Creativity and the Meaning of Life

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Creativity and the Meaning of Life

• Dr Paul Martin
• Brighton Creativity Centre

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Creativity

• it is up to each person to make the first step
  for himself, without following another or setting
  up another as his authority for the definition of
  what creativity is and for advice on how it is to
  be obtained. Unless one starts to discover this
  for himself rather than to try to achieve the
  apparent security of a well laid-out pattern of
  action, he will just be deluding himself and thus
  wasting his efforts ( David Bohm 1998)

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A brief history of Creativity

• Act of God Creation bringing the universe
  into being.
• God inspired act of man - from the rise of the
  individual in the Renaissance.
• Romantic belief in the inspired self as a
  reaction to the rationalism of the enlightenment
  and means to an end rationale of industrial
  capitalism.

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A brief history of creativity

• Romantic belief in the spirituality of nature and
  the muse at a time of declining religious belief.
• Zarathustra God is dead (Nietzsche) man/woman
  is at the centre of their own universe and all
  can be creative.
• The sublimation of the individual as consumer
  in the global economy leads to devaluation of
  creativity as a means to economic ends.

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What is Creativity?

• Originality
• Innovation
• Newness
• Novelty
• Inspired
• Self expression
• Search for truth
• Making meaning

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Conditions for creativity

• One must have chaos in oneself in order to give
  birth to a dancing star (Nietzsche)
• ..real perception that is capable of seeing
  something new and unfamiliar requires that one be
  attentive, alert, aware and sensitive (Bohm)
• Knowledge, skills and a working practice and
  philosophy which is open to new possibilities.

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Conditions for creativity

• one prerequisite for originality is clearly that
  a person shall not be inclined to impose his
  perceptions on the fact as he sees it. Rather, he
  must be able to learn something new, even if this
  means that the ideas or notions that are
  comfortable or dear to him may be overturned
  (Bohm)
• Mezirow, Bohm, Krishnamurti, Freire, Fromm all
  state need for unconditioning as pre-requisite
  for change
• A non-oppressive and supportive environment in
  which to be able to try out, express new ideas
  and fail.

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Barriers to creativity

• Fear of failure
• Fear of change and disruption
• Fear of responsibility for outcomes (Fromm)
• Existing values and perceptions
• Existing knowledge
• Existing neural connections
• Oppressive environment
• Family / friends / peers / colleagues / employer
  etc. not valuing or fearing challenge and change

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Creativity and making meaning

• The being of ourselves is meaning the being of
  society is meaningtherefore a change of
  meaning is a change of being (Bohm)
• This change equates to Mezirows Transformative
  Learning
• Can happen when people realise that reality not
  fixed but patterns of shifting, responsive
  potential (Zohar)

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Outcomes of creativity

• Psychologically outcomes can be uncomfortable,
  challenging, disruptive or joyous.
• Ultimately it is not the clever idea, new device
  or design or great work of art which is important
  but the new meaning made within the creator or
  other people that change of being.

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Helmholtz concept of creativity(late 19th
century physiologist)
saturation
incubation
Illumination
research
mulling over
sudden solution
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Poincares model of creativity(mathematician
1908)
saturation
incubation
illumination
verification
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Getzels model of creativity(psychologist 1960s)
First insight
saturation
incubation
Ah ha!
verification
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Ehrenzweigs model of creativity(psychoanalytic
model 1950s)
Initial state fragmentation De-differentiation
Attendant anxieties must be tolerated
Third state re-introjection or integration
re-differentiation conscious awareness of new
whole
Second state initiate unconscious
scanning Integrate new structure through
countless cross ties
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Reading

• Bohm, D. 1998, On Creativity. London.
  Routledge.
• Erhenzweig, A. 1984ed, The Hidden Order of Art.
  California. Uni of California Press.
• Freire, P. 1978, Pedagogy of the Oppressed
  London. Penguin.
• Fromm, E. 1984, The Fear of Freedom London. ARK
  Paperbacks.
• Krishnamurti. 1978, Beginnings of Learning.
  London. Penguin Books.

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Reading

• Mezirow, J. 1991, Transformative Dimensions of
  Adult Learning. Oxford. Jossey-Bass.
• Negus and Pickering. 2004, Creativity,
  communication and cultural value. London. Sage.
• Nietzsche, 1969ed, Thus Spoke Zarathustra.
  London. Penguin Classics.
• Nussbaum, M. 1997, Cultivating humanity.
  Cambridge. Cambridge Uni Press.

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Contacts and information

• Creativity Centre website www.brighton.ac.uk/creat
  ivity
• InQbate CETL in creativity website
  www.inqbate.co.uk
• Dr Paul Martin p.r.martin_at_brighton.ac.uk
• Martin Studios website www.martinstudios.co.uk