Some people view creativity as a personality trait. They think it really isn’t something to be learned, just hire someone who can do it better. It comes easier to some, that much is true, but not all can learn it so easily. Creativity is not just something that people either have or don’t have, it is a learned trait.
How do I know this?
I was born in a family full of logical thinkers/business majors. My dad is an IT manager, my mom was going to major in accounting, my brother in marketing, and my sister in business communications. Meanwhile, I am a writer and artist… A mutant personality in my immediate family. Logical thinking does not come natural to me. (Queue my family mumbling in agreement.)
Because of this, for a long time I thought I had to find something other than writing to make a living. I forced myself to learn logical thinking and business, and it was not easy. I even took a logic and business class to strengthen my abilities. Over time, logical thinking became more natural and I learned how extremely useful a tool it can be alongside my creative mindset.
I realized logical thinking and creativity should go hand-in-hand. If you think about it, every craft you ever did as a child had to have reasoning in it somewhere. The popsicle stick house you did when you were four years old was not held up by faith and trust, it was probably held up by Elmer’s Glue™.
Creativity is the ability to come up with outrageous ideas; logic is knowing when or how to use those ideas.
Another revelation I had in the midst of my logic class involved me having to relearn some of my creative habits. In focusing purely on logic, I left out the creative aspect of thinking. Having discovered this, I knew I couldn’t have my writing career be fully ‘business’ or fully ‘creative.’ Those two concepts need each other to thrive.
It’s a tightrope walk. One has to balance both boosting their career through marketing or communication, but also they have to foster their own creativity in order to generate unique ideas to build up their business.
Now, I know this was a broad post, so in turn I am going to go a little bit more in depth about some of these concepts over several blog posts. Let’s start by clearly stating these false perceptions on creativity I will be evaluating:
- One cannot learn how to be creative.
- Those who are creative cannot possibly thrive in the business world.
- Those in the business world cannot possibly be creative.
- One can’t make a living if they focus too much on their creativity.
- There are no more unique ideas left.
Writing Rachel's Story 