Creativity, the divine spark. That thing that makes us sit upright, take notice, smile. Creativity is universally hailed as desirable, a positive quality, one that parents seek to enhance in their children’s characters. What, though, do we mean when we speak of creativity? The word is hard to grasp and actually refers to several different concepts that often get conflated and confused in the literature. Typically, creativity evokes notions of novelty and originality. Other qualities cited as relevant to creativity are spontaneity and flexibility. Lists of as many as 40 characteristics have been circulated to explain what makes something ‘creative.’ And there are so many working definitions of creativity, some 75 or so, that researchers have even grouped them into 6 different categories: perception-type, end product, esthetic, psychoanalytic, solution thinking, and other! You can see how complicated it can be to talk about a single notion of ‘creativity!’

Much of what has been written about creativity, the older texts and the academic texts, typically refer to the creative process. When you open one of these books, you will find the author discussing how it happens that a ‘thing’ can arise from ‘nothing,’ how an idea springs from within and moves through to manifestation, how a product goes from a state of potential to realization. If you pick up a scholarly book on creativity, chances are you will find a presentation of the 4 or 7 or x number of stages in the creative process.

A second thread in the literature concerns the creative product. What is it that makes a given thing, a painting, a poem, a design creative? This literature often discusses how creativity is embedded within the social, cultural and familial environment. There is discussion about the relativity of the standards of creativity. What is creative at one time and place may not be considered creative at another time or in another place. There are endless lists of the characteristics of the creative product, of creative behavior etc. And discussions follow about fostering creativity in the school system, in the home, how to make and keep society “ creative-friendly.”

And the third area of discussion concerns creativity as a trait in the individual: the creative person, and what makes a person creative. Here, too, we see how challenging it is to try to grasp exactly what that means. And we see that ‘creativity’ actually is an umbrella term for many other traits and qualities. And still, there is no universal agreement on the issue! We still ask the question, “What makes a person ‘creative’?” And so we rely on lists composed by aficionados of the subject.

Here is one example of such a list, this one setting forth six criteria for creativity in an individual: lack of conventionality (making up rules as one goes along), integration and intellectuality (makes connections and distinctions between ideas and things, puts things together in a new way), aesthetic taste and imagination (has an appreciation of the arts), decisional skill and flexibility (follows gut feelings in making decisions, can change directions when needed), perspicacity (questions societal norms, truisms, is willing to take a stand), and drive for accomplishment and recognition (is motivated by goals, likes to be compliments on work, is energetic).

This is a good list, a reasonable list. But it is only one of scores of such lists! It seems that every person who has studied creativity has some different way to define or try to capture it! Some of the most fun definitions of creativity are the artistic definitions, analogies or metaphors. Here are some: creativity is like plugging into the sun, like listening to a cat, like cutting holes to see through. Creativity is an arbitrary harmony, an expected astonishment, a habitual revelation, a familiar surprise, a generous selfishness, an unexpected certainty, a formable stubbornness, a vital triviality, a disciplined freedom, an intoxicating steadiness, a repeated initiation, a difficult delight, a predictable gamble, an ephemeral solidity, a unifying difference, a miraculous expectation, an accustomed amazement.

When I recently asked my creativity class for their working definitions of creativity, most of the students said that they thought of creativity as somehow thinking outside the box, being different, being original. And this seems to be a common assumption about creativity…it involves originality, unconventionality, difference. Certainly the lists of attributes include these traits.

But I propose a slightly different way of looking at the issue, a way of conceptualizing creativity as a life stance. When we decide to take a life position that promotes the creative process, that maximizes individual creative potential, it involves seeing ourselves as ‘source.’ When we see ourselves as source, our life, our thoughts, our behavior, our actions, our relationships, flow from us, imbued with the attributes of one’s own unique individuality. We become the drop that holds the ocean, the local, personal channel for the universal creative force.

This is an important decision in one’s life, and a decision that many people never make. Seeing yourself as source has many ramifications. It means not only being creative, but more, it means BEING CREATIVITY ITSELF: not being the consequence but the source, not being the victim but the context of one’s life. ‘Source’ has ultimate responsibility, for the manifestation or for the experience of the situation.

What a revolutionary stance! Try it! What flows from this place of source has qualities that lead to ultimate creativity. There is a personal-ness in the creative work or individual, an intimacy that is inviting, coupled with an authenticity and genuiness that imbue the work and attest to the artist herself. Spontaneity is also a hallmark of the creative, and even a carefully planned work has, paradoxically, as aspect or moment of spontaneous surrender in its unfoldment. Perhaps what makes something or someone creative is not that it is different, or not simply that it is different. Rather, what we label creative is what flows spontaneously and authentically from the source place within the person, capturing, along with the universal creative energy, the individual unique attributes of the artist.

CREATIVITY AND INTELLIGENCE
One question that researchers have explored is the connection between creativity and intelligence. Sometimes there is an assumption that creativity belongs in the realm of genius, and that the creative genius is always intelligent. Somehow, the argument goes, creativity cannot belong to the common person! Starting in the 1960’s, many studies were conducted to explore this connection. Typically, students were tested on measures of creativity and measures of either intelligence or achievement. Some studies found a relationship between intelligence and creativity, others found none. Some studies examined instead the life histories of famous people, usually men, and used measures of intelligence and achievement based on historical profiles, such as Goethe, who wrote poetry in Latin when he was eight and scored an adult IQ of 185. In one such study, it was found that Voltaire had an IQ of 175, Mozart 155. In general, great philosophers averaged 170, poets, novelists and dramatists 160, and scientists 155.

Again, there is a wide divergence of opinion about the relationship between IQ and creativity. It is currently thought, however, that while many creative people have a high or superior IQ, a large percentage, about 50%, have an IQ within the normal bell curve of distribution. However, it is thought that a minimum IQ of 120 is normally associated with the quality of creativity in an individual. 120 is higher than average (the average IQ is 100) but certainly nowhere near the standard of genius, or even brilliant, or even bright! And this standard of association has come to be accepted in the field today.

In our next discussion on creativity, we will look at the source of creative content within the mind, accessing the fonts of creativity within each one of us, and plumbing the depths of our unconscious content. We will explore some of the most common blocks and obstacles to creativity and suggest methods for overcoming them. In future essays, we will look at the myth of the creative genius and come to understand what truly constitutes the creative experience, and we will explore the common assumption that creativity is somehow linked to depression, madness or pathology. I expect there to be 2 more essays on creativity, and hope to have them up within a short period of time.