A quote from Loori's the Zen of Creativity:
My life has been the poem I would have writ,
But I could not both live and utter it.
Henry David Thoreau
“Every child is an artist; the problem is staying an artist when you grow up”
-Pablo Picasso
Greetings all and happy new year.
It’s been awhile, but now the big project that has consumed me for a couple of months is past, the holidays are over and time to consider Creativity in the New Year.
How many times have you heard, or maybe said yourself…”I’ve not creative bone in my body”?
We are all part of this amazing universe which is by its/our nature Creative, evolving, forming, changing constantly. People tend to think of creativity as belonging only to artists, visual, performing, writers, poets. There are as many ways to express our creativity as there are individuals to express creativity.
Scientific American Mind published a magazine called The Mad Science of Creativity (spring 2017). Worth reading if you have an interest in all sorts of topics concerning our creative minds. It turns out our early ancestors figured out how to knap a handheld, multipurpose ax several million years ago (an enormously creative invention considering they had nothing to build on). Although they made the same ax for about 1.6 million years with only minor changes! But eventually ‘cultural ratcheting’ began as our brains grew.
Cultural ratcheting is the phenomenon where our species passes knowledge on from individual to individual, from generation to generation. The social networks that H. Sapiens formed helped with this and eventually someone in the network figures out a better way to accomplish tool making, art making, hunting, cooking, whatever.
It’s now understood that long before Homo Sapiens evolved (200,000 years ago) the human brain was changing / growing to allow creativity to flourish. Previously it was assumed that new ideas for technology and art began about 40,000 years ago. But with subtler testing and more far reaching exploration archaeologists are discovering a remarkable array of inventions that previously have gone unobserved. (“The hunter/gatherers who inhabited Blombos Cave [in Africa] between 100,000 and 72,000 years ago, for example, engraved patterns on chunks of ocher; fashioned bone awls, perhaps for tailoring hide clothing; adorned themselves with strands of shimmering shell beads; and created an artists’ studio where they ground red ocher and stored it in the earliest known containers, made from abalone shells.” From the 'Origins of Creativity', Heather Pringle.)
Anyway, the point of this is that we are a creative species and have been for millennia. It is part of our biology. Our brains are adapted to bringing plans to fruition and organizing sensory input which are necessary skills in creativity. Of course, there are the prodigies, Mozart writing his first piece at 5 - Minuet and Trio in G major. But certainly, most of us aren’t born prodigies. But we are all capable creative beings.
Motivation plays a huge part in our creative efforts. Without that… well… who cares?
Any ideas about creativity, how it expresses uniquely in your life. How you encourage it (motivation). Do you have a supportive creative network where ideas are shared and explored? For example I'm in a writer's group. We take turns reading each others work and comment/suggest/support one another. I've learned so much from this group over the years. Plus it motivates me to keep writing.
Any thoughts? What does creativity mean in your life?
This is a juicy topic, and we’d love to have your input.
Gassho
Anne
~st~
My life has been the poem I would have writ,
But I could not both live and utter it.
Henry David Thoreau
“Every child is an artist; the problem is staying an artist when you grow up”
-Pablo Picasso
Greetings all and happy new year.
It’s been awhile, but now the big project that has consumed me for a couple of months is past, the holidays are over and time to consider Creativity in the New Year.
How many times have you heard, or maybe said yourself…”I’ve not creative bone in my body”?
We are all part of this amazing universe which is by its/our nature Creative, evolving, forming, changing constantly. People tend to think of creativity as belonging only to artists, visual, performing, writers, poets. There are as many ways to express our creativity as there are individuals to express creativity.
Scientific American Mind published a magazine called The Mad Science of Creativity (spring 2017). Worth reading if you have an interest in all sorts of topics concerning our creative minds. It turns out our early ancestors figured out how to knap a handheld, multipurpose ax several million years ago (an enormously creative invention considering they had nothing to build on). Although they made the same ax for about 1.6 million years with only minor changes! But eventually ‘cultural ratcheting’ began as our brains grew.
Cultural ratcheting is the phenomenon where our species passes knowledge on from individual to individual, from generation to generation. The social networks that H. Sapiens formed helped with this and eventually someone in the network figures out a better way to accomplish tool making, art making, hunting, cooking, whatever.
It’s now understood that long before Homo Sapiens evolved (200,000 years ago) the human brain was changing / growing to allow creativity to flourish. Previously it was assumed that new ideas for technology and art began about 40,000 years ago. But with subtler testing and more far reaching exploration archaeologists are discovering a remarkable array of inventions that previously have gone unobserved. (“The hunter/gatherers who inhabited Blombos Cave [in Africa] between 100,000 and 72,000 years ago, for example, engraved patterns on chunks of ocher; fashioned bone awls, perhaps for tailoring hide clothing; adorned themselves with strands of shimmering shell beads; and created an artists’ studio where they ground red ocher and stored it in the earliest known containers, made from abalone shells.” From the 'Origins of Creativity', Heather Pringle.)
Anyway, the point of this is that we are a creative species and have been for millennia. It is part of our biology. Our brains are adapted to bringing plans to fruition and organizing sensory input which are necessary skills in creativity. Of course, there are the prodigies, Mozart writing his first piece at 5 - Minuet and Trio in G major. But certainly, most of us aren’t born prodigies. But we are all capable creative beings.
Motivation plays a huge part in our creative efforts. Without that… well… who cares?
Any ideas about creativity, how it expresses uniquely in your life. How you encourage it (motivation). Do you have a supportive creative network where ideas are shared and explored? For example I'm in a writer's group. We take turns reading each others work and comment/suggest/support one another. I've learned so much from this group over the years. Plus it motivates me to keep writing.
Any thoughts? What does creativity mean in your life?
This is a juicy topic, and we’d love to have your input.
Gassho
Anne
~st~
) Part of my parents' concern was just how difficult it is to make it financially in the arts, and then, as you're saying, being a woman doesn't help that. And then, as my husband and I slowly bettered our financial situation and moved into apartments with extra space, my husband always got the extra room. And I want to be clear that he never demanded it. (I married the kindest, gentlest being. He would never have demanded it.) But I always thought that he needed the extra space more than I did. I could work in the corner. And that's where Woolf's essay gets me. Why did I ever think that? 
Comment