The magic and myth of creation

Time is the raw material of creation. Wipe away the magic and myth of creating and all that remains is work: the work of becoming expert through study and practice, the work of finding solutions to problems and problems with those solutions, the work of trial and error, the work of thinking and perfecting, the work of creating.

Creating consumes. It is all day, every day. It knows neither weekends nor vacations. It is not when we feel like it. It is habit, compulsion, obsession, vocation. The common thread that links creators is how they spend their time. No matter what you read, no matter what they claim, nearly all creators spend nearly all their time on the work of creation. There are few overnight successes . . .

— Kevin Ashton, Why and How Creative People Need to say "No"

Painting: Salvador Dali

Creativity Is not Always Child's Play

All you need for an excellent exercise that stimulates a young child's imagination is a blank sheet of paper and a few crayons of different colors. A creative spirit and busy little hands will do the rest. It’s not so easy for us adults! While creativity can be as easy as child's play, for an artist or a craftsman, creativity can mean painstaking work.

Creativity is also an integral part of any work environment, and it’s not surprising that creativity in business drives profitability.

The Magic and Wonder of Creativity
Small clumps of different-colored clay can make a bigger clump of multicolored clay. It’s one thing to mix ingredients and come up with something interesting. It’s quite another to conceive a totally new way of looking at things that leads to an unexpected result.

The work of a creative artist can make us pause in awe and wonder. Creativity can transform the mundane into the useful or the sublime. A talented artist only needs a handful of colors. His ability to create an appealing or emotional effect by combining a few available elements can translate into a magical outcome or the perfect result.

Quantum Leaps of Creativity
Some riddles are so difficult to decipher that we have to make quantum leaps of creativity to arrive at their solution. We intuitively understand that if you apply force to an object it will move. We quickly grasp why we need more force to move a heavier object. It takes a substantial leap of creativity to figure out that if you’re moving fast enough, time literally slows down.

Water emerges from two invisible gases, hydrogen and oxygen. Nothing about those two gases would predict what water is like. Quantum leaps dominate in creation everywhere we look but especially in the startling, beautiful novelty of life-forms on Earth.

–Deepak Chopra

Rules and Creativity: Putting Theory Into Practice
Fortunately for us, most creative endeavors have rules. If you want to write a convincing and emotionally satisfying plot, there are rules you can follow. The theory behind the rules was proposed in 335 BC by Aristotle and they haven’t changed much since. A painter’s knowledge of the theories of light, perspective and color enables him to create a stunning three-dimensional portrait on a canvas of two dimensions.

The Tedium in Creativity: Getting the Facts Straight
It’s a fallacy to think that creative work means you don’t have to deal with facts. Most novels contain narrative passages that require research. The writer has to gather and organize bits of general information, historical events and geographical details. A vivid setting with accurate details can help bring a plot to life and make the story realistic. Even a make-believe world has to be consistent and should be subject to some rules of cause and effect.

Where Creative Insights Come From
If you immerse yourself in the theory of your work and the facts of your project, creative insights will come to you like bolts from the blue when you least expect it. Creative people are those who are most receptive to their own intuitions. They know that insights come from their interpretation and understanding of basic knowledge and available information.

They have faith that a new insight will come to save the day. Every time they get “stuck,” they go back to doing something called for by the basics until they get another insight. They master the basics and stay in tune with their work.

Creativity Requires Commitment
All work requires planning and focus. Creative work is no different. You can’t carry out a plan and you won’t be able to focus if you don’t have time. It’s a valuable asset—and like all valuable assets—you shouldn’t squander time because it’s scarce. There’s never enough.

This is why making priorities and setting goals are so important. Setting priorities will help you manage your time. Having a goal will keep you focused.

What works for you when you need to be creative?


Painting: Johannes Vermeer, The Milkmaid

The Lost Art of Letter Writing

Vincent Van Gogh was not only a great artist, he was also an accomplished writer. We know this because of the many letters he wrote to family and friends. Some writers of significant renown say his writings qualify as literature.

I recently read a blog post, The Beauty of Handwritten Letters by Guilie Castillo and it inspired me to write this piece.

Once Upon a Time
Anyone who has posted or received a scented, handwritten letter knows the joy that such a missive can carry. Today, there are so many ways to stay in touch—and they’re so much more efficient and immediate—it isn’t fashionable to write a personal letter any more. What’s the point of writing a letter when its contents won’t be read for a week or more?

Letter writing is a lost art. Once upon a time, letters were the most efficient method for individuals to stay in touch over a long distance. Nowadays, letters are used primarily for formal communications associated with a business purpose. The immediacy of mobile phones, email and text messaging have relegated letter writing to the status of a quaint and frivolous exercise.

Art Is a Painstaking Enterprise
Preparing a personal, handwritten letter requires the writer to put her heart into the task. The letter writer also needs time to choose her words carefully and to fashion her thoughts with deliberation.

All art is a painstaking enterprise and writing a letter is no different. Letter writers of bygone eras did not have the luxury of spell-checking software and couldn’t easily go back to rephrase sentences. They certainly had the option of preparing a first draft if they were so inclined, but all last minute corrections showed on the page.

What some might consider insignificant details like the choice of stationery, the writing implement used and the writer’s penmanship are all an inherent part of what makes a letter special. Because of its relative permanence as a tangible object, the final piece is literally a work of art.

The Contents of a Letter
The very essence of a letter limits it to conveying written information. But, very often, a personal letter serves purposes other than communicating essential pieces of information.

A typical letter starts off with the dateline (like a news article) and the salutation. If appropriate, at the outset, you make reference to prior correspondence and acknowledge its receipt. Aside from these basics, the contents of a letter are limited only by the writer's imagination.

A letter is also a way for the writer and the recipient to affirm their relationship and reinforce the bond they share. To this day, the salutation (dear) and the closing (very truly yours) reflect this erstwhile function. Love letters are a specialized form of this type of written interaction. If the writer is so inclined, the parchment can be scented as a way to add a personal touch of intimacy and to highlight an ethereal presence.

An Inspiration for Creativity
The act of writing a letter might encourage the writer to mention pleasant memories and portray them in the best possible light. It can compel the writer to be imaginative so as to tell an interesting anecdote. Under particular circumstances, it can require the writer to be careful in framing a delicate situation.

As with all writing, composing a letter requires the writer to narrow his focus and organize his thoughts. Today, we share more information with more people than ever, but it’s mostly in bits and pieces. Many of the stories and sentiments we share online are reduced to a few sentences on social media websites with the benefit of digital photo albums.

A Sense of Mystery
At best, a posted letter can take a few days to reach its recipient and, depending on the destination, can take several weeks to arrive. The recipient, very often, doesn't know for sure a letter is on its way or when one will arrive. The physical distance that a letter has to travel and the lapse of time until its delivery gives each letter its own aura of mystery.

It could very well be that when the letter arrives, and is read, some of the circumstances it describes have changed or that perhaps—because of the change in circumstances—an argument that it convincingly lays out is now invalid or has become irrelevant.

Have you ever had occasion to write a personal, handwritten letter?

Painting: Vincent Van Gogh, Self-Portrait