Cultivating Creativity

Creativity…what is it? How do we experience it? And how do we construct an environment in which the creative mind can grow?

Creativity as a State

Creativity is a state of resourcefulness. It is a field where one has access to more of themselves, their ability and their connectedness to the world around them. This state is achieved by climbing up through the neurological levels of physical environment to the level of connected oneness with all things (or of seeing yourself as part of a larger system). This can be done through meditation, an activity of great enjoyment, using the body in a way that is physically challenging or a series of questions as it is done in coaching.

There are many ways to access it, but the key attributes that these activities share and must produce in order to successfully bring about the state are: cessations in the stream of thought, mental space, focus, body awareness (i.e. the way that the activity feels, the emotions it produces and or the locations of the feelings associated with the activity), an increase in energy and a sense of being safe and alive.

How Do We Experience Creativity?

New ideas pop into the mind when the mind is relaxed, empty and still. Often times when we are having fun and completely engrossed in the moment they will appear. Sponsorship and space provide the necessary support for inspired thoughts to come into being. Creativity also requires down time. Time spent daydreaming, drawing, scribbling, writing, puttering, meditating, singing, playing and walking in nature…are all examples of activities that are often associated with the creative state.

Cultivating creativity requires stepping away from structure and allowing yourself to be free of time for periods. Maybe you indulge in a nap or a cup of tea on the couch while doing nothing but cuddling your cat…you may not think this is anything special, in fact you may beat up on yourself for engaging your time in this way but it is exactly this kind of space that is necessary for new ideas to come.

The most vital components that I have noticed are the cessation of mental chatter and the kind of doing that leads to a sense of enjoyment. These states are similar to meditative or trance-like states, it’s a return to the source. When we touch home and connect to our origins in that way…we exist, fully centered, in the flow of life. In these moments we receive transmissions…often times in the form of ideas.

The Creative Environment

In my training we used techniques that explore the process of taking something that exists in the imagination only and forging it into a physical existence that directly influences the experience of others in a positive way.

The models that we used uncovered methods of interacting with ideas from the perspectives of three separate entities, with very different points of view, but ultimately the same goal. Through these exercises I became extremely interested in the conditions that encourage people to get creative.

One of the first things I understood is that people need to feel safe in order to dream and that most dreams are torn apart before they ever get a chance to sprout their wings…so I’m going to talk about sponsoring the dream, and how to stick with this position long enough to let the dream develop fully.

Sponsoring the Dream

In order for a dream to fully flourish the proper sponsorship needs to be in place. Sponsorship is an attitude of support, in order to provide support, you need to be fully connected to yourself. In martial arts this connection is often called “your center”. When you loose “your center” you begin to loose resources. Obviously, it is difficult to offer support cut off from your own resources…this connection or center is what allows for responsive engagement.

Sponsorship is about seeing and fostering potential, acknowledging and blessing something that does not yet fully exist, developing a curiosity around how it will evolve and creating a receptive and safe place for that evolution to occur.

The basic attitude of sponsorship is acknowledgment: You exist, I see you, you are valuable, important, special, unique, you have something important to contribute, you are welcome here, you belong, it is possible for you to succeed, you are capable to succeed and you deserve to succeed, are examples of positive sponsorship.

This is turn creates the emotional responses necessary to be truly creative: a sense of relief, relaxation, feeling centered, at peace, satisfied, motivated, energetic and safe. Sponsorship is important because when a person feels like they are a valuable, contributing member of a system (of something larger than themselves) the sense of well being they experience, produces an environment for creativity to flourish.

The Dreamer: What is Possible?

Being really creative requires the ability to dream. For this to occur you need to step out of reality and pretend for a moment. This releases your mind from the constraints of what you’ve learned is possible. You are then free to let it get as large and imaginative as it can go…the biggest and best of what you can conjure up. Your objective at this point is not to be realistic, it is to let go of your map of the world and step outside of the box.

To assist you on this level your focus will be on the what of your dream, your thinking will be visual and big picture oriented and your attitude is one of anything is possible.

Cultivating the Dream

The dream is not the place for the world, life and rules that you know…it is the place to create something in alignment with the higher order of things. Take this idea and plant it firmly in the ground of possibility. Let it grow, let it mature and when it is mature…you will step out of the dreamer and into the planner and then out of the planner and into the critic.

As you do, the idea will be pruned and trimmed in a way that makes it stronger, the bed in which it is planted will be weeded and other complimentary ideas will begin to grow with it.

Many of us don’t know how or when to start pruning and sever the foundations of our dreams before we know which limbs they need in order to grow. Every dream is infused with it’s own form of life, a distinct energy, that needs to be observed in order to be acknowledged. Bringing out the planner and the critic in a way that works with the dream rather than against it, is the art of keeping the dream space safe, an act of reverence and sponsorship that holds the key to creating something concrete and achievable of an idea that previously existed in the mind alone.

Creation myths around the world start with empty space…by an act of the divine that most cultures view as sacred, life comes forth from the void. Similarly, an idea comes forth from empty space as a seed or spark within the imagination that grows into a dream. Consider where these gifts of the divine might take you when they are treated with reverence and seen as the acts of creation they really are…

Comments

By Vitor - El Bosque Nevado on September 13th, 2007 at 5:35 am

Paula,

thank you for this piece. My flow just opened up immensely after reading it.

By Paula Kawal on September 13th, 2007 at 2:11 pm

Vitor,

You’re so welcome…I had the same experience while writing it