. We create sadness, happiness, love, peace, violence, and everything in between. We create order out of chaos and chaos out of order. Our creations run the gamut from tiny to monumental, practical to completely frivolous, transitory to long-lasting, and helpful to harmful. I had fun writing about some of the things I created when I was in elementary school.

To a great extent, we also create ourselves.

Yet, the many myths and mysteries surrounding creativity get in the way of our ability to unleash our full creative potential. So let’s do a little myth-busting and demystifying.

What is creativity?

There are many different definitions of creativity, some of which are quite complex. I think simpler is better. Creativity is the ability to see what already exists in a new light, to think of new ideas, and to make new things.

Is there a difference between actually creating something and just thinking creatively?

Some creativity “experts” make this distinction and suggest that unless the creative form (the new idea or object) is widely accepted (valued) in the field within which it was generated, it isn’t entirely legitimate. But that seems like a very high bar and one most people would fail.

Certainly creative thinking is a prerequisite for being able to create something new. But being a creative thinker has many rewards apart from the products of creativity. For example, compared to a non-creative thinker, a creative thinker is less likely to be bored, is more likely to have greater problem-solving abilities, and is very likely to get more general enjoyment out of life.

Is creativity something you’re born with or can you train yourself to be creative?

Based on their orientation to tradition, authority, and conformity, some personality types may have a greater or lesser tendency to think creatively. But everyone has the ability to be creative, and people who are already creative can become more creative.

Is being creative the same as being artistic?

Absolutely not. This is one of the biggest myths about creativity. Creativity is extremely useful, even necessary, in mathematics, science, computer technology, education, medicine, business, and many other “non-creative” fields. It may be even more important to note that being artistic is not the same as being creative.

Do you have to be “right-brained” in order to be creative?

The myth of people being either “right-brained” or “left-brained” has contributed to the stereotype of the free-spirited creative person who is high on imagination and low on logic and practicality. Although the two sides of the brain do have different functions, they are in constant communication with each other and both are essential to creative thinking.

Are creative people more eccentric than other people (maybe even a bit mad)?

Well, in the case of highly creative people, the answer seems to be…maybe yes; maybe no. For more on the link between creativity and mental illness, you can read this post with links to some of the research. But learning how to think more creatively is unlikely to lead you down the slippery slope to eccentricity or madness if you weren’t already traveling along that path.

Is brainstorming an effective technique for increasing creativity?

Perhaps surprisingly, the answer is yes and no. Beginning with a group brainstorming session is not the best approach to creative problem solving. But research shows that if the members of the group first consider possible solutions on their own before participating with the group, group brainstorming produces more numerous and better quality ideas.

How practical is creativity in the real world?

As counterintuitive as it may sound, creativity may be the best hope we have for solving most, if not all, of the real-world problems that now exist. As Einstein is quoted as having said, “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”

Creativity: It Isn’t All in Your Head

September 25, 2015 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

creative-brain

Creativity is the ability to see what already exists in a new light, to think of new ideas, and to make new things.

If whatever has been created (the new idea or object) is widely accepted (valued) in the field within which it was generated, it is called Big C creativity. Creative results that don’t meet both of those criteria are referred to as Little C creativity.

The fact that we can imagine something does not prove that it is possible. —Julian Baggini, The Ego Trick

Maybe your creative endeavors have—or will—generate widespread acceptance and approval; maybe not.

You don’t have to aim for Big C creativity, but if you aren’t engaging in Little C creativity, you’re unlikely to create anything big. And you might also be depriving yourself of a more enjoyable and satisfying life.

Even though personal creativity may not lead to fame and fortune, it can do something that from the individual’s point of view is even more important: make day-to-day experiences more vivid, more enjoyable more rewarding. When we live creatively, boredom is banished and every moment holds the promise of a fresh discovery. Whether or not these discoveries enrich the world beyond our personal lives, living creatively links us with the process of evolution. —Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

What Does It Take to Be Creative?

Are creative people different in some fundamental way from other people? Do they have exceptional intelligence? Are they more right-brained? Do they tend to be messy, unfocused, disorganized, and impractical? Are all creative people artistic? Highly talented in some particular area? Are they unconventional? Do they feel things more deeply? Do they have more vivid imaginations? Do they know how to think outside the box?

These questions are common, because we tend to think of people as being either creative or non-creative. End of story. But even the most diehard “non-creative” person will occasionally, sometimes accidentally, come up with a fresh insight. And even the most relentlessly “creative” person will run out of ideas from time to time. Regardless of personality, background, talent, or experience, just about anyone can get better at being creative because anyone can learn how the creative process works.

How Does the Creative Process Work?

Depending on who you ask, the creative process has anywhere from three to ten steps, maybe more. What it all boils down to is using the right part of the brain at the right time. In fact, the creative process isn’t significantly different from problem-solving—and a case can even be made that the way to approach art is as problem-solving.

Practicing problem solving in art projects gets the mind working, thinking and open to solutions not before considered. If the student can think about an “art problem” in new ways, then they not only build skills for the art room, but they train their minds to think in a problem-solving mode. —artist Valerie Mann, speaking at the University of Michigan School of Social Work

Find or identify a problem to solve and create an intention to solve it. This involves using both focused and unfocused attention. (What’s the difference between trying to solve a problem and trying to find a problem to solve?)
Immerse yourself in it. Grapple with it. Obtain the knowledge or information you need to have in order to solve it (focused attention/knowledge loading). Choreographer Twyla Tharp has a good exercise for this step. Write down 20 things you’ll need to know in order to be able to solve the problem.
Divert your attention. Step away from the problem to an unrelated activity (unfocused attention/System 1) to allow your unconscious to process the problem and arrive at a solution. You could turn to a repetitive task, take a walk, or listen to some music.
Fine tune and implement the solution.

Each experience with the creative process expands your mental model, which increases your creative possibilities. To get the greatest benefit, though, you need to take action (Step 4). We are embodied beings, and what we do has more of an effect on our mental model than what we think.

Counterintuitive Creativity Tips

Creativity involves both parts of the brain—the conscious and the unconscious. The trick, if there is one, is to know which type of thinking to use when. Sometimes you need to apply focused (conscious) attention, which is linear, logical, effortful, and slow. At other times you need unfocused (System 1/unconscious) attention, which is associative, non-logical, runs in the background, and is fast. Attempting to sustain focused attention is counterproductive.

New ideas are not spun from thin air. Creativity involves synthesizing, remixing, and re-envisioning what already exists.

Routines and habits are not by their nature creativity killers. They can actually increase your creative thinking by freeing up System 2 attention. The only real creativity killers are tunnel vision and inflexibility.

Constraints can be beneficial to creativity as long as you know they’re there.

If you want a brain that can think more complex thoughts and solve more complex problems, get in the habit of learning new things. And move!

Physical activity is cognitive candy. Exercise stimulates one of the brain’s most powerful growth factors, BDNF (brain-derived neurotrophic factor). According to Harvard psychiatrist John Ratey, “It keeps [existing] neurons young and healthy, and makes them more ready to connect with one another. It also encourages neurogenesis—the creation of new cells.” The cells most sensitive to this are in the hippocampus, inside the very regions deeply involved in human cognition. —John Medina, Brain Rules

As John Cleese says, Creativity is not a talent. It is a way of operating. In daily life, all over the world, we are faced with many problems, large and small. Why not operate on them creatively—and find some new ones to solve while we’re at it?

Grateful for My Brain: a 2014 Year-End Review

January 5, 2015 by Joycelyn Campbell 5 Comments

Doing a year-end review has always been one of those things that seem like a good idea but which I never quite get around to. This past year was unique in a number of ways, and so I decided—almost on the spur of the moment—that it would be prudent and productive to spend some time evaluating what happened.

I’m a huge fan of list-making, so instead of using any of the many different tools, processes, and resources available, I conducted my review in the form of making several lists. This turned out to be so helpful that I’ve already put it on my calendar to do again at the end of 2015.

Here are my list headings:

What I accomplished

This was by far the longest of my lists. Because I have a tendency to dismiss what I have done in order to berate myself for what has yet to be done, making this list helped me stop and smell the roses a bit. It gave me greater perspective on the multiple endeavors I’ve been engaged in. It also showed me the areas where my attention was focused—and the areas where it wasn’t.

What I didn’t anticipate

There’s no question that this was the most useful of my lists. The more than two dozen things I hadn’t anticipated—roughly half positive and half negative—not only had a significant effect on my life in general and what I was able to accomplish, they also provide concrete evidence that I can’t predict the future no matter how much my brain wants me to believe I can. We can—and should—plan ahead, but it’s important to remember that getting from here to there is rarely a straight line. Randomness and luck often play a larger role in both process and outcome than we’d like to acknowledge.

What worked

It was good to recognize what I’m doing right so I can keep doing more of that.

What didn’t/doesn’t work

It was also good to recognize mistakes I’ve made, opportunities I’ve missed, or areas that need major or minor tweaking.

What I’m grateful for

In addition to many other things—and people—I’m grateful for my amazing brain (yours is equally amazing, of course) and all the fantastic tricks it can do. Read to the end to see what my brain did with the material from my year-end review.

What I learned

One thing I learned is that I have a lot more to learn! But it was illuminating to see how much more I know now than I knew at the beginning of last year. It gives me hope and also some confidence in the face of the always uncertain future. Here’s actual evidence that I figured out how to do quite a few new things, so it’s likely I’ll be able to figure out how to do more things I don’t yet know how to do.

What I’m not satisfied with or what needs more attention

This list helped me focus on where to put my attention now. It was the last 2014 list, which made it relatively easy to complete and included a couple of surprises. I’m pretty sure it would have been more difficult to hone in on these things if I had started with this category, and I might not have seen things as clearly.

I created just two lists for 2015:

What I want to have happen this year

15 things that are sort of a hodgepodge of goals, intentions, and hopes. This list and the list of what I’m not satisfied with are the foundation of my short-range (3-6 months) planning process.

4 habits I want to keep; 4 habits I want to improve or change; 4 habits I want to start

Again, it was useful to identify what I’m doing that’s working before listing what I want to change (what isn’t working so well). I limited each category to 4 to keep it manageable. A limit of 3 might be even better.

I worked on these lists in bursts of time over several days, so the content was on my mind—and in my brain—throughout that period. As the brain tends to do, mine started looking for solutions for some of the bigger problems I’d identified. And not just during the day! One very long night, I was unable to fall asleep because I couldn’t stop trying to figure everything out logically (as illogical as I knew it was to be doing that in the middle of the night—or maybe ever).

Then, in one of those sudden moments of clarity I’ve come to know and love, the solution to one of the problems just showed up (thank you, System 1!), and as soon as it did, I realized that particular solution also took care of two other problems. I hadn’t even seen the three things as being connected. At that point, I immediately fell asleep, only to be awakened by the alarm clock an hour and a half later.

In the clear light of another day, and after a decent night’s sleep, the solution that appeared in the wee hours that morning seems both obvious and elegant. But had I not laid the groundwork for it by focusing my attention on all these areas of my life, I doubt I’d even have been able to identify the problems. And even if I had identified them, I’d probably be trying to find individual solutions for each of them—using the slow, logical part of my brain.

The moral of the story (which I should have tattooed somewhere on my body, sans parenthetical expressions and asides): Use System 2—the conscious part of your brain—to lay the groundwork, and then give System 1 an opportunity to do its thing (which includes seeing patterns, making connections, and putting the pieces together) to come up with a creative solution System 2 can only stand back, figuratively speaking, and admire.

Do You Ever Find Yourself Chewing Your Mental Cud?

October 5, 2014 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

ruminating woman

That’s my definition of rumination—chewing your mental cud. A more elegant definition, provided by Susan Nolen-Hoeksema of Yale University, is “a tendency to passively think about the meaning, origins, and consequences of our negative emotions.” Rumination isn’t the same as worrying. Worrying is usually focused on the future (an anticipated threat), while rumination tends to be focused on past or present events (some type of loss).

We ruminate over external situations and events and about relationships. We also ruminate over our own mistakes and shortcomings. That’s called self-rumination.

Rumination feels like problem-solving, but it actually prevents us from solving problems because it keeps us focused on negative events and emotions. We continue to dwell on our problems instead of attempting to resolve them. Rumination disrupts our self-regulation. Because we want to feel better, we try to distract ourselves or turn to immediate gratification. Rumination also increases stress levels and has a negative effect on our general health.

Rumination is a low level of thinking in which one thought leads to another but never to a solution or a conclusion. Rumination occupies mental space and System 2 (conscious) attention, which is already in short supply. So what can you do to stop yourself from ruminating?

Antidote #1: Practicing Mindfulness

Mindfulness means paying attention in a particular way; on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally. –Jon Kabat Zin

Mindfulness correlates negatively with rumination. That means practicing mindfulness is effective at decreasing the tendency to ruminate. Mindfulness helps people:

Observe themselves, events, and other people with curiosity and compassion
Shift their perspective
Become less attached to their thoughts, emotions, and sensations
See the patterns of their own mind more clearly
Recognize changes in their mood
Recognize the onset of ruminative thinking
Switch to a non-ruminative mode

Mindfulness can help you maintain a focused yet relaxed attention on the present moment. Observing your thoughts without judgment allows them to come and go. You don’t have to get carried away with them. The more you’re able to avoid getting attached to your thoughts, feelings, and sensations, the less likely you will be to develop a rumination habit. When you’re being mindful, it’s especially hard to slip into ruminating over past events.

Mindfulness correlates positively with self-reflection and self-awareness. While mindfulness is likely to decrease your susceptibility to rumination, it won’t affect or interfere with your ability to be self-reflective. In fact, it will enhance it.

You’ll be less likely to get drawn into ruminating if you remain open and curious about what’s going on around you and within you—and curious about your own actions and reactions.

Charles Tart (Waking Up) says:

The practice of self-observation…is the practice of being curious, along with a commitment to do your best to observe and learn whatever is there, regardless of your preferences or fears.

If you diligently practice self-observation, you will see much that is painful and much that is joyful, but seeing more of reality will turn out to be highly preferable to living a fantasy. You will begin creating “something” in yourself, a quality, a function, a skill, akin to learning how the controls of your automated airliner work. And you will be pleasantly surprised at how much more there is to life.

Antidote #2: Work on Solving the Problem

Problem-solving requires conscious attention. You can’t ruminate and problem-solve at the same time. If you focus your attention on addressing and dealing with the issue, you’re less likely to continue ruminating over it. Grab some paper and a pen and try this eight-step process.

Identify and clearly define the problem.
Ask yourself why you want to solve this problem.
Imagine it solved.
Gather information and/or brainstorm ideas.
Consider alternatives.
Decide on a plan and develop it.
Implement the plan.
Adjust as necessary.

Antidote #3: Write Your Way Out of Your Story

Negative feelings are the fuel for rumination. They can be so compelling they keep us caught up in the story we’ve spun long past the point we know we should let it go. This writing exercise can help you separate the facts from your feelings so you can disengage from the story.

You will need a pen or pencil and paper, a highlighter pen, and a timer.

Set your timer for at least 10 minutes.
Begin writing, describing what happened or what’s bothering you in in as much detail as possible. Keep your pen moving across the page. Don’t stop to think about what you’re writing. Just continue putting words on paper without editing or censoring. (Let it all hang out.)
When your timer goes off, stop writing. Reread what you wrote with the intention of identifying facts (as opposed to feelings, opinions, conjecture, etc.). Either highlight each fact, or list the facts on a separate page.
Reread only the facts. Take a few minutes to summarize in writing what you discovered or how you now think or feel. If there’s something you want or need to do about the situation, write a declarative sentence to that effect.

Antidote #4: Come Up with an Anti-Rumination Image

Rumination keeps you stuck traveling the same ground over and over again, your attention focused inward. It stops forward progress. There are many different metaphors or images you can probably think of for rumination (things that keep you stuck or block your progress or things that take up space, for example), such as:

A roadblock
Junk thinking
Mental clutter
Brain fog
A brick wall
A no exit sign
MindLESSness
Being under the influence

Find an image that works for you. The next time you find yourself ruminating, turn your attention to the image to remind yourself of how unproductive and destructive rumination is.

And if that doesn’t work, just STOP IT! (Thank you, Ana.)

U Is for Unconscious

July 31, 2014 by Joycelyn Campbell 3 Comments

Three things we don’t like, all beginning with u: uncertainty, unsolved problems, and urgency. Combine the three and we’re likely to encounter another u word: uncomfortable. Actually, uncomfortable is putting it mildly. Our discomfort with the triumvirate of uncertainty, unsolved problems, and urgency is so strong we will go to great, sometimes absurd, lengths to avoid experiencing or even acknowledging it.

That’s…unfortunate. For at least two reasons.

First, in our haste to return to the illusory state of certainty, we tend to do things like jump to conclusions, accept the first answer or explanation that comes to mind (consistent with our preexisting beliefs), make a mess by acting prematurely, or immobilize ourselves in endless rounds of rumination. Rumination feels like problem-solving but it’s the opposite.

Second, by refusing to let ourselves experience—and appreciate—the discomfort that accompanies uncertainty, unsolved problems, and urgency, we deny ourselves another experience: the pure joy of the aha! moment when a solution presents itself. It may take a while, but suddenly what was murky and inchoate becomes bright and clear. The path ahead becomes obvious. I say the solution “presents itself” because although we tend to take credit for coming up with the brilliant idea or flash of insight, the part of our brain we identify with had little to do with it. It’s the unconscious that figured it out and then clued us in.

One of the reasons waiting it out while the unconscious does its thing makes us squirm is that we have no control over the process. It isn’t going to occur by the force of our will or on our timetable. When we try to make it happen we usually just end up getting in our own way and muddling the process.

Something that’s helped me develop an appreciation for—if not a wholehearted embrace of—uncertainty and the other u states is recognizing the times when I’m unclear or don’t have enough information. No matter how desperately I might want to act, if I’m not sure which action to take, I wait until the next thing to do becomes apparent.

That still makes me uncomfortable, and certainly no one would describe me as a patient person. But I’ve had enough of these experiences that I’ve come to expect an answer or a solution to show up. A pattern will be seen. Dots will be connected. I’ve learned to trust the unconscious part of my brain in these situations even though I can’t observe what it’s doing.

I’m learning to give credit where credit is due. After all, the hamster with the rudder (the conscious part of my brain) would go nowhere at all without the hamster on the wheel (the unconscious part of my brain).

It isn’t easy, but rather than trying to get back to comfortable and certain as quickly as possible, we can develop a tolerance for the discomfort. We can even learn to appreciate the uncertainty, the knottiness of an unsolved problem, and the urgency of the situation. Whatever is on the other side of our current distress is unimaginable to us now, but it could be amazing—even awesome. Why take the chance of missing out on something awesome just to avoid feeling a little uncomfortable?