Thursday, July 1, 2010

What is creativity?



In the recent times I have seen 3 movies that made me think about the question! what is creativity. The movies I am talking about are Wake up sid, Rock on, Three Idiots. The media and movies have created an image that a creative person is one who has very long curls,(trying to copy einstien) has a rugged look with a rustic beard, or a frenchie, wears odd looking spectacles, is either a painter, sculptor, dancer, stylist or a movie director, keeps blabbering sense on every issue etc etc. For example the protagonist sid in the movie hates wearing formals, thinks that going to his dad's office which is into the production of bathroom accessories is very boring and not even worth a BMW. So he ends up as a photographer enjoying the sceneries and works with a bunch of "different" people who publish a very high class time pass magazine with rich photographs in it. They do all this for me to say that - "yes this useless fellow is very sensitive and creative". So his father played by brilliant Anupam kher is a big fat loser who zipped his creative serum only to build what? A useless boring business empire. Come on give a break.

And in Rock on our hero whose life is made redundant by a fat paying investment banker job rediscovers himself by taking up his passion! Music. That lets him trigger the his brain and look people as people. And he understands his supportive wife prachi only when he was "CREATIVE". In 3 Idiots, our wangudu/rancho is termed very creative. Finally an engineer has come in that category :), but after what? 400 PATENTS!. My question is how do you quantify a person as creative? Say I am writing this parody on some of the cult classic movies. I am basically a engineer who s still studying. Mind you for the creative geniuses engineering is one of the most boring things to do. How can I be creative? or am I creative? Will people just about include me in that list as I vent out my creative vacuum in this blog? Load of bullshit.

Creativity raises out of how we think. This lists out the characteristics of the creative person. So my question is can a common man with limited skill set clouded by lust and materialistic needs be creative? Yes ofcourse. We can be creative in every walk of life. Creativity is the bringing into being of something which did not exist before, either as a product, a process or a thought.In fact, we are all creative every day because we are constantly changing the ideas which we hold about the world about us. Creativity does not have to be about developing something new to the world, it is more to do with developing something new to ourselves. When we change ourselves, the world changes with us, both in the way that the world is affected by our changed actions and in the changed way that we experience the world.
Our mind is a canvass that is never ending. Use it to make your day today happenings interesting. If you are creative, do something different, however minuscule it is, you have a sense of satisfaction that cannot be put in words. Like solving a sudoku, use a small innovation to reduce ur mom's work in kitchen, making a person laugh in the most dolorous of situations and many more small things.But doing that you will never come in this list . But who cares? We have sated our hunger for innovation. thats it.
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Our life in earth is very special. We have a brilliant processing unit inside our skull that works non stop. So don't worry if you are not as brilliant as rancho, cant understand physics as good as Einstien, as eloquent as Obama, free spirit like Richard Branson, suck @painting, no so good vocabulary, you dont look as stunning as ash or hrithik, still we can be as creative as da vinci in our own way. Only down side is others cant realize that. But who the heck cares? Our "mona lisa" is totally different from his!

7 comments:

Unknown said...

hey..this post makes absolute sense
branding someone as creative only after he has some 400 patents is silly!
thinking out of the box,finding a way out of everyday problems and even quick wit define creativity

sharika nair said...

absolutely right!

nowadays the youth think its so- called ' cool' to be creative. and their definition for creativty is whacko!
evry bit of innovation adds to creativity...

Dutchaa aka Sriram said...

Wow my juniors sure know what creativity is :)... Actually as sharika says.. exactly the 'cool' thingi is prevalent every where...

chandarr said...

so thatsy ur psychometric tests gave you -45 in creativity ??? :P ..
but agree with u fully !!

Abishek Ramdas said...

hey buddy
awesome post :) rock on bro

The nutty student said...

It is clear from your post how much time and thought you've put in and I agree with your opinions about creativity. However, with regards to the characters in the movies you mentioned, ie Sid, Rancho etc... I believe that it is actually the viewer's perception, whether they were being potrayed as creative by the director. The way I perceived it, they were not more creative than the other characters, but rather more adventurous and openminded(as in open to try out unconventional things). I felt that is what the directors wished to potray. But if they actually made a mention in the movie that these guys were the creative ones, then your post applies 100% to the movie.

Dutchaa aka Sriram said...

Thanks you debu. Why I have come to conclusion like I mentioned in the post is because the directors try to influence our perception. Its very common is Boolywod, the heroine leaves her would be who is a banker or an engineer to a more cassanovish character who belongs to one of the above mentioned careers. So its generally what the more "creative" ppl try to portray.