Dissecting the term “Creativity”

By Noman Mahmood

The problem with the word “creativity” is that it is often overused without being understood clearly. Especially in the modern times when creativity is seen as the new iconic academic term for everyone, it is very hard to make them understand and identify the exact connotation of it.

Before proceeding we need to understand the modern common concept of creativity. We can refer to Wikipedia for its definition:

| The use of imagination or original ideas to creating something new; inventiveness |

The definition above that is provided by Wikipedia is a general understanding of this term in modern times, which is to bring out something original through thinking. In simple words a person who produces a totally new thought. In hearing out this definition normally, one can assume it to be very glamorous, but there is a serious error when it comes to the implementation of the process of creativity. But before we understand the problem of it, we have to examine the roots of this particular definition. The idea of the original thought is a byproduct of the philosophy of rationality which actually links back to the starting of the universal thinking in the period of renaissance.

Let us now see what Britannica has to say about the Renaissance man:

| Renaissance Man, also called universal man, Italian Uomo Universale, an ideal that developed in Renaissance Italy from the notion expressed by one of its most accomplished representatives, Leon Battista Alberti (1404-72), that “a man can do all things if he will.” The ideal embodied the basic tenets of Renaissance Humanism, which considered man the centre of the universe, limitless in his capacities for development, led to the notion that men should try to embrace all knowledge and develop their own capacities as fully as possible |

The above information regarding Renaissance man actually explains the exact concept these thinkers had. For them rationality was above all, and thus capable of making them eligible of making their own rules and develop thoughts that are totally independent of anything. The fallacy in such kind of thinking lies in thinking oneself as totally independent and perfect, therefore producing a thought that is totally independent and perfect. This thought was actually generated to reject divinity of God, so that man could think of himself as sovereign over himself and everything. This was not clearly apparent until the time of “Age of Enlightenment”, therefore the concept of original idea is mostly advocated by the liberalist mindsets, who themselves are the product of the age of enlightenment period.

Following the above definitions one might think that creativity is a process of total independence and hence producing a totally independent output, which truly is not practical at all. A human being’s mind is totally dependent upon what he does all his life, which includes his decisions, experiences and also his thoughts.

Substantially an idea is a product of several thoughts that come up with the help of your surroundings and past experiences. It can never be known as an independent variable in the literal sense of mathematics.
The first rejection of the idea of modern concept creativity can be found in the writings of one of the early Greek philosopher, Plato, who says in a dialogue:

| Will we say, a painter, creates something new?” Plato answers, “Certainly not, he simply imitates” |

Even though a painter will show you something that you might not have seen before, but it does not indicate that what he is showing you is an independent element and has complete independence over everything. Surely the elements in it are totally dependent on his past and his surroundings.

An idea truly is a composite of many elements that you didn’t bring to this world, but existed before you.

According to Mark Twain:

| There is no such thing as a new idea. It is impossible. We simply take a lot of old ideas and put them into a sort of mental kaleidoscope. We give them a turn and they make new and curious combinations. We keep on turning and making new combinations indefinitely; but they are the same old pieces of colored glass that have been in use through all the ages |

It could be quite clear that the concept of creativity for people like Mark Twain and Plato was synonymous to discovery and innovation. For them everything existed before you existed and all you had to do was to tweak it to give it a new shape. It’s like sculpting towards a desired form.
Although creativity can have many dimensions but the core of it is actually about how you express yourself in different ways. In simple understanding, a creative person is simply a person who knows how to express himself artistically in a way that is different from many. Again, the point of consideration is “different from many” but not different in the sense of total independence.
There is no such thing as an original idea/thought. It’s all an extension, subtraction or improvement in order to meet particular need or requirement.

What exactly is the drawback of the concept of creativity in terms of “original idea”?
This kind of thinking actually gives rise to selfishness in terms of originality which results in the following:

1- Wastage of time - Since one is always looking for a thought above all. A thought with total supremacy, one keeps on rejecting thoughts that sounds similar to the person, i.e. a similar kind of idea that was once in past or already in the present attached to someone.  He keeps on spending time in trying to bring out a thought that has no connection at all of any kind of to any person or product in present or past. He spends more than half of time in developing something that can never exist in the form of total independence.

2- Lack of improvement – When one is in the mindset of producing totally original, one always become selfish of what he thinks so for him that idea remains original, he is always afraid of sharing it with others, therefore always fails to get it improved, or even get feedback to how his idea might have an impact or no impact.

3- Expense due Selfishness – Since he is in too much love with his thought because he thinks it is original and independent from anything, he tries to protect it with patent laws. It actually means monopolizing the thought by thinking that the sovereignty of the idea belongs to that person. Such kind of selfish love leads to expenses that is not worthy of value. In actuality we can relate it with the hoarding of thoughts and knowledge. Education is nothing but analysis of thoughts and when you try to protect it, you are actually claiming yourself to be the producer something that in reality is not an independent product of your mind.

4- Over protectiveness can lead to failure – When you are over protective about your thoughts, you don’t get enough feedback to analyze the perspectives of others regarding your idea, therefore before implementation most of the times the person is unable to analyze its pros and cons, plus you put in the money for its patent that you are not even sure of will have high percent of success or not. Since you believe its success rate from your own point of view you always fail to fight back when it gets launched in the society. It all happens because you have are living in this assumption that your idea is independent and will be successful.

5- People don’t need “new thought”, they need “good thought” – Since you are always into the fallacy of bringing in new thought in front of others, it almost makes you think it is the secret to success, when in fact people really don’t care of how new it is. What they care for more is that how good it is for them even if it reflects similarities with other ideas. The idea should solve their problems. You will never see people chanting how new the product is, they will always chant how good the product is.

6- Depression – Since human beings are not perfect, therefore having such thinking can make you assume about yourself as a perfect creation with a perfect pattern of thought generation.  Developing such a mindset will want you to have a perfect outcome with an error less thought. This great fallacy can lead to severe kind of depressions because an imperfect being can never product perfect thought, and therefore failures of such thoughts after implementation can be disastrous to one’s mind. It also gives rise to egotistical mindset when you really believe your idea is perfect and want it to be successful, it is at this time that you different wrong approaches to make it successful at any cost.

So what is creativity exactly?
Creativity is the process of discovering thoughts and expressing it artistically in different ways which has “least” dependency over its surroundings, present and past.

Here is what Al-Beruni has to say about the mind of man:

| Our learning is no more than remembering what we have learned in the past. Forgetting is the passing away of knowledge, and learning is remembering what the soul new before it came into the body |

Human beings are just the rememberers and connectors of what already exists, all we have to is discover them and express it.

The magnificence of this concept of creativity requires you to be totally dependent upon how you interact with yourself and your surroundings to the maximum, since it requires combinatorial, collaborative and communication skills with a heart that can understand others and a mind that can solve. It requires you to interact with almost everything and ease out the problems for you and make you considerate and open minded with more acceptances to failure, mistakes, and errors.

Remember, if human beings were perfect or had the capability to achieve perfection, they wouldn’t have required creativity; therefore we should be exploratory in our thinking and shouldn’t burden ourselves with something we can never be.