Creativity at WomanTalkLive
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The Spark Factory: Creative Confidence – A Definition
Thursday, May 17, 2012
Susan BishopWhat causes one person to create with abandon and the other person to hold back their creative self? In a word: Confidence.
Specifically, CREATIVE CONFIDENCE.
Creative confidence is a term that’s been used a lot in recent discussions about innovation, design, raising creative kids, the difference between the two people scenario I just described and more. It’s especially used frequently in presentations by IDEO founder, David Kelley – a thought leader in the discussion around creativity.
Over the next few weeks, we’re going to launch into a deeper exploration of creative confidence – what it means, how to get it, how to keep it and how to pass it on.
Starting with an excellent article from the Children’s Creativity Museum, “Defining Creative Confidence,” which not only defines the term in a way that literally made me tear up (imparting the belief that “all of the ideas you create have value,” just could not be a better expression of what drives me – why I love writing Spark Factory articles and what my blog Idea Tango is all about. Communicating this TRUTH to all people – and especially to the next generation is, for me, a personal mission and life’s work.
And, not only does the Museum’s article define the term, but the author also illuminates the process this organization went through in getting to that definition and shares how it’s impacted their customer experience.
I found “Defining Creative Confidence” beyond fascinating and I want to share it with you as a way to start our discussion – I hope you enjoy!
Read “Defining Creative Confidence” by Ben Growsman-Kahn of the Children’s Creativity Museum
To the value of ALL ideas,
Susan B.
Unlocked Box – coaching for risk-takers, box-breakers and wannabe’s.
Sign up for the eZine Guts at UnlockedBox.com and get the 10 Un-Rules of Creativity.
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The Spark Factory: Creative Un-Stucking – The Best Un-Stucking Advice Out There
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Susan BishopWell, this is it. The final article in the creative un-stucking series: TIPS FROM EVERYWHERE!
Thanks to all of you who read and commented on the getting unstuck series – sharing ideas around creativity is something I love to do and it’s been a real pleasure to read your feedback and thoughts.
To find out what others have to say about creative unstucking, just follow the link below:
Find out what others have to say
about unstucking our creative selves
Again, thank you for participating – opening the conversation around creativity, I think, is one of the greatest gifts we can give the creator in each of us.
To you,
Susan B.
Unlocked Box – coaching for risk-takers, box-breakers and wannabe’s.
Sign up for the eZine Guts at UnlockedBox.com and get the 10 Un-Rules of Creativity.
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The Spark Factory: Creative Un-Stucking – Just Do It (even if it’s a cliché)
Thursday, May 3, 2012
Susan BishopThis is the second to last article in the un-stucking series, which means it’s time to talk about the most important un-stucking method of all:
Moving Forward Anyway
By the way, it’s the second to last and not the final article because I have a special request of you for the final un-stucking article in the series. So, be sure to read through the end today to see if you’d like to throw your hat into the ring next week. Now, back to the topic at hand:
Moving Forward Anyway is the most important un-stucking method not because it’s the best tool for expanding or enhancing creativity, but because it’s one of the most valuable tools for just plain getting on with it. Meaning that Moving Forward Anyway is about taking a monumental step toward being able to confidently claim, “I AM CREATIVE.”
At a certain point in many creative processes, there is a deadline – either one you set yourself for any number of reasons, or one imposed upon you. Your deadline may be as non-urgent as “I want to finish this project, because I want to finish this project,” or as truly urgent as, “My boss needs to see my ideas by 10am tomorrow.”
If you’re not stuck, your only problem may be that you’re so in the flow that you don’t want stop. But if you do feel stuck, well, that’s where Moving Forward Anyway comes in. Even if there is no deadline, for the reason stated above, Moving Forward Anyway is simply an invaluable action step toward learning how creative you really are.
Two years ago, I bought a townhome. About two weeks BEFORE I bought the townhome, I bought three nice chrome frames from Ikea. I also bought three nice mats and several sheets of REALLY nice watercolor paper. The following describes what I wanted to do with the frames, mats and watercolor paper:
I want to create some original artwork to go above my blue sofa in the living room.
I want the artwork to pick up the colors of my downstairs – blue and orange.
I want the three paintings to be based on an interesting single concept.
Now, what that concept was going to be, I had no idea. And over the two years that I’ve lived in the townhome, I’ve played around with a bunch of ideas. I love creating word paintings and I thought about doing a concept about my husband’s habit of saying “the word of the day is ____” whenever I use a word that has more than two syllables. In fact, I even went so far as to write a poem called, The Word of the Day is Tenuous.
I really like the poem – and I have no artwork based on that concept.
I also thought about buying a fourth frame and doing one painting that represents each person in my family – my husband, myself and my two stepdaughters.
I also do not have any artwork based on that concept.
So, about three weeks ago, my youngest stepdaughter announced that she would like to work on a couple of creative projects for her room over Spring break.
I thought, GREAT! This is my chance to finish those #$%&!#*% paintings!
We made a plan to go to Michaels to get ideas, and while my stepdaughter proceeded to figure out what she was going to create, I felt even STUCK-ER. I was totally uninspired to watercolor.
But what did inspire me was the idea of spending quiet creative time with my stepdaughter.
I remembered a song my husband shared about how taking your kid fishing has nothing to do with fishing, and I realized that what was important to me for this particular creative project was Moving Forward Anyway – moving forward so that I would not blow this precious opportunity to create side by side with someone I love.
So, in this case, Moving Forward Anyway meant just choosing something – anything – and just doing it. I based choice on my goal of spending time with stepdaughters which meant I just need to mix the colors I wanted and paint something I could paint while focusing on her.
We spent two days painting together. She created three watercolor paintings, including a card for her boyfriend and I finished my three pieces for the frames.
I really hated my paintings – AT FIRST. After all, there was no big idea behind them like I originally wanted. But now, I absolutely love them – except the one on the left – I still hate that one, but it’s my husband’s favorite. And that is a good enough reason to keep it up on the wall. Because – does it really matter? Was that really the point? I had set my deadline (2 days with my stepdaughter), and I chose to make what I created in that time okay.
Un-stucking myself by Moving Forward Anyway on this one project did what Moving Forward Anyway tends to do. It made me feel creative. It made me feel proud. It un-stuck me in general. I received a renewed creative spark for a lot of other projects that had been on my mind.
So, whereas this one painting series is not what I wanted to create, Moving Forward Anyway got me more in return than what having a better idea or more inspiration could have possibly given me. It always works that way. If you let it.
Never underestimate the value of just deciding to do SOMETHING. Pick your idea out of a hat if you have to, and just follow through and see what transpires. What you actually create is likely the least of what you’ll get.
Like me, you may walk away with a deeper appreciation of how creative you really are – and you may find yourself in flow in another place in your life.
Even more, you’ll strengthen the deeper “I AM Creative” KNOWING that lives in each of us. The knowing that knows the I’m NOT Creative belief is a lie.
Moving Forward Anyway is not a cop out. It’s a legitimate response to a stuck scenario that enables you to create even though you are stuck. Letting go of the outcome and just being in the creative experience is only one of the gifts.
What I love so much about those paintings was the process of creating an intimate moment, not a painting. That’s what I think about when I look at them – and that turned out to be the big idea.
To choosing the act of creation over the creation itself,
Susan B.
To see the 3 paintings, visit Idea Tango and scroll to the end of the article.
THE BIG REQUEST: I’ve shared a few of my favorite ways to get un-stuck creatively – and they only scratch the surface. The final article in the series needs to be from all of you! Please share your favorite un-stucking method in an email to susan@unlockedbox.com. There will be a link to everyone’s tips in next week’s Spark Factory. Thank you in advance for “just doing it”.
Unlocked Box – coaching for risk-takers, box-breakers and wannabe’s.
Sign up for the eZine Guts at UnlockedBox.com and get the 10 Un-Rules of Creativity.
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The Spark Factory: How Creativity Works – A New Book to Take Us Yet Another Step Away from the Idea that Creativity is Only for Some of Us
Thursday, April 26, 2012Susan Bishop
Last week, we talked about the skill of making new connections as a way to get un-stuck creatively.
This week, I want to share a New York Times article about a new book by Jonah Lehrer that reportedly offers example after example of this skill in practice. Not to mention, a more in-depth discussion about making new connections via other people specifically; creativity within communities; and also a vision for facilitating a more creative world.
The book is called, Imagine: How Creativity Works. I ordered a copy especially in light of what we’ve been discussing recently about why traditional brainstorming doesn’t work and what does – a real hot button of mine!
Just click on the links to go either to the New York Times article or to the Amazon write-up:
Read the New York Times Article: “How to Cultivate Eureka Moments”
Check out the book: Imagine: How Creativity Works
To un-doing the b.s. around the natural act of creating,
Susan B.
Unlocked Box – coaching for risk-takers, box-breakers and wannabe’s.
Sign up for the eZine Guts at UnlockedBox.com and get the 10 Un-Rules of Creativity.
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The Spark Factory: Creative Un-Stucking – Making New Connections
Thursday, April 19, 2012Susan Bishop
So far in the discussion about how to move forward when stuck creatively, we’ve covered two methods: shifting perspectives and finding inspiration. If you have a lot of experience being conscious of your own creativity – the how you do it part of the puzzle – you may have noted that these two methods are not only useful when you’re stuck, but are also great general creativity sparkers in that they help a bunch with idea generation, whether you’re stuck or already in the flow.
This week, we’re going to cover another way to get out of stuck that’s also one of the best idea generators I know. I would go so far as to say that the vast majority of really great creative ideas come from this one method alone: Making New Connections.
Interestingly, both the skill of shifting perspectives and the various methods for finding inspiration work so well, in part, because they help us make new connections. They open the mind to new ways of thinking, or just open the mind period. That said, making new connections is a skill all on its own. Which means it can be learned and practiced. And, of course, the more you practice making new connections, the easier it becomes.
At first glance, the concept of making new connections may seem fairly self-explanatory. You take what you are working on and put it up against ideas or “things” from elsewhere – weird ideas, incongruous ideas, ideas from other mediums, ideas from other fields, and ideas from other people. But when creative people (meaning everyone) use the skill of making new connections, it often does not look like the work of putting ideas up against other ideas.
Instead of work, it looks like magic.
As a result, being around someone who is good at making new connections (if you are unpracticed at it and doubt your own inherent creativity to begin with) can have a really negative impact. It can make you believe, even more deeply, that you really do belong in the “I’m NOT Creative” box, when you absolutely DO NOT belong in that box. Ever.
Like everything else, making new connections, easy as it may sound, means committing to using techniques that will help you make those new connections. In other words, it means committing to playing around with the skill. Even if you already feel wildly creative, practicing even more with making new connections can blow the lid off whatever plateau you happen to be on at the moment – no matter how high up on the creativity scale that plateau is or how prolific you currently are.
Going back to where we started, if the plateau you’re on is a stuck point, making new connections may be one of the fastest ways out.
This week’s Idea Tango is all about the how-to of making new connections. Per usual, just click on the link and scroll down through the article until you get to the part in blue.
To wild, weird, whacky and wondrous connections,
Susan B.
Unlocked Box – coaching for risk-takers, box-breakers and wannabe’s.
Sign up for the eZine Guts at UnlockedBox.com and get the 10 Un-Rules of Creativity.