From there, the sky’s the limit.Īt A Little Bird, we know first-hand how critical a safe space is in extracting the best ideas. It’s imperative to create a safe and open environment while introducing and incorporating various strategies and conditions that will foster the collective creative. This is especially relevant in the workplace where office politics, competitiveness, and fear of failure are often front and center. Land, based on his studies and the brain scans he has dissected, fostering creativity comes down to the need for us to judge less and seek to understand more.
FWSIM MODS & ADDONS PROFESSIONAL
But in a professional environment, if you need specific strategies to break barriers and tap into your team’s creative potential.Īccording to Dr. Individually, sparking the creative mind may be as simple as changing a daily routine, environment, getting outside more, learning a new skill, meditating, or working out. We all need to reconnect with our inner Peter Pan and simply believe we can fly.ĭemystifying the creative process “Creative entitlement simply means believing that you are allowed to be here, and that – merely by being here – you are allowed to have a voice and a vision of your own.” – Elizabeth GilbertĪs Steve Jobs famously said, “creativity is just connecting things.” Sounds simple, but just as most of us have disconnected from our creative selves at an early age, we can’t expect to reconnect without consciously thinking differently. So, can we get it back? How? In many ways, it’s simple. In the end, the study shows us that we all have the ability to be creative, or at least, we had it. While many factors were considered, the conclusion was that a heavily-standardized educational system coupled with social norms have stifled the creative genius in all of us. The study showed that, between the ages of 5 and 10 years old, the participant’s creativity decreased by a whopping 68%, then plummeted to a 96% decrease by adulthood. The results concluded that, as we age, we learn non-creative behavior.Īside from being a massive bummer, the results were a wake-up call. And while the intention was to unlock the source of the kids’ creativity, the study found something unexpected. They then re-tested the participants at 10 and 15 years of age. It was even used by NASA to select the most innovative scientists and engineers based on their “creative potential.”Īs an experiment, the researchers tried the test on children – 1,600 of them – ranging in ages from three-to-five years old. George Land developed a wildly-successful creativity test that was used to determine the source of creativity. Years ago, creativity researcher and general systems scientist Dr. It’s because we teach ourselves to reject our ability to be such. It turns out that when we feel less-than-creative, it’s not because we inherently lack the quality. Creativity can be as much about crafting something beautiful as it is about designing something useful. It’s about solving problems and finding better ways to communicate with others. As humans, we create art, but we also create systems, processes, concepts, relationships, and ideas.īy definition, creativity is “the ability to make new things or think of new ideas.” It is the tendency to recognize alternatives and uncover new possibilities. It’s not only about being able to draw, write poetry, or make music. Creativity is not just about producing art. Why creativity is not what you think “The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease forever to be able to do it.” – J.M.
Creativity can be found in every corner of the human experience and needs to be nurtured, encouraged, and utilized – especially in the workplace. The concept is not owned by a certain type of media. The ability and desire to be creative is a human characteristic, not an individual one. We live in a world that tends to imply that if you’re not excelling in the art room, you need to resign yourself to the fact that “creative” is not a word you identify with.īut the truth is, creativity is not an elusive talent that is unique to a few. By the time we reach our teens, our experiences and interactions have likely altered our idea of what it means to be creative. For most, that question would result in a self-reflective pause. But, if we were to ask our teenage selves the same question, the reaction would likely be different. If we were to ask our kindergarten selves if we were creative, most of us would without a doubt answer yes. “ If you’re alive, you’re a creative person.” – Elizabeth Gilbert, Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear