3 Keys to Tapping Into Your Inner Creativity
Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things.” Steve Jobs
For people prone to creative outbursts, the world can be a wildly glorious place. It’s colorful and exciting, lit with life in a way that those more prone to thoughtfulness and analytical considerations may have a hard time understanding.
Creatives can also be frustrating people.
They process the world differently, and this can making working alongside them sometimes harder to tolerate. There are different levels of creativity that people can express as well, and this works to makes each person act and react differently.
Some creatives are shy, quietly mulling each step inwardly until all the pent up energy releases in their art, be that writing, music, drawing/painting, building, and so on. These brooding creatives make us nervous. We don’t understand what they’re thinking because the thoughts all tangle tight inside, and so we watch them from afar, admire their work, and comment on their inability to hold a decent conversation.
Some of the greatest innovations of all time, the greatest works of art, have come from these brooding creatives.
Other creative types are much more engaged in the world around them. They live in it, fully and completely, abandoning themselves to the little moments. These people are usually quick-witted, funny, engaging, and can be the life of the party.
Or the center of attention.
All of us are creatives on some level. Created in the image of the Ultimate Creator, we have no choice but to give in to the creative impulses unique to each one of us.
Here are 3 Keys to Tapping into Your Inner Creativity.
1.) Learn how you individually are most creative.
Make no mistake, you are in some way a creative. Even mathematicians have a perspective that flows out of the creative nature of man’s soul. Perhaps there is more formula involved in the problem solving, but the fact remains they still had to tap into the inner mind to decipher the solution.
And you can’t tell me that the likes of Isaac Newton, Blaise Pascal, Albert Einstein (recognizing that he would probably be identified more as a physicist than a mathematician), and Galileo Galilei, who famously wrote, “Mathematics is the language in which God has written the universe,” were not all deeply creative and inventive men.
2.) Learn when you feel most creative.
Do you thrive in the quiet? Are you most thoughtful, productive and sure of yourself when you withdraw from a crowd and quiet your soul?
Perhaps it is quite the opposite. Maybe you’re the type who energizes only in a room full of people. Do you feel most alive in front of a crowd, and is laughter and raucous talk your muse?
Most deeply creative types are going to spend more time alone than in a group. There’s something about the quiet that recharges the brain. However, while some would happily spend all their time alone with only their thoughts to keep them company, there are many who need a group setting to further fuel their creative prowess. Extroverts, we would call them, as creativity comes in sound bites of conversation and entertainment.
3.) Embrace Your Creative Bent
There is power in knowing who you are and how you were created. Entertainers keep us laughing (and thinking) through their actions. Musicians feed our souls with melodies and lyrics. Artists show us the world on canvas. Writers take us into a different time and place, introducing us to new concepts, new characters, new ideas, and new ways of thinking.
Scientists take us inside the molecular space in which we reside. Mathematicians show us there is order to life and space. Inventors give us new tools. Designers help us see the space we live in in a whole new way. Businessmen (and women) link ideas and innovation in such a way that gives us structure in this world.
Parents foster a creative spirit inside the walls of their homes. Grandparents take that a step further, creating memories and filling their grandchildren with unmerited love (and perhaps a little bit of candy for good measure).
I could go on and on, but hopefully you get the point, with the point being this:
You are creative. It’s just a matter of looking in the right place to understand exactly how you were wired to tap into the creative energy with which you were designed.
Happy Wednesday, and Happy Creating!