Liz Strauss sparked a heated debate recently with her post 10 Reasons Creative Folks Drive Us Crazy, with some people (mistakenly) interpreting her as meaning that “creative folks” are somehow different in kind to the rest of us. I made a half-baked comment on one of her follow-ups, and she suggested I turn it into a blog post – so this is my attempt at the slightly-more-baked version, with thanks to Liz for the prompt.
It’s a question that comes up for me quite often in relation to my work, when people ask me why I focus on coaching creative professionals – after all, isn’t everyone creative? So aren’t I being restrictive by working with the “creatives”? To which I answer: Yes of course they are; and No I’m not. To explain why, let’s look at the concept of the “creative person”.
We can probably all recognise the classic image of the artist or creative person – a Romantic, wilful, sensitive, temperamental, tortured soul, a perpetual outsider with a mysterious and misunderstood talent. A bit like a cross between Lord Byron and Vincent Van Gogh.
The trouble is, it’s not true. However appealing the image might be to some artists and the makers of biopics, there are many creative people who don’t fit the stereotype. Even among the poets, some of the most obvious candidates for the mantle of the incurable Romantic, we find quite a few actively resisting the image. W.H. Auden called himself “an incurable Classic”, and his friend and fellow-poet Louis MacNeice wrote:
Why hold that poets are so sensitive?
A thickskinned grasping lot who filch and eavesdrop,
Who enjoy ourselves at other men’s expense,
Who, legislators or not, ourselves are lawless,
We do not need your indulgence, much less your pity,
With fewer qualms, we have rather more common sense
Than your Common Man (‘To the Public’)
Philip Larkin produced perhaps the most memorable anti-Romantic poetic manifesto, by saying “deprivation is to me what daffodils were to Wordsworth”. Yet if some artists resist the stereotype, there are still plenty of people, particularly in the Creative Industries, who are keen to perpetuate the idea that there is something special about the “creative personality” that sets it apart from other mortals, and makes creatives either social misfits or mysterious geniuses – or both.
This attitude gets short shrift from Robert Weisberg in his book Creativity: Beyond the Myth of Genius, where he debunks the idea of the creative genius by arguing that attempts to define the creative personality have met with failure. Similarly, in Creativity – Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention, Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi admits that he started out as a creativity researcher by trying to identify the common personality traits of creative individuals – but later abandoned the attempt, concluding that there is no fixed ‘creative type’. The closest he could get was “complexity”, as described in Liz’s post, meaning that creative people often combine very different and seemingly incompatible traits. (E.g. a friend once told me she didn’t understand how I could both like football “and write such sensitive poems” – to which I answered, of course, that it’s because I like football that I can write such sensitive poems.)
One area of psychological research on creativity that has produced some positive results is motivation. Theresa Amabile’s research has shown that there is a strong correlation between creative performance and “intrinsic motivation” – i.e. when someone is working on a creative task for its own intrinsic interest they are likely to demonstrate more creativity than if they are pursuing the task in order to achieve an extrinsic reward, like money, fame or promotion. She quotes the American poet Anne Sexton:
Anne Sexton told her agent that, although she would love to make a great deal of money from her books, she knew that she had to forget all about that while actually writing her poems
Weisberg and Csikszentmihalyi similarly emphasise the importance of motivation or determination in creative performance. A key element of Csikszentmihalyi’s concept of creative flow is that this kind of peak performance is “autotelic”, meaning it is enjoyable for its own sake. So one way of defining the ‘creative person’ is simply someone who enjoys creativity and therefore does a lot of it.
So if the special “creative person” is a myth, why do I focus on working with creatives? Having worked with professional artists and creatives for over 10 years, as well as with many other types of client, I would say there are basically three differences between them and many other people.
1. They think of themselves as “creative”. I’ve come across many people who are perfectly capable of coming up with original ideas – but who keep blocking themselves by saying “I’m not creative”. Even when it is pointed out to them that they have done creative things, they resist the label, and clearly feel uncomfortable with it. The “creatives” on the other hand, are quite happy to think of themselves as creative, and don’t create this kind of internal obstacle to their natural creativity.
2. They love doing creative work. Because they enjoy creative work more than most people, they spend more time doing it. Which means they get better at it. Which means they enjoy it more. Which means they do more of it… and so on. This is not to say they don’t enjoy money, status, recognition or other rewards, but these are not as important to them as the pleasure of creativity itself.
3. They put themselves in an environment where creativity is encouraged. I once ran a seminar and set a group of managers the task of finding the “second right answer” to a question (based on Roger von Oech’s excellent creativity book A Whack on the Side of the Head). A couple of minutes into the activity, I noticed they were looking very uncomfortable. When I asked them what was wrong, they said it felt very unsafe, as they were constantly told by senior management that mistakes were unacceptable and they had to get things “right”. No wonder their creativity was inhibited! Creative types on the other hand, gravitate to situations where creativity is not only encouraged but expected of them – art schools, ad agencies, design studios, artists’ quarters, writer’s colonies, film sets and ‘clusters’ of creative businesses. By surrounding themselves with others engaged in creative work, they immerse themselves in the latest ideas and developments in their field – and some of that creativity rubs off.
These three factors help them develop their raw creative talent into accomplished skills. This is not to deny that some of us are naturally “gifted” with more talent than others, but this is a matter of degree rather than kind – and talent is nothing unless you put it to work.
How you can be a more creative person
So what are the implications for someone who wants to be more creative, either as a professional or keen amateur? It boils down to doing these three things:
1. Assume you are creative. Don’t worry about labelling yourself a creative or uncreative person. Just assume that creativity is humanly possible, and you are a human, therefore it’s possible for you.
2. Follow your heart. Your passion for creativity is your guide to developing your talent. When your curiosity is aroused, when you feel yourself becoming absorbed, fascinated and excited by a creative task – that’s your talent telling you you’re getting warm – it’s saying “Do more of this”. Creativity can be hard work, and it requires dedication and commitment to keep going, but if you apply yourself and follow your heart, sooner or later you will taste creative flow, at the point where your motivation, talent and experience blend together.
3. Hang around with creative people. Get involved. Go to work in somewhere creativity is encouraged; go to readings, galleries and concerts; attend classes and stay behind for a drink and a chat with the other students; read books; read magazines and offer to write for them; hook into online communities via blogs, mailing lists and and discussion boards. Whatever your chosen medium, soak it up by hanging out with the people who are doing it. Get familiar with the whole of your chosen field, its history as well as its present – that way you have a chance of contributing to its future.
So back to the original questions – I hope I’ve shown that I’m not putting labels or restrictions on people. Anyone can be creative, provided they do these three things.
And why do I work with creative professionals? Partly it’s a matter of personal taste – I’m a writer myself and love working with people with a similar passion for creativity. If you’re going to spend a lot of time coaching others to do something, I think you should have experience of it yourself.
The other reason is that the “creatives” don’t put any limits on their creativity, which makes them very exciting to work with. They are not essentially any different from other people, but they are doing the three things listed above, consistently – which means they are enjoying their work more and producing better and better creative results, working towards the possibility of creating something extraordinary.
And if you want to, so can you.
Liz Strauss says
Hi Mark,
Thank you for thinking my writing was worth sharing. I so enjoyed this post and what I’ve been reading on your blog since you stopped by to see me.
It seems that the word “creative” has too many “others” attached to it. Our parents either do or don’t want us to be it. Our coworkers and managers both value and fear it. Too many creative ideas can unbalance the power in a group. Group think doesn’t threaten folks the way a new idea does. Folks who think themselves “not an idea person” find creativity mysterious and threatening.
The joy of being truly in “flow” is something “hardworking” individuals can see as “taking the easy road” rather than finding an optimal match of skills to challenges that they too might enjoy.
That’s the main reason I think that creativity flourishes when people who are creative can be with others who are. In some situations, I’ve felt it necessary to close the door when I’ve needed to access my creativity, because others perceived it as “speaking in tongues.” 🙂
The joy of creativity is something to celebrate and something that my work with children tells me everyone can access. What fun that you spend your days helping other do just that. Can I come?
amber simmons says
Hi Mark,
Thanks for the interesting post. It got me thinking about the differences between being imaginative and creative, or being a person of ideas with no real pragmatisim as opposed to someone who can give birth to unique and interesting projects.
For me, the most important aspect of being genuinely creative is not letting my pragmatism edit my imagination prematurely. While culling back is extremely important in the creative process, we still need the time and the space for expansion first.
Quentin says
I know Romanticism has a bit of a bad press these days, but I think Romantics can be creative, too. Of course, you don’t say they can’t, but you seem to, here:
“We can probably all recognise the classic image of the artist or creative person… The trouble is, it’s not true.”
Check out the Romantics’ response to Enlightenment literal-thinking and materialism, and you’ll find we owe them a great debt.
Mark McGuinness says
Thanks for the comments guys.
Liz – you’re right, we need to be careful who we hang around with and listen to – sometimes we get useful feedback, sometimes it’s time to close the door. Yes, spending my time with creative people is tremendous fun – and you’re welcome anytime!
Amber – I agree it’s very importance to get the right balance – or sequence – between pragmatism and imagination. Too far one way, you get lost in daydreams, too far the other and you’re trapped in the mundane. I’ll be writing more about that soon.
Quentin – well I should come clean and confess that the Romantics are some of my favourite poets, especially Coleridge and Wordsworth. I don’t think Romanticism as practised by C + W is an obstacle to creativity – quite the reverse. I just think the Romantic image of the artist has become a stereotype, and can lead to limited creative horizons as well as self-indulgence. As you point out, the Romantics were compensating for the dullness of the Enlightenment; I’m trying to compensate for a little Romantic excess.
It’s interesting that all three of you have brought up the issue of balance – between skills and challenges, imagination and pragmatism and Romanticism and Realism. Maybe there’s another post in that…
News-Mind-Graph – thanks for the link, much appreciated.
Quentin says
“I’m trying to compensate for a little Romantic excess.”
Perhaps my response was an example of such excess. If not, my blog post certainly is.
I have provided a link to it as, for some reason, the backtracking (or whatever it’s called) doesn’t seem to be working.
Mark McGuinness says
Thanks Quentin, an elegant riposte in your inimitable style.
K Amber says
How to make a Creative Person
Be spontaneous, be flexible be happy
How to get this traits easily in our lives
Keep polishing your Right BRAIN. Once your RIGHT brain is empower, you are in a confident calm mode to do things differently and thats where your creativity will come it
Remember you need to transform form your roots to hardwire your habits and make them stick with you for the rest of your life
Don Droga says
If you need to try then you are not creative… it is an innate ability.
Mark McGuinness says
Thanks Amber, I agree you need the ‘right brain’ (lateral thinking, out of the box etc) for creativity but would also argue you need to balance it with ‘left brain’ qualities (rules, logic, order etc).
Marta says
In my experience, the most important thing to be creative is to “have a well-furnished mind”, in the words of David Ogilvy.
Interesting subject, though.
Don Droga says
Old
Mark McGuinness says
Marta – so true. And I always think a room looks unfurnished without bookshelves. 🙂
Nick says
Hi Mark,
I love your article,
Nick.
Elli says
Excellent, articulate post! I would add that one does not have to be in a traditional “creative” job to use creativity. I have observed builders working around both their customer’s designs and a lack of level or square corners to produce beautiful work. Engineers get a bum rap for being too left-brained and yet, some of them create technology that simply upends how we know ourselves. Much like the Romantic poets challenged what was known in their time.
I’m not saying that creativity must be used only to radically change the world. Creativity is manifested by the work of the artist, whether the artist is a poet, copywriter, or engineer. It is important to look beyond our preconceptions of who is a creative person.
Mark McGuinness says
Thanks Elli, yes I agree that creativity is more about what you do than what your job title says.
Andrey CHE says
I think, that it is not bad enough.
Orly says
well, all of the above post were TRUE, but to see on other,s thought/ thinking might also be consider as to settle and arrive at what exactly a definitive and universal concept that would describe a person creative thinking and consider him Creative Person. the Degree/ Level of thingking, thoughts.
Mark McGuinness says
@ Andrey – I’ll try to do worse next time. 😉
@ Orly – Are you suggesting creative thinking is necessary for a definitive concept of a creative person? I’m not sure about that. For me, the best definition of a creative person is ‘a person who creates something’. They can have all kinds of characteristics.
KATSIGAZI RICHARD says
Thinking and putting your thoughts in practice is also creativity but it should be done quickly, but otherwise I thank you for teaching us and most people have learn t from you especially me as a student plus fellow UGANDANS mostly KABUYANDANS.
Ruth says
My doctor told that Iam creative, so I decided to google what it means. but according to what I have read, it does in some ways applies to me. Thanks for the article
Don Droga says
There’s a big difference between being a ‘creative’ and a relevant creative. It’s not simply about having ideas or being whacky (stupid). Good creatives are able to tap into something much deeper and have a relevance to their work that captures the attention and imagination of their audiences. I don’t believe anyone can be creative in that way. I can’t stand those folks who say ideas can come from anywhere ~ it is true but it’s just plain stupid. The contemporary relevance to an idea and ability to successfully target them is the gift.
Don Droga says
There are special creative people. Not a myth. The study is flawed because they cant measure the x factor in a person.
Eugene van den Berg says
Love the article. I think the majority of people live in the confines of human laws as if it is natural laws. ‘What goes up’ should not necessarily come down; if you hold a creative perspective why only break the laws implemented by humans 🙂