Creative technique series:
What is Creativity?
We might say that creativity is about difference. A Difference but a very different difference!
A difference that is unique which can be produced through an intentional creative process but also quite by accident, and more, by an intentional and accidental process.
This special difference might be called a “Differa”, if you will, a unit of difference. Creativity would then be a process by which we create Differa. The more different the Differa, the more unique the Differa, the more creativity there is.
But all of this is academic, boring and obtuse. And this does not get us nearer to the meaning of creativity.
Why?! Because creativity is a behavior, it is a feeling, it is a way of being. If you discuss creativity as products, you end up discussing it from the outside like a researcher. You cannot really know creativity by observing its results; you must go inside to truly know it. At the same time this is possible for ALL of us, because all of us have the neurological equipment to be creative, even if our jobs or school systems have denied this to us.
Creativity is an experience above all. An experience hardwired into your brain, possible in you and me and even “them” too. Creativity arises from various parts of your neurology; it is a perception, feeling, method.
Creativity is a spirit, a force, and life itself. It bursts out. It breaks through all barriers set up within your mind and outside of it. Creativity batters down the doors and walls. That is what creativity is – a force, a spirit, life itself that will not be contained.
Since we live in an age that suppresses creativity or distorts creativity into the mis-creative, we must see the act of creativity as a form of liberation. Add to this that the creative mind is rebellious by nature and we get an explosive situation for established authorities.
So after we grasp this important point, then we can get to the “technical” issues of creativity.
But first what is a Genio?
A “Genio” is a Human who has developed high creative skills, but everyone has inborn Genio skills that can be developed, thus everyone can be a Genio. “Genio” simply means creativity in this language here. “Genio” comes from the same root word as “genius”.
Genio is an essential force of the Diverse. Genio is the essence of the process of differentiation in the cosmos. Genio created our Diverse reality. Genio is in all things, Genio is in Humanity. Genio is the genius of the cosmos; Genio is the genius in all of us. In the Diverse we all have genius within us. The Diverse makes genius democratic and mass.
And more, Genio is a prime need of a Human being, Genio makes life worth living, and Genio is life. The genesis of the world brought Genio to all things, genesis is within you and everyone, and it is the most sacred of Human powers.
Genio is the self-conscious Diverse, it is the Diverse brought to self awareness, the Diverse awake.
Creativity ultimately comes from Nature and the cosmos for Humans are not the only creative force which exists. In fact, our creativity is derived from Nature; ours is simply conscious and planned while Nature’s is spontaneous yet remarkably skillful at the same time.
Biological evolution is creativity, DNA is creative. If you examine Nature you will find great overlap between natural creativity and Human creativity in methods and techniques, believe it or not!
Creativity is a kind of magic, it is an everyday magic, ubiquitous magic that inhabits everything. It can be understood, analyzed, catechismed, converted to curriculum, taught, disseminated far and wide. It is a profound power to which all have access. And it is closer to the true essence and power of the cosmos than logic or analysis. Nature does not think or deduce or categorize, but it does innovate and mutate, and it even imagines in its own way.
And when we are creative we actually feel our connection to this core energy and dynamic of all things. Art, invention and discovery return us to our beginning, and to the beginning of all things, they remind us what life is, where life comes from, how we are to live life, why we are made the way we are, who we are.
Creativity is a very complex topic to write about. When you try to narrow it down, it gets away from you. Creativity is a vast subject covering psychology, emotions, neurology, philosophy, art, theology, ethics, techniques, society and culture and more. Because it is about behavior and our brains it cannot be easily pinned down like economics or government. Creativity is a perception that looks at an infinity of things, and sees creativity in all things too. Creativity seems almost limitless in scope. It is a universe looking out upon a universe trying to create new universes.
For the sake of simplicity the issues of creativity here are divided into these various groups below. (If you want more discussion than offered here, please see the free ebook Dictionary of Creativity)
ISSUES OF THE ETHERIAL BREAK:
Lack of creativity is the issue in this age, so the first point about creativity is its unleashing, that is, the creativity of creativity.
To be creative we must make an “etherial break” with the logical mind; we must exit the realm of abstract reason with its absolute rules and strange prejudices and paranoid dogma. Then other realms of the psyche gain freedom and act independently. Sensations, emotions, sphere mind, subconscious, memory, morality, wisdom, the doing mind and more are liberated. This revolution frees all realms and creates some chaos. But this act ends the dominion of the rational mind and allows the creative mind to rise, and very importantly to cooperate with other minds in its projects. Just the freedom of other spheres will lead to creativity – sensation, memories, emotions, dreams, voices will spark new ideas.
The creative mind is one mind that works out of various places in your neurology (right brain and prefrontal cortex). When the free creative mind is ready, it can return to the logical mind and establish a new relationship with it. The two can work together to finish projects. Further, all the sub-minds may be used in a project or experience; the creative mind may be working with many other perceptions at once. We get a kind of general brain improvisation happening.
ISSUES IN SPECIFIC CREATIVE TECHNIQUES:
There are many issues of technique as the list below shows:
Singularity, Flash, Metaphor, Rule Formation, Randomness, Recombination, Juxtaposition, Re-Purposing, Novelty, Non-Imitation, Absurdity, Negation, Play, Humor, Story Writing, Generality, Intuition, Vagueness, Wholes, Form, Collecting, Excepting, Induction, Mystery, Word, Subsume and the Emply, Distinction, Synthesis and Whole, Re-paradigm, Structural similarity, Singularity to complexity, Thinking in Dualities, Vague Whole Word, Chaos , Filling in Gaps, Grammatical rule breaking, Suspension of theme/content/pre-existing idea, Explaining the New, Improvisation and more.
All of these issues above are important; it is hard for the author to say a few are more important than the rest. Randomness is essential in developing an alertness and openness toward spontaneous possibilities. Synthesis and whole is important for many new things come from thinking in these terms. The Subsume idea of returning to a sort of vague whole state of mind is highly critical. But flash thinking, negation and other skills are necessary too. One just does not know which technique will be key to making a breakthrough or leap. You just don’t know, so you are forced to keep developing and expanding your techniques the whole of your life. So creative technique are themselves the subject of creativity. And the problems of life, society and history give us no respite from creativity.
ISSUES IN OVERALL BRAIN MANAGEMENT:
Related to the above list are the issues of overall management of the whole mind.
Here we find that simple improvisation to make a creative product may develop into a higher, more complex skill of improvising your various sub-minds all together in the service of a project or goal. Particularly, in challenging situations we learn to improvise the whole brain to solve a problem.
There are other issues of management having to do with techniques of meditation and disconnection, juggling multiple awareness, focus vs. improvisation, wisdom vs. doing, conscious behavior vs. subconscious behavior and so on.
The creative mind cannot be separated from all other minds, so we must develop a way of looking at overall behavior, and this leads to methods of overall management. All the other sub-minds can aid the creative mind in its goals and interests, but at the same time the creative mind will have to be one player in an ensemble that has purposes beyond just creativity.
So here a thesis of creativity has limits as all things do in a Diverse. But at the same time creativity now makes a leap from its narrower goals to the larger task of creativity applied to the whole of brain management, and to the improvisation of our whole mind as a creative technique itself.
ISSUES OF EMOTIONS, PSYCHOLOGY AND CONDITIONS:
There are literally hundreds of issues about psychology when it comes to creativity.
Below is a list of some of these issues, some major, some minor:
Ego, self confidence, rebellion, joy and depression, voice and external messages, the subconscious, sensations, memory, wisdom, mystery, intuition, view of time, other people, doldrums, creative will, rational and not rational, directness, emotions and dysfunction, fear, anger, love, love of work, idealism, emptiness, etheria, self identity, fecundity, the future, gender, rights, morality, improvisation vs. plan, self inspiration, Isothink, fantasy mind/child elaboration, multiple projects, moment circling, momentia, multiple perception, self growth, perfectionism, personal myth, popularity vs. creativity, power, random lifestyle, Reality, illusion and Tanginot, boredom, sleep, diet exercise , fasting, managing temptations, diverse thought methods, range thinking, your creative tree, transcendent emotions, vapor to structure, destruction/violence/force, limits and creativity, forcing creativity, margin of acceptance, stress and creativity........and many more issues.
The issues are legion. We are complex beings, with a many sides to ourselves. When we assay creativity and seek its maximum functioning, we are confronted with an overwhelming array of issues.
ISSUES IN ASSEMBLY:
One large set of issues simply has to do with making a creative product. Beyond the above list of simple creative techniques, we also have to develop methods for assembling all of our output, our warehouse of parts into a singular thing. This can be challenging, the topics are varied:
Problem solving, production stages, thread and sphere mind together, singularity to complexity, systematizing, managing fecundity, retaining mystery and openness for development, termination of work, two track strategy of form and content, managing social creativity, types of feedback .... and more issues
SOCIAL ISSUES:
This includes education in creativity, emotions, psychology, use of multiple minds and self identity. This topic also includes social conditions that suppress creativity such as Polythea, media vertigo, myth substitution, consumerism etc. Other topics include theft of creativity, suppression of invention, Genio rights, the rise of mis-creativity and dis-art, Historical Differentiation and creativity, features of thread mind culture, the need for a Genio culture and its institutions, the concept of a Geniotariat, the Rights of the creative, the Future as art, ending the crisis of creativity and more.
Education is also a very, very important issue in this category and probably should break out into its own distinct category.
ISSUES IN SOCIAL CREATIVITY
Actually, social creativity breaks into its own category of creative technique. It follows from a combination of ideas about individual creative techniques to theories of sociology, organization and leadership, and to critiques of the current culture. So here we are dealing with issues of direct and indirect leadership, chaos and competition, facilitators and agents, direct democracy, organizational forms, types of social creative leadership, errors of social creative leadership and more.
ISSUES IN SELF TRANSFORMATION:
Lastly are discussions about Self Genio and creativity, how they are closely related. Personal transformation is a creative process, and while we have rules having to do with emotions, identity and psychology, we also have techniques that draw upon creative theory itself. In other words, the basic themes of creativity apply not only to ideas or art or inventions but also to self development too.
This list of topics does not exhaust the general categories at all. You may include a bundled topic around the themes of the presentation of a creative work or themes of philosophy or spirit, or break up the social category by adding education and so on. This is just a starting list in an attempt to corral as many issues as possible.
This article is one in a series on creative technique. There are more to come which will go into the details that have been raised above. In the meantime if you are interested in more, please see the free ebook, The Dictionary of Creativity—it has over 300 entries on various topics. Also, please look on the Axxiad News site for articles on creativity.
The Creative Technique Series will try to elaborate on key issues of method in the upcoming months.
Cage Innoye
Axxiad News