Snippet: Habits & Creativity

Creativity. It exists all around us, plain for the eye to see. The books we read, the music we listen to, the content we're currently binge-watching on Netflix; all products of creativity. Sometimes, creativity is a more subtle creature, hiding in plain sight. For example, have a look on Instagram. Anyone familiar with the app knows that opening it will give you access to a seemingly endless supply of photos and videos, all shot by people utilizing their creativity. It is astonishing, isn't it? The amount of creative content that the human race can produce on a daily basis. Now, consider the phone that you're using to access Instagram. A smartphone, originally conceptualized by IBM in 1995, popularized by the release of the Apple iPhone in 2007, and eventually further developed into the modern-day devices that we cannot be parted with today (Tweedie, 2015). Without creativity, the engineers at IBM never would have thought of combining the functions of a cell phone and a PDA to create the Simon Personal Communicator, the world's first smartphone. Without creativity, Steve Jobs wouldn't have been able to innovate and find a way to make such a product available and marketable to the average consumer. And without creativity, mobile phone manufacturers all over the world wouldn't be able to expand on each others' ideas and designs in order to provide a whole range of smartphones, including the one currently residing in your pocket, or bag, or desk, or hand. Indeed, creativity is present in all facets of modern society and has been a presence since humanity crawled out of the primordial ooze. All throughout history, creative minds have helped shape and steer humanity towards greater heights through innovations of engineering, artworks of cultural significance, and philosophical musings present in pieces of music, film, and literature. Who knows where we would be without the Mona Lisa, or the Great Pyramid of Giza, or the teachings of Confucius? For better or for worse, there is no doubt that creativity has been a huge contributor to what human civilization is today. Setting aside the important role creativity holds within human society, the importance of creativity in the lives of the individual should also be considered. There are several reasons to be creative in our daily lives. Creativity can help with problem solving, which is a necessity in many areas of our lives. Creativity helps you approach difficult situations from different angles and come up with solutions that could go overlooked if only a logical approach is taken. Being better equipped to solve problems improves one's adaptability and reduces the risks of anxiety caused by the unknown. Creativity helps in building confidence. By exercising creativity, we may be able to successfully create something brilliant... but usually only after multiple failures. However, it is from failure that we learn and grow, eventually developing our skills to the point where we can be happy with our work and confident in sharing it with others. Each failure brings with it its own lesson but the overarching lesson to be learned is that failure is not something to be feared but rather something that should be welcomed as a teaching point. Once you are able to shake the fear of failure that is natural to all humans, you can watch your confidence soar, not just in your creative projects but in your everyday activities. Creativity can help us live a longer, happier life. That's right. You may not think of creativity as having a direct impact on health but scientific studies show that “cognitive flexibility and the willingness to entertain novel ideas, has emerged as a lifelong protective factor” (Rodriguez, 2012, p.18). This phenomenon is suspected to be linked to the creative mind's ability to handle stress as well as creative thinking's role in maintaining neural networks going into old age. So, we can see that creativity is important, not just to the human race but to each individual. So why is it so difficult for us to exercise creativity?