Perreault Magazine / February, 2014 50
Creativity is within each
and every one of us
but the key question is:
how can we harness it?
First we need to understand where creativity comes from.
Contrary to popular belief, creativity is not just in the right side of our brain. The widespread myth is based on studies conducted in the 1960's and 1970's by Nobel laureate Roger Sperry. These experiments involved the separation of the left and right brain by cutting the joining tracts of the corpus callosum. In these experiments he observed that there were certain areas of activity that were more prominent on the left versus the right brain. Based on these studies, theories about our creative and logic brain raised until today.
In August 2013, Dr. Jeff Anderson and colleagues from the University of Utah conducted a series of experiments that unintentionally put an end to left and right brain theories. In their study they analyzed over 1000 brains from people aging 7 to 29 and found no evidence that people use one side stronger than the other.
It is true that there are prominent logical and prominent creative people but the reality is that both halves of our brains work in cohort sending signals from one side to the next to perform almost any task whether it be a mathematical problem or playing piano.
Where does creativity
come from?
I believe that true genius comes from combining both creative and logical thinking. Take for example Leonardo Da Vinci a renaissance genius who was able to master both. He created a new movement in the world of art (his creative side) and he was able to engineer draw bridges and irrigation systems (his logical side)
We are all born with the ability to develop our creative and our logical minds. In fact, almost everything you do in life is a combination of both. You have to look at both of them from an out of the box perspective. Being creative does not have to mean that you can paint or play an instrument, creativity is heavily used by doctors, architects and entrepreneurs as well. Being able to solve a complicated task at work not only involves thinking clearly and logically but also creatively in order to find a solution to that problem. The same goes in reverse, an artist who is creating a master piece has to undergo a complex and logical thought process to come up with that master piece.
I think part of the problem we have been facing in our life started early on in life. When we were young children our brains were in its purest creative form, i am sure you can remember how you played with your toys, how you drew and created fantasy stories and how you were able to have supernatural powers using a simple rock and a stick. That is true creative out of the box thinking process at its best.
What happened with all that creativity? Where did it go?
We can start by analyzing our education system. In the US and in most areas of the world we focus very hard on developing logical thinking skills leaving aside our creative skills. By the time our children are in junior high school their creative skills development drop considerably. Think when you were in high school, how many classes that spark creativity where you taking? Take it a step further, let’s focus on your college years. If you were a science or an economics major for instance, how much creativity were you subjected to?
Where has our creativity gone?
by Dr. German Garcia-Fresco
Neuroscientist