Last week I enrolled for a Creative Thinking: Techniques and Tools for Success by Peter Childs, a reminder from the course via an email pushed me to sit on it and work on Week 1 out of Week 7 of the course. One might question my disciplined behaviour. To such questions I mostly disagree as the course helps me to understand & explore my innate abilities.
I shall use some thoughts from the course to share my experience of creativity. The first discussion prompt was, what is creativity to you? For me, Creativity that Adds Value Unconditionally. For example, scientists & medical fraternity across the globe are racing against time to help and save humans from the coronavirus. This resonates with one of the definitions of creativity - “Creativity is imagination with responsibility” (Sae Ra Kung, 2009). In one of my conversations with Dr. Nivedita Agarwal a Professor from FAU Germany on differentiation of creativity and innovation. She says, “Innovation must be commercial viable otherwise it can be creative work”. Link to our conversation in understanding, What isn’t innovation?
Peter Childs says that creativity exists on two levels: big C versus little c. Something like Dr. Nivedita’s examples in the conversation. Let’s explore two C’s : The small “c” is something I make my needs better. For example, in a pandemic I have to manage household activities that include buying groceries, cleaning and cooking. These activities will influence personal satisfaction. With iteration I have mastered to prepare breakfast and lunch together in less time than in the pre-pandemic era. Another “C”, the big one that would have milestones to make impact scientific, aesthetic or social values. I could relate this two examples, first to self development training activities imparted to over 50K students and a book, She: Ekla Cholo Re that touched hearts of readers to reflect on the gender stereotyping. How does one make either or both Cs work? I like the suggestion mentioned by Peter Childs - to create a low stress environment. I am completely in sync with his thoughts. I am often gifted with this environment, when do I get ideas? In other words the course gives us an interesting question to discuss - When are you creative? The question led me to list the place or time of the day that influenced my creativity. I made a gig to present factors that influence me:
Peter Childs' course says such examples mentioned in the video are B’s of creativity. I have praised myself and the course, now I would like to praise your experience of creativity. Why don’t you share them?