August 18, 2011
“All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up. -- Pablo Picasso
Are you searching for ways to be more imaginative and creative and to make life simpler?
If so, I would suggest this. Ask a kid or a senior.
Here's why. Kids and seniors know the secret of creativity.
For everyone else somewhere between our childhood and the September of our lives, creativity often appears to take a vacation.
Nonetheless, we can be creative whenever we want, can't we? In fact, we are all Michelangelos at heart, if we could just figure out how to remain creative.
I like the following definition of creativity from Charles Mingus, American musician, who says, "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."
Therefore, creativity equals simplicity. That's hard to do when we are in the 'busy' years of our lives.
In our childhood years, we knew how to make complex things simple, awesomely simple, as Charles Mingus noted. However, life happened in between and our imagination went on hiatus, meaning a long break.
We wish it stayed with us, but it didn't.
Instead, our creativity became what McDonald's founder Ray Kroc once observed, " Creativity is a highfalutin word for the work I have to do between now and Tuesday."
There was no time or energy to be creative.
Then, 'faster than a speeding bullet', the 'senior' years arrive, although we may no longer feel like Superman or Superwoman. There is good news, however, because those years come with a bonus.
Creativity returns and leads seniors to dreams they left behind as children.
Aha, the very same reason dessert is served last. It's the best part.
Casey Mase wrote a story for the blog Live Now in which she explored the possibility that creativity does indeed increase with age.
She asks each of us to remember the 'creative types' we encountered in our youth. You remember the type, the ones who never cared what others thought and seemed to have the gift of free self-expression.
Turns out a recent Psychology Today article presents the theory that people over the age of 65 are exuding characteristics of creative artists, those same creative free spirits of our youth.
Yes, they mean those kids we remember from high school who ignored social expectations and did whatever they pleased.
Artist Louise Nevelson commented that she never feels age and that if you have creative work, you don't age.
Perhaps that is why so many over the age of 60 excel at creative pursuits and find great joy in them, such as oil painting, pastels, carpentry, gardening, jewelry making, music, poetry, woodworking or writing.
Relaxation sets in, boundaries disappear and creativity returns.
In Casey Mase's blog, she explains more of this Psychology Today premise, "The area of the brain involved in self-conscious awareness and censoring, the prefrontal cortex, is thinner in the aging brain. In a population of older adults, this may account for their reduced need for acceptance and an ambition to speak their minds--common traits among artists."
Thus, the brains of creative artists and the aging could be similar.
Casey's blog poses the question, "Could the September of your life be the best time to pursue the creative dreams of your youth? And the converse of that: If in our youth we had let go of our stresses, self-censorship and self-consciousness, could we have been the creative souls we wanted to be?"
Since kids know a lot, I asked Grandson Cole, age 8, what he thought.
He showed me his Dude Diary, in which all the answers of the universe are stored.
The diary asked, "Dude, what's on your mind? What are you thinking about man?"
Cole wrote, "Pretty much, I just want to draw a nice cat and dog."
And that, dear readers, is simplicity and creativity at its best.
