Creativity needs freedom

It is clear that we (as a society) need a lot of creativity to solve global, complex challenges, like climate change, income inequality, food security, and migration.

However, many people have lost their creativity. Yes, lost it. 

There is research that confirms this. The creativity test Land and Jarman created for NASA was so simple, it could actually be applied to any age group. So, they found 1,600 children between the ages of 4 and 5, and decided to measure their progress. What they found shocked them. Out of the 1,600 kids that took the test, 98%of them scored at genius level! Excited by these incredible findings, the team decided to turn this test into a longitudinal study, and give the same group of children the same test again in 5 years’ time. Once again, their findings were quite shocking, but this time for conversely different reasons. Because these same children, by now in grade school, had rapidly declined to just 30%; a 68% reduction! The same study was conducted again 5 years later on the same group of kids — by now in high school — and they had dropped all the way down to just 12%! Disturbed, but still intrigued by this fascinating study, Land decided to conduct this same test on adults aged 25 and up (with an average age of 31). After numerous studies, what he invariably found, was that less than 2% of all adults scored at genius level. And for those who question the consistency of these results — or think they may be isolated incidences — these results have actually been replicated more than a million times! 

Creativity is born in the mind; specifically, the imagination. The good news is, in spite of the ruling class’s best efforts to degrade our inner genius, the imagination can only be suppressed, it cannot be killed. Because every night when we go to sleep, the imagination gets stimulated. Therefore, your creative potential — your inner genius — is simply sleeping within and just needs to be reawakened and rehabilitated. (https://anewkindofhuman.com/creative-genius-divergent-thinking-test/).

I think one of the main reasons that we have not used our creative capabilities is that at school and at work, creativity is not valued. On the contrary, we want students and employees to be obedient and predictable, so actually creativity is discouraged, it is seen as a kind of threatening skill. I know so many people who came up with creative ideas for their companies and then those ideas were just completely dismissed. Maybe you have the courage to come up with a new idea, but if that isn’t appreciated, you will stop bringing up new ideas.

So, what happens when you don’t use a skill (any skill) for a long time, you lose your proficiency and your confidence in using it. Then we are simply accepting that we aren’t creative. 

That is a huge loss, both to yourself, to business and to society. 

For yourself, being creative is very fulfilling. Not using your creativity is numbing you down. Harvard psychologist Shawn Achor says that the happiest people are those that express themselves and create everyday ..... whether this is a song, a soufflé, a spreadsheet .... or whatever .... the choice is yours.

For business the impact is huge. Research conducted by Francesca Gino (Harvard) backs up these findings. In her survey of more than 3,000 employees, only one-fourth reported feeling curious about their jobs, and 70 percent said they face barriers to asking questions at work. Gino also presents conclusions that help to explain why employees don't feel curious. She discusses a separate study she conducted of 520 chief learning and talent development officers in which leadership reported discouraging curiosity. The leaders believed that curiosity would lead to disagreements, slow down decision making, and generally make their workforce harder to manage. While curious employees may not always produce workable new ideas, Gino's survey of employees found that 92 percent of respondents see positive outcomes to curiosity, including an increase in new ideas, job satisfaction, motivation, and higher job performance. All this research reveals that when executives discourage curiosity, they may lose out on innovation in return https://www.td.org/magazines/td-magazine/the-curiosity-gap.

For society, it is crucial to use both individual as well as collective creativity to come up with solutions to the big challenges that we face. That means that we need to encourage creativity everywhere. A prerequisite is that people need to be free to express themselves. And that failures are part of the process and not a stick for punishment. 

This metaphor shows you the current situation. Assume that you are a horse pulling a carriage.

The blinkers limit what you can see. The reins are determining what you have to do and the rider with the whip is your boss. In that situation is no room for curiosity, creativity and being entrepreneurial. Once you remove the blinkers and are liberated, then you can see what is wrong with the world and start to contribute. 

Now imagine a free, a wild horse.

Then you can see wherever you want, you can move in any direction and with any speed you want. And, most importantly you can do what is needed, do what is your unique contribution to the world.

Who are you, are you free and creative or are you suppressed and not creative?

I think that deep down we all want to be free and contributing. Therefor we have to put in the effort to liberate our creativity!