Why embracing creativity is so important

Expressing our innate creativity is essential in many areas of life. Creative problem solvers tend to do well as leaders. From where does creativity arise? Does it stem from our thoughts, or are thoughts merely a medium of expression of that innate gift?

In the mind, thoughts are like islands, and the space around those thoughts is like the water around an island. Just as we are land dwellers, not sea dwellers, our attention lives on thoughts and not the space around them. The spark of creativity exists not as a thought but as latent energy surrounding our thoughts. We cannot think our way into creativity.  

Creativity implies spontaneity, and it happens in the present. To be spontaneous, we must let go of the old and embrace the new. Thoughts carry ideas, and the moment we think of an idea, it is already in the past. Thinking involves time. Our attention shifts to the past to retrieve knowledge we may have gained. We then bring that knowledge to the present and create something new out of the old.

In contrast, in creativity, there is no time involved. All of us have probably experienced moments where a sudden inspiration or a new way of looking at things arises. It comes not from thinking about it or wondering how. It just happens, and that is spontaneous creativity.

Creativity also means that we bring something into the world. It could be a new way of looking at conventional problems. Steve Jobs said this about creativity, “Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things.”

We only see one perspective when we are sitting on an island looking out to the sea—the view from where we are. However, if we were on a boat, we would see a completely different view of the island, or we may see other islands not visible from the shore. Similarly, when our attention enters the space between thoughts, we experience a new dimension of the mind. We leave the programmed and conditioned world of ideas and free ourselves to spontaneous intuitions.

When we distance ourselves from our usual pattern of thoughts, that distance makes it easier to connect the dots between seemingly unrelated ideas. Perhaps many creative geniuses can keep their attention in the thought-free void without their knowledge. But can it be done consciously?

Creative thinkers don’t dwell on negativity.

Just as our legs give us the freedom to move around, we can direct our attention anywhere we choose. The first step is recognizing that we can consciously direct our attention away from our thoughts. A significant impediment to taking our attention away from our thoughts is our tendency to dwell on negativity. When we experience negative thoughts, we instinctively want to move away from them, but we are usually not very successful. However, if we cut the emotional cord that binds us to our thoughts, we set those thoughts free, and our attention moves far enough away that those thoughts lose power over us. Cutting the emotional cord happens when we watch thoughts. However painful they may be, if we keep our attention on them without giving into a reflex reaction, those thoughts will drift away and leave for good.

We spend a lot of our mental energy processing negative and troublesome thoughts. But through consciously watching them and not reacting, we begin to create more space in the mind. As thoughts thin out, we find thought-free pockets to rest our attention. As a fisherman who drops a line and waits for fish to take the bait, we can ‘drop’ our questions and problems we seek to solve into a thought-free void. Being patient and observant in that stillness—two qualities of a good fisherman—increases the chance of catching creative intuitions we can apply to problem-solving. As Steve Jobs said, creativity involves not ‘doing anything’ but ‘seeing something by connecting experiences and synthesizing new things.’