Creativity Lecture 9/10/10

This week was probably one of my favorites mostly because it addressed a few things I've always been confused about. Before, I had no idea whatsoever how to describe creativity. One time in my art class about sophomore year, my friend looked me in the eye and said, " How did you get so creative?". To be honest i never thought that I was. If you gave me an image i could drawing almost exact, but I can't come up with an image in my mind to draw. Very bluntly I told her. " I'm not creative at all. I basically copy." I wasn't ever sure if being able to draw an image from a page was creative, but I knew it was talent. Going through the list of characteristics of someone creative, I kept going through my mind thinking, is that me? Is that my personality of attributes? I wouldn't say all of  them, but most are. Its a little mind boggling that one who is creative can be summed up in these words. Makes me think that my friends and family were seeing something that I wasn't about myself. But then again you never really know yourself until someone points it out to you.

We got a list/diagram of the characteristics, and it was a bit difficult to decipher but I managed to get the gist.
I'm going to give a picture of my notes instead of typing. They seem to make more sense on paper than on a computer screen for some reason.

These are just a list of the attributes and kind of describes how it works with one who is creative. The one that stood out the most to me was ORIGINALITY. The stereotypical artist is someone who hates the man and doesn't want to conform to society. That's the basis of what people have in their minds as who is an 'artist'. And i have to say going over how originality works with being creative, I can see where the stereotype comes from. There's nothing wrong with being alike, was my first thought, but my mind said screw it, you know normality is boring as hell. Well said mind.

With one you must have the other, so we moved on to what can keep you from being creative. That's right people, its all about blocks. Mental, emotional and everything in between. Just to be honest, I hate, almost despise, not being able to think of ideas or sitting there, tapping my chin and going. "Uhhh..."
It sucks. Quite literally. And I'm sure that most of you can agree that you feel incompetent when you sit there and cant think. I  used to do the whole Pooh Bear thing and tap my forehead saying think over and over again. Ms.Kelley you were right, I can't ever think of anything like that. But i did find a simple way of over coming mental and emotional blocks. Just step away. I don't think about things for a while and leave them there until i come up with good motivation and good ideas for them. Like one time I needed to paint my best friend a picture for her birthday. I knew what she wanted, but i couldn't get it to work in the medium i was using. So, literally (and i mean it), I tossed the canvas out in our backyard.  I had a spazz moment, I wont lie, but it was so frustrating. After dusting the canvas off and putting it away, I went onto youtube to distract my mind. Lo and behold one of my subscriptions posted a video of her painting with water colors. Needless to say my brain clicked into action and i spent hours painting my friends picture because I was so excited.
To get past cultural blocks... I kind of have a f*ck it attitude towards most society taboos. You would understand if you've seen my family, they are not the norm. And I love them for it! The best way to get over something that's not a conflict inside yourself ( this works for me at least) is to not give a rats ass. It's liberating once you master it. Of course there is a difference between
These are ways that I've learned over the years on how to get over blocks. They're not perfect, and I still stumble and get stopped in my tracks, but a few new ideas that was given to us in the lesson was pretty interesting. I think that i have the worst habit of assuming boundaries. Like to the extreme. It sucks and I try to get past it, but for the activity with the pipe and ping pong ball.. I couldn't think of a thing. Kind of pitiful, but that's the truth. After this lesson, I gave myself a goal: Stop assuming. Pretty simple, I think I can handle it... maybe.