Creativity... what is it?

Creativity. 

That word means a lot of things.  Creativity has a lot of connotations.  Creativity.  Just say it.  What do you feel?  What images do you think of?  What ideas come to your mind?  Creativity has a lot of juice, a lot of meat, a lot of fruitful vegetation, ... and the possibility to get a whole lot of people STUCK as soon as they hear the word. 

I am an artist but I spend a great deal of my time working in expressive and creative art therapies.  I do this with myself as well as with others.  In my training and in my experience with others, there is one word that has the ability to stop the creative process... Creativity.  It is not just in this atmosphere though.  My friends who know me as an artist will often say things to me like "I wish I was creative".   I will be at the Art Hop in Kalamazoo on the first Friday of the month and hear others walking around whispering to one another "if only I were creative...". 

I have tried to explain on so many occasions to so many people that we are all creative.  Every human being is creative.  Everyone has creative potential and uses it.  Creativity comes in many shapes, many forms, and is expressed in a variety of ways.  Unfortunately-- we've been taught to think of creativity narrowly.  We have also been taught to value creative endeavors and products through narrow lenses.  The truth is... or one truth I suppose, albeit many creative people believe it... everyone has creativity in them. 

When we are young we are all creative.  We all play, we all dream, we all imagine.  As we get older we are taught how to do those things "correctly".  We are given scripts by society and told what is the "right way" to do things.  This scrunches our creativity-- sometimes it takes the breath right out of it.  Do not be fooled, creativity doesn't die, and no one is born with out it.  It just means we have to learn to be free again.  Creativity needs freedom.  To be creative we need to be free of constraints. 

When I decided I was going to blog on this topic I started by looking up definitions of creativity and reading about it in some of the books I have on the topic.  No surprise to me that no definition was the same, and the books all discussed that that there are different ways to look a it.  Some of the authors began to give theories of creativity and discussed that based on the origin and the reason for the discussion (business, etc.) the discussion and definition will develop in one direction (that is with agenda).  They went on to define what it takes to be a creative person.  I wasn't sold on this last part-- that is, "what it takes to be a creative person". 

 I did happen to find a page where students defined creativity.  Each student defined it for themselves... what it meant to them.  Here there are are wide range of definitions from the more narrow artistic definitions which are the reasons many people tell me they are not creative, to much more open definitions which show that some people are realizing and getting in touch with their "inner creative beings". 

The truth of the matter is that there are a lot of ways to be "creative".  You can think creatively, you can build things creatively, you can do your finances creatively (and in this economic time-- many of us do!).  You can cook and bake creatively, you can teach creatively, you can garden creatively, you can take walks creatively.  You can be an artist-- of any sort-- and be creative.  The end result is not what makes you creative... it is the process, and it is the way you approach it. 

My final point... you all... we all... are creative beings.

I am interested in your thoughts.  Do you think you're creative?  How do YOU define creativity?  Do you think about creativity differently now?  Did you hop over to any of the links and read the definitions and learn something new about creativity and it has made you think differently about it?  Drop a comment and let me know. 

Alice's Owl... The Hatching Story "Out of the Nest- From a Little Egg"

Alice's Owl is my shop on Etsy.  I am an artisan. 

It has taken me a long time to be able to say those two sentences. 

I created Alice's Owl as an outlet for my creative hobbies. After years of imaginative play, crafting, making art, and the practice of living creatively it was more than evident that "this" is what made me truly happy as a person. To be creative and produce creativity had become a way of life for me. More than that, both passing those pieces of creative art and handcrafted work onto those around me as well as spreading the gift of creative and expressive artistic experience had become a form of healing for me.  Eventually, I was creating more than I could reasonably give away.  In addition, many of those around me had been asking on and off for years if I had considered selling my work.  In time, Alice's Owl grew out of me, like the birch and the oak grow out of the earth-- naturally.

For most of that time I did not identify as an artisan, an artist, or a crafter.  I was simply someone who was doing something.  I was someone who was making something.  If others identified my work as artistic, or beautiful, or subversive-- it was all the same to me.  It was not the end product that was as much the concern for me, as it was the process getting there.  It was the creative endeavor, and the emotional and spiritual journey that I was on each time that I valued.  The only thing that has changed today is that I have learned to accept the label of artisan.  I, the one who produce the art and the craft-- am thereby the artisan.  The focus and the journey are still the same. 

People sometimes ask me how an artist can be assured their work will turn out well if they aren't concerned with the product as they are working.  The answer is simple-- they can't be.  If I was thinking about my result the entire time I was working, there would be no room for evolution of my work, no room for progress, and no room for my creativity.  They also ask me then how everything turns out so wonderful.  I laugh.  Everyone is human, which means that no one is perfect.  In all of my experiences as an artist there are many lessons learned, and certainly not every piece of work that I create meets the public eye.  Every piece of work brings me joy, a connection with myself, and the emotional and spiritual journey I was hoping for.  Often times, one piece also often inspires another, or an entirely new idea.  The point in being creative is not to end up with masterpieces... it is to exercise my imagination and if I end up with masterpieces, that is an extra special surprise. 

People also ask me a lot about my education and experiences learning to be an artist.  Simultaneously they usually inform me that they are not creative.  All people are creative.  Creativity has many forms.  If there is one thing I love it is teaching individuals how they are creative in their own life.  If there is a second thing I love, it is teaching people that they can be creative in the way that they think they can't be when they say this to me (usually artistically). 

As for my education and experiences, I have various formal, semi-formal and informal experiences learning my craft (used broadly here) over the past three decades.  This includes formal university courses, community courses, a variety of professional workshops, summers teaching and working as an arts and crafts specialist and director at a summer camp, growing up in a family that fostered creativity and with a mother and grandmother who taught me many crafts, and incessantly learning skills on my own throughout my younger adulthood as well.  This culmination of experiences combined with life experiences in general, are brought together during creatively combustive experiences and the results are (usually) handcrafted goods. After the past (nearly) three decades of these processes, it was no longer possible to keep simply gifting these wonderful art pieces and handmade goods to my family, friends, colleagues, and neighbors. Even their houses, bodies, walls, kitchens, (everything and everyplace) else were becoming too well adorned! Thus, (with some creative inspiration and support of a close friend) Alice's Owl was birthed.

Alice's Owl is best thought of as an eclectic boutique of handcrafted goods and arts which includes gifts for people, items to adorn their bodies, beautiful and whimsical decorations to enchant both the interior and exterior of their homes, and creative and artistic pieces to awaken, love, and heal their souls.  From as young as I can remember I went to arts and craft fairs with my grandmother and I dreamed of being one of those people behind a booth.  When I was very young my Uncle opened a very successful Art gallery and Framing shop in a nearby city and I always aspired to be a successful artist like those I saw there.  Those dreams changed shape and occasionally shifted in terms of how I wanted to go about being creatively professional, but they were always alive and well within the deep recesses of my being.  Today-- Alice's Owl is a reality.  I am a small business owner-- Indiepreneur.  I am an artisan.