CREATIVITY CAN BE TAUGHT

HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR CREATIVITY -PART 1: ATTITUDE

              

Do you remember in your childhood, there were kids who found it easy to turn a fence into a wire car of any shape and size; they always seemed to find a way out of their challenges. Some of your childhood friends turned out to be great artists, very creative lads.
When we think of creative minds, we think of Thomas Edison, Napoleon Bonaparte, Albert Einstein, Benjamin Franklin, Henry ford, Picasso, creatives at advertizing agencies and so on. It is true that some people like the ones we have mentioned were well endowed with a high IQ and imagination. You may think that you can’t achieve as much these people did, but you will be surprised that there is little or no difference between you and these people, let us look at some of these similarities

1. The number of cells in every brain is the same.
2. On average we all get exposed to the same amount of information.
3. Our bodies all work the same way at the time of birth( if born normal)
4. We all make mistakes.
5. We all have the latent mental capacity( potential to learn more under certain pressures)
6. We are made of the same raw material-water, soil, spirit and will.

The very first thing you need to do is to develop a creative attitude, believe that you are able to solve problems, that you are not in the world to add to the world’s problems but to provide a special remedy. This kind of divergent thinking allows you look into yourself and bring out the things that are deposited in you. Always remember that the underlying factors of human personality are similar it is their purpose and usefulness that differs. The creators intention was and is originality, develop an original mindset and shun conformity, you will be well on your way to genius.

I happen to believe in the CREATION account for the foundation of the earth, and in the good book it says that we are made in the image of God, what that means in essence is that we can do what God can do- not all; only those things he has allowed himself to share with us. One of these things is the inherent creativity that we human beings display. Try as they may, chimpanzees could not accomplish what we have achieved as human beings- simply because we have Gods creative DNA in us and they don’t, however all of nature displays marvelous displays of original thinking and innovation in order to adapt with change, from camouflage, to hunting techniques like a chimp using a stick to pick termites, these are a testament of our potential as Gods supreme being and that includes you.

When I was about 3 years, my grandmother brought home those small, green and hard passion fruits, being the only child at home; they were surprised at the rate of the fruits disappearance. One day when my mother came from her teaching, she found me seated with an array of passion fruit shells behind me and my baby cheeks covered with passion seeds as I pushed my tongue into the half passion fruit in my hands with such relish.  She was astounded at how a toddler could accomplish with so much ease a task that adults had employed a pestle to do- break the passion fruits open.

My mother didn’t say a thing to see my secret to my destructive efficiency, to her surprise, I got another hard passion fruit from the basket and put it in the door hinge and pulled, as the door closed in the passion opened with a loud crackle. That is how at 3 years I invented for my home our passion cracker. Of course she was so thrilled at my ingenuity I got away with stealing passion fruits. Honestly I didn’t know that story till my mother told it to me, and looking back I see that every human being has a God given ability to creatively solve problems

You may look at yourself and not think you are very creative, you may not remember contributing significant ideas in the different life challenges that you have faced lately. When you recollect those days at work when your boss asked for ideas for new products and how you could solve a particular challenge, you probably recall some particularly vocal individuals, some of them had valid ideas and some just loved the sound of their voices. When it came to you, there was literally nothing coming out of your mouth. If you found yourself in such quagmires you could think your next door neighbor is more creative than you are, or that you are a run of the mill ordinary Joe.

My encouragement is that while there are people who are naturally born creative, some of them have been made and taught; likewise if you let yourself go and think right you can definitely develop the creativity trait.

So on average you will see that there is very little difference between you and the more creative people.

This brings me to the point that there are things you can do to become more creative hence improving your standard of life and performance at work. I am going to share with you those things that you can do to become more creative and the “go-to-person in your organization or community, watch out for these in my next article. But you also could register for our OUTSIDE-THE-BOX WORKSHOP: A seminar on creative thinking skills.