How Creativity Can Improve Life

Everyday Creativity
The concept of everyday creativity is about finding joy in the things we do and obtaining happiness in even the most routine aspects of life—such as finding food to eat, getting dressed, getting to work, or even adapting to an unexpected emergency. Everyday creativity is about the art of spontaneity, the art of adaptability, the art of being okay with things the way they are because at all times one has the means to succeed, to feel good, to be brave, the obtain joy even in the most miserable of times. This idea is rooted in the belief that there is grace in all things, all around one, and that by tapping into this grace, one enhances one’s own life exponentially. This paper will show how the American Psychological Association (2007), through the articles by Zausner (2007) and Richards (2007), proves that creativity is the best approach to take to life in order to truly be happy, healthy and successful.
Richards (2007) explains what is meant by the idea of everyday creativity and why it has to be considered as “everyday”—i.e., something that occurs within each moment of one’s life: everyday creativity “is about everyone, throughout our lives; it is fundamental to our survival. It is how we find a lost child, get enough to eat, and make our way in a new place and culture. It is not so much what we do as how we do it, whether this is at work or at leisure” (Richards, 2007, p. 25). In other words, to be creative is to allow the flexibility into our lives, to explore options, to expand horizons and think outside the box. The freedom to go off the beaten path empowers one to assume responsibility rather than to take the easy way out and pass accountability along to someone else. For instance, when it comes to schooling, one could easily say that it is the responsibility of the teacher to see to it that one’s child is educated properly. However, if one is being creative in an everyday sense, one would realize that the opportunity to take responsibility is actually there for you and that all you have to do is begin to guide the child in developing ideas by demonstrating activities that you know the child will be interested.
This was essentially the idea behind Vygotsky’s concept of the zone of proximal development (Gray & Feldman, 2004). Whether one is changing the oil in one’s car or going to the park, making one’s child a part of that experience enhances it and allows both participants to grow in new and undefined ways. This is the essence of creativity. Ailwood (2003) notes that “play serves as a significant nodal point in the discursive relations of early childhood education” (p. 286). Just as we are created uniquely, every learner is also unique—each one learns in different ways. Some learners are visual. Some are experiential. For some, hearing is all that is required—for others, they must perform. Some benefit when their own personal background is brought into the lesson. Others can learn on their own and have a high tolerance for self-directed learning. Some learn from observing. Learning itself is a creative endeavor and falls into the category of everyday creative. Those who get to spend time learning are among the happiest—because they are engaged in self-actualization, as Richards explains: “self-actualizing people seemed happier, more fulfilled and at peace, not grasping, worried, striving, and were motivated in other higher ways” (Richards, 2007, p. 27).
The concept of self-actualization comes from the Maslow (1943) who developed a theory of human motivation and a hierarchy of needs, which identified a kind of step ladder of development that people go through. First, they have to have their ground floor needs met: these are things like food and shelter. Then they can move on to having their social needs met—things like friendship and love. Then they can focus on building their own confidence and esteem because the supports are in place that allow them to do this. Finally, they can become self-actualizing, driven by their own motivation to succeed because of a moral principle inside themselves that they cultivate and want to adhere to as they continue to grow.
In fact, just the act of having children is a creative act. It might seem like a burden to some and an immense joy to others—but the creative action is part of the process of giving new life to the world. Life is conceived and then shaped and molded by our approaches to parenting, education, and so on. Everything that we do shapes the child’s development in some way—and if one wants a happy child, one has to focus the creative energy and creative spirit on positive things that can bring happiness: shelter, food, warmth, love, security, esteem, confidence—all of these are things that a parent can give a child to help that child attain happiness, and in the process the parent attains joy because the parent’s life work, the parent’s whole creative focus has been on raising the child. That is an aspect of everyday creativity that often goes unobserved by many but that without which society would simply not exist. It is an example of everyday creativity that should really be celebrated among all others as the most important form of creative expression because it is dealing with actual life, whereas artists are only dealing with representations of life.
But of course representations of life are also important and play a role in allowing creativity to flourish and bring joy and peace to one’s life. The arts especially are helpful because they allow one to interact with ideas and feelings, which is where creativity finds inspiration. If one wants to kill creativity, one should never interact with anyone or anything, because interaction is what allows for the communication of ideas to occur, and in that communicative process, seeds are planted within the soul that bring forth creative fruits.
Creative fruits help one to grow in self-actualization. They give one peace because they help to purify the emotions. This was what Aristotle meant by praising drama on the stage: he saw it as a creative form that allowed people to go through a cleansing experience without actually having to experience the tragedy personally. They could experience it virtually by watching it performed on stage and thereby learning from the representation and feeling the experience but not really having to endure the experience in reality.
Inherent in Maslow’s theory of motivation is really the idea of everyday creativity. To develop as human beings and to achieve the happiness that self-actualization affords, one has to embrace the concept of creativity. The ways of doing this are not limited to the mundane, just as they are not limited to the arts. However, the arts offer a way for creativity to be especially explored. As Zausner (2007) notes, “Every choice we make in life is a decision and that decision has a creative basis. It brings together a synthesis of all of our past experience in a new way as a direct response to a specific stimulus” (p. 76). One way of demonstrating the synthesis of this past experience is through art. Art allows for an expression of everything that is internal to us to come out in a variety of forms—whether painting, acting, photography, filmmaking, singing, playing a musical instrument, or sculpting. Art is way to communicate creatively.
Art can also help one to get over an illness (Zausner, 2007). It does this by giving the person something else to focus on other than the bad things that are happening in the body or in the mind. Art can be a soothing, alternative method of treating an illness; it can help to reduce anxiety; it can be an outlet for stress; it can lift up one’s mood and give one meaning or purpose. One does not need to be “artistic” in the sense that one’s talent or skill is recognized by an art authority: one’s art is one’s own and no one has to give one permission to be creative or to pursue a craft.
The famous painter Matisse is an example of a person who turned from illness to art just to get over the boredom he experienced following his bout with appendicitis as he recovered at home. He turned to painting just to have something to do: “Matisse began to paint in every spare moment: before work in the morning, at his lunch break, and again in the evening. Eventually he convinced his parents to let him study art in Paris. The pastime that started as everyday creativity turned into a world famous career” (Zausner, 2007, p. 79). This is one example of how letting art into one’s life can actually take one’s life in an entirely new and unexpected direction. After all, Matisse had been practicing for law up to that point—so being a painter was really the last thing on his mind, but it turned out to be the most important thing in his life to bring him joy and happiness. That is the power of art.
But one does not even have to make art to be creative. Actually, simply viewing art is a creative exercise, as Zausner (2007) states. What is meant by this is that when we respond to art we are responding with a feeling that we allow the art to produce inside of us. By communing with that feeling, we create an experience that gives pleasure, pain, joy, sorrow—whatever we are meant to experience, which is often subjective and up to us but in many cases there is a sense of what the artist wants us to feel. However, everyone brings forth their own experiences, their own history, their own identities into the experience, so that the stimulating activity of viewing art, of interacting with it, takes on its own creative dimension.
Whether one is an artist or is viewing art, one is essentially “tuning in” to something bigger than oneself, as Richards (2007) states: “Creative persons can be more mindfully attuned to what is happening; more consciously aware in the moment, rather than leading a habit-bound routinized life” (p. 42). It is as though they are operating on a higher frequency, listening to the voice of God as He directs their course through life with sweet melodies and harmonies. The person who corresponds with their art is invited to take part in this sweet discourse and as a result can be transported upwards to the highest reality. Up there is where the joy of life can be found, for it is the peak of transcendence.
By allowing everyday creativity into our lives we can elevate even the most mundane of tasks to the realm of the transcendental. Making eggs in the morning can become a meditation in and of itself on the one, the good, the true and the beautiful. Reading a story to a child can do the same, can touch the soul, the heart, the mind and the will and imagination. Teaching someone how to do a task, or composing a piece of music, or acting in a drama, or painting a picture—all of this helps to bring joy to life because it heightens one’s sense of life and appreciation for it. It allows one the opportunity to focus and be successful by alleviating stress and purifying the emotions. Just looking at a piece of art can be of immense spiritual and physical benefit—just ask Matisse.
References
Ailwood, J. (2003). Governing early childhood education through play. Contemporary
Issues in Early Childhood, 4(3), 286-299.
Richards, R.. (2007). Everyday Creativity. In Everyday Creativity and New Views of
Human Nature: Psychological, Social, and Spiritual Perspectives, edited by R. Richards. Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association.
Gray, P. & Feldman, J. (2004). Playing in the zone of proximal development: Qualities
of self-directed age mixing between adolescents and young children at a democratic school. American Journal of Education, 110(2), 108-146.
Maslow, A. H. (1943). A theory of human motivation. Psychological Review, 50(4), 370.
Zausner, T. (2007). Artist and audience: Everyday creativity and visual art. In
Everyday Creativity and New Views of Human Nature: Psychological, Social, and Spiritual Perspectives, edited by R. Richards. Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association.