FOOD FOR THOUGHT

A creative moment does not have to mean the discovery of gravity or hearing an entire symphony in your head. There are everyday expressions of creativity: rearranging your office, adding a secret ingredient to your meatloaf, or saying just the right thing to please a client. Whenever you escape from the routine or conventional, you are being creative.

Creativity is also not something that comes in a blinding moment of insight. Most people who could be considered creative agree that inspiration is usually the result of hard work. A falling apple may have been a factor for Isaac Newton’s discovery of gravity, but as he put it, it happened because he was “thinking on it continuously”. Researchers have also found that when people are being creative, they aren’t necessarily driven by rewards of money or glory. They are endlessly curious, intrigued by the work itself, whether it’s playing with formulas or combining notes in intriguing new harmonies. For them, work becomes play.

Imagination can’t be stimulated if you’re content with the status quo. To be a creative thinker, you must continuously break the rules by challenging existing conditions, asking ridiculous questions and making preposterous suggestions. You must risk being laughed at and making mistakes. Yet, despite all the misses, you’ll also smash a few out of the park, and that satisfying feeling will never happen to those who are too afraid or too unmotivated to step up to the bat in the first place.

How can you challenge the status quo?

 

Janet Stewart-Lussier

Member of the Canadian Association of Professional Speakers