Creativity: What’s your definition?

I have been researching creativity for a while now and besides the fact that I find it so interesting, I also noticed that; the more I find out about definitions, theories, methods, approaches and views, the more mysterious it gets. Everybody has an idea about what is it and what it’s for, but there is no universal definition we all agree upon. You can ask 10 different people what they think creativity is, and I am pretty sure you will get 10 different answers.

Have a look at the following quotes of a few influential people you might know:

‘’The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources’’ Albert Einstein

‘’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 thing.’’ Steve Jobs

‘’The chief enemy of creativity is ‘’good’’ sense.’’ Pablo Picasso

‘’Creativity is more than just being different. Anybody can plan weird; that’s easy. What’s hard is to be as simple as Bach. Making the simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity.’’ Charles Mingus

As you can see the viewpoints are so diverse that we can’t really draw a conclusion looking at what other people said. Important to think about is how YOU define creativity for yourself. How you give shape to your thoughts and how you generate your ideas. Of course it is never wrong to look what others say and think, but eventually it is up to you. Below you can find a collection of TEDtalks about the beauty and difficulty of creativity to give you some inspiration:

Julie Burstein:  4 lessons in Creativity

Elizabeth Gilbert: Your elusive creative genius

David Kelley: How to build your creative confidence

Isaac Mizrahi: Fashion and Creativity

Amy Tan: Where does creativity hide

Steven Johnson: Where good ideas come from

Janet Echelman: Taking imagination seriously

Kirby Ferguson: Embrace the remix

Malcolm McLaren: Authentic creativity vs. karaoke culture

Tim Brown: Tales of creativity and play.

Click here to view these video’s and get inspired!

A.S.