CHAPTER 23
WHAT IS CREATIVITY?
When it comes to creativity, we often think about great scientific discoveries or famous works of art. But creativity is not just for artists and scientists. We need creativity to solve the countless problems we encounter in our workplace and in our daily life. Whether you are a student writing a term paper or a company CEO expanding your business, a creative mind brings better results. Psychologists also tell us that people are happier when they can exercise creativity in their work. The good news is that there are concrete steps you can take to make yourself more creative, and this is what this and the next chapter is all about.
Where do new ideas come from? The simple answer is that new ideas are just old ones combined in new ways. A mobile phone is an old landline phone without the wire. A smart phone is a mobile phone with powerful computer functions. Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata is a creative masterpiece, but what makes it unique is the arrangement of the musical notes, not the individual notes that all composers know. Einstein had the creative insight to put together the famous equation E = mc2, but the concepts of energy, mass, and the speed of light were familiar to all physicists. In some sense then, it is true that there is nothing new under the sun.
The observation that new ideas come from old ones is of practical importance, because it tells us that creativity requires knowledge. Creativity does not happen in a vacuum. Our imagination depends partly on what we know. If you know very little, you can only recombine a few ideas to get new ones. When you know more, the combination of new ideas you can come up with increases exponentially. We often forget that creative achievements are built on past successes by other people. Without Newtonian physics, Einstein probably would not have discovered relativity. Newton himself famously said, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” To create something new, it helps to know what other people have done and which things work and which do not. It is not surprising that creative types are eager learners and they often read a lot, of everything. Remember Mark Twain’s famous quote that “The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.”
Creativity and knowledge
These days, education reforms often emphasize creativity and are critical of rote learning. But we should not forget that creativity relies on knowledge and information as raw material. Bill Gates, chairman of Microsoft, said, “You need to understand things in order to invent beyond them.” Steve Jobs, the CEO of Apple, which is regarded as one of the most innovative companies in the world, has this to say about creative people:
[T]hey were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things. And the reason they were able to do that was that they’ve had more experiences or have thought more about their experiences than other people have. Unfortunately, that’s too rare a commodity. A lot of people in our industry haven’t had very diverse experiences. They don’t have enough dots to connect, and they end up with very linear solutions, without a broad perspective on the problem. The broader one’s understanding of the human experience, the better designs we will have (Wolf, 1996).
Coming up with something new in itself is not hard, but it is not sufficient for creativity. It is easy to think of new ways to combat global warming that nobody has thought of before: kill half the people in the world or switch on all air-conditioners to cool the air. These ideas might be new, but they are just stupid, and producing 1,000 of them will not make you a creative person. Creativity is a matter of coming up with new ideas that are also useful.
This brings us to the important role of critical thinking in promoting creativity. First, we use critical thinking to analyze a problem and identify the limitations of existing solutions. So we know what a better solution might look like. And when we have a new solution, critical thinking helps us determine whether it really works. Actual creative process involves trial and error. We might have to fail a thousand times before hitting on the best solution. Good critical thinking enables us to learn from our mistakes and solve our problems more efficiently. In business, a distinction is often made between a creative idea and an innovation—an idea becomes an innovation when it is implemented and brings about substantial commercial success or social impact. This crucial process of creating a practical impact also requires good critical thinking.
It is sometimes said that critical thinking is bad for creativity because critical thinking kills off new ideas before they are fully developed. However, this is a serious misconception. Critical thinking does not tell us to reject ideas before they are fully tested. It also does not tell us to think and analyze nonstop. If suspending judgment can sometimes promote creativity, it would be rational to do so.
Many people seem to think that creativity is a matter of waiting for inspirations and that inspirations come more readily to geniuses than ordinary people. Our discussion about the role of knowledge and critical thinking tell us that this is not correct. Also, some psychologists suggest that creative people usually have above-average IQs, but beyond an IQ of 120, extremely high IQ makes little difference to the degree of creativity. And if we look at the case histories of famous creative geniuses, we find that they are often hardworking and disciplined, and their successes broadly follow the 10-year rule discussed earlier (see Section 1.3.2). Mozart is a good example. The popular legend is that he was a genius who created wonderful music without effort. The truth is that whatever innate talents he had, he worked extremely hard all through his life. Mozart’s father taught him music when he was a kid, and by the time Mozart was 28, his hands were already deformed because of the constant practice and composing. This dedication and hard work produced a database of musical knowledge and ideas Mozart could draw on again and again. Mozart himself emphasized this fact in a letter to a friend, People err who think my art comes easily to me. I assure you, dear friend, nobody has devoted so much time and thought to composition as I. There is not a famous master whose music I have not industriously studied through many times (Tharp, 2003, p.27).
23.1 THE CREATIVITY CYCLE
Although there is no algorithm for generating new and useful ideas, there is actually a lot we can do to become more creative. Creative people are often diligent, disciplined, and highly focused. Many have a daily work routine that they steadfastly follow. The work ethic is motivated and sustained by a passion about their work. Ultimately, you have to discover for yourself what you love to do, and the kind of environment and lifestyle that make you more productive. But whatever the details, the work cycle often follows a four-step procedure:1
Step 1: Preparation
Start by gathering information about your problem. This might mean going to the library, searching the web, talking to people, or collecting data or other items. Keep everything you have found in a way that you can access them easily, whether in a notebook, a box, or a computer. At this stage, you just collect whatever might be relevant without too much filtering or analysis. This is not as simple as it sounds. Sometimes people are too impatient, and they want to make great discoveries even when they do not know enough. Others might be unwilling to explore unfamiliar territory and so fail to gather the data they need. So broaden your mind and think about all possible sources that might help you in your task.
Step 2: Exploration
At some point, we need to stop collecting and start analyzing and digesting what we have collected. This might mean trying to classify the material, reorganize them, look at them from different perspectives, and trying to connect ideas and draw conclusions. The aim is to use the connections to come up with a new and useful idea. In the next chapter, we shall look at a list of thinking techniques that can help us accomplish this, but remember that this part of the creative process requires a lot of concentration, analysis, and patience. If possible, avoid all distractions and devote 100% of your attention to the task for a long period of time. A few things might then happen. First, we might get some preliminary ideas and conclusions about what might or might not work. So make sure that you always have a notebook ready in case you need to record your thoughts. Writing them down can make the ideas clearer, and we can build on them or revisit them later. Second, we might discover gaps in the collected material. If so we need to fill in these gaps ourselves or collect some more data. Finally, it can get mentally exhausting trying to find order in chaos. But do not give up so soon even if you do not seem to be getting anywhere. Keep trying and come up with a few more observations. Go further than where you think you can go, and when you absolutely cannot continue, you have earned your well-deserved break.
Step 3: Incubation
This is when you leave your task aside, relax, and forget about what you have been doing, and just wait. Many of us might have had the experience of being unable to solve a problem, but after a good night’s sleep the solution came up suddenly the next morning. Or an idea might come to you while you are listening to music, taking a shower, or watching a movie. For some strange reason, a period of inactivity after intensive thinking does seem to promote creativity. The fact that sleep enhances creativity is well documented. Some people say it is because it gives a chance for the unconscious mind work on the problem. But maybe a period of timeout helps us look at the problem with a fresh eye. But whatever the explanation might be, working as hard as we can and then taking a break appears to be an effective strategy for most people. You need to find some activity (or inactivity) that stimulates your imagination most. Of course, there is no guarantee that taking a break will produce a creative idea inevitably. In that case, we need to go back to either step 1 or 2 and try again.
Step 4: Verification
Once we have obtained some promising ideas, we should check whether they really work and whether they can be improved further. When we are dealing with a problem that requires a complex solution, it is very rare that the first solution we come up with is the perfect one. If the proposal turns out not to work, we should try to understand why, so that we can avoid similar mistakes in the future. Even when we have found the perfect solution, we can always review the whole creative process to see how we can repeat the success.
Although we often read about the successes of creative people, we usually pay less attention to their failures. But many successful people are successful precisely because they are willing to take risks and fail, or they have failed spectacularly but have managed to learn from their failures and rise above them. What is important is that we know why we fail and learn from our mistakes. Here are some main reasons why people fail in their creative endeavors:2
- Failure due to lack of knowledge: New ideas are based on past knowledge. Your idea might not be successful if you do not know enough, or you lack the relevant skills. Response: Learn more.
- Failure of concept: This means there is something fundamentally wrong with the initial idea or theory. Whether in science or in art, creativity always contains an element of luck. Sometimes we discover that our favorite approach turns out to be a dead end, but only after considerable time and resources have been spent. Response: Tough luck. Ditch the approach decisively and quickly, and move on to something else.
- Failure of judgment: You can have the right idea, but make the wrong decision in executing and developing it. Maybe you were careless about the details. Maybe you did not work fast enough and other people beat you to it. Again you might also just be unlucky and made the wrong call. Response: Reflect and improve your work process, especially if you have failed the same way before.
- Failure of attitude: Forging a new path where others have not gone before requires courage and the right balance of attitude. Fear of failure causes us to abandon an idea before it comes to fruition. Complacency makes us think we can get away with mediocrity without significant sacrifice. Denial results in a stubborn refusal to abandon a hopeless project and a failure to remedy our own weaknesses. Response: Work harder to avoid failure. Allow yourself to fail in private and learn from the mistakes so it is less likely for you to fail in public and look foolish. Be brutally honest to yourself and listen to people you can trust, even if you do not like what they have to say.
The creativity formula at work
The work habits of many creative people seem to follow the creativity formula very closely. A recent example is Andrew Wiles, a mathematician famous for proving Fermat’s Last Theorem in 1995. The well-known theorem is easy enough to be understood by a 10-year-old, but nobody had been able to prove it for 300 years. Wiles spent 8 years working on the proof, and this is how he worked:
I used to come up to my study, and start trying to find patterns.… I would wake up with it first thing in the morning, I would be thinking about it all day, and I would be thinking about it when I went to sleep. Without distraction, I would have the same thing going round and round in my mind.… When I got stuck and I didn’t know what to do next, I would go out for a walk.… Walking has a very good effect in that you’re in this state of relaxation, but at the same time you’re allowing the sub-conscious to work on you (PBS, 2010).
Another example is the prolific British philosopher Bertrand Russell (1872–1970), who won the Nobel Prize in literature in 1950:
It appeared that after first contemplating a book on some subject, and after giving serious preliminary attention to it, I needed a period of sub-conscious incubation which could not be hurried and was if anything impeded by deliberate thinking.… Having, by a time of very intense concentration, planted the problem in my sub-consciousness, it would germinate underground until, suddenly, the solution emerged with blinding clarity, so that it only remained to write down what had appeared as if in a revelation (Russell, 2003).
EXERCISES
23.1 
There is no standard test that measures creativity, and it is not clear if such a test is even possible. But this does not stop psychologists from trying. One short test is to generate as many possibilities as possible within a limited time, the more the better. You can also try to think of ideas that no one else might think of. Here are some exercises to try out. You have three minutes for each question.
a) Think of as many uses as you can for a pencil.
b) Consider the typical Barbie doll, a plastic doll with clothes and movable limbs. Think of ways to improve it so that it is more fun to play with.
c) Imagine that people do not need to sleep anymore. Think of as many consequences as you can.
d) Imagine that people could transport themselves from one place to another just by twitching their fingers. What might happen as a result?
23.2 Imagining new possibilities is an essential part of creative thinking. Think about ways to deal with these problems.
a) Jack and Jill have been dating but now they quarrel all the time when they meet up. Still, they do not want to break up completely yet.
b) We need more prisons, but no additional money should be spent on the prison system.
23.3 A hiker started walking up a mountain at 1:00 p.m. along a path. He reached the top at 6:00 p.m. and camped there for the night. The next day at exactly 1:00 p.m., he walked down along the same path, and reached the starting point at 6:00 p.m. It is not known whether he stopped along the way, or how fast he was walking. Is there enough information to determine whether there was a point on the path where he passed by at the same time on both days?
23.4 Try to gain better insight into your own creative thinking. Here are some questions to think about:
a) Recall a situation in which you had to try very hard to solve a difficult problem. What did you do? Was your method similar to the creativity formula? How could you have done it better?
b) What kind of environment is most conducive to your creativity?
c) Is there any specific area where you want to become more creative? Who are the successful people in this area? Can you read more about them and see what you can learn from them? Have you put in about 10,000 hours of training or study in this area? If not, roughly how many more hours do you need?
1 See Young (1975), a short and well-written book about this work process. German physiologist and physicist Hermann von Helmholtz (1821–1894) had a similar idea.
2 The list is adapted from Tharp (2003), a wonderful book on creativity. Highly recommended.