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What is Creativity?
I’d like to offer a definition of creativity: Using the resources God has given you to make something that benefits you and others. The first thing to notice in this definition is that we don’t create out of nothing. There are always resources that we draw from. Resources include raw materials, such as paper, pen, piano, pipe. Raw materials also include your culture, your personality, how you were raised. And raw material includes all of the stream of ideas that have flowed down to you through the millenia. Creativity grows out of all the materials that God has given you. Once you have the raw materials, you combine them. Most…
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Sin is the Greatest Obstacle to Creativity
God is the ultimate source of creativity. We’re made in his image and therefore we create. We create from essentially a limitless supply of diverse and abundant raw material. So, even from a young age, we create. And we make some great things! We push ourselves to our limits as artists. Our art reflects who we are – what’s unimportant to us, what excites us. We might even take lessons, get a mentor, etc., all in the service of expressing ourselves. So far, so good, right? Then how does sin slow us down and set-up obstacles to our growth, limit our creativity? Sin… clutters/occupies our thoughts, and saps our energy.…
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Creativity, Coming & Going
Have you noticed how many creatives have particularly fertile periods of output – times of especially high levels of creativity? Why is that? How do you call the muse? Can you even call it? Why does it appear to fall away? Can you keep it? What is inspiration? Too many questions! For any creative, there are times of heightened connection/awareness of the muse. It’s always best to jump on an idea when it’s fresh. That visit is a combination of time and circumstance – two things which by definition are never exactly replicable. Therefore you must jump, before the time and circumstance take you out of the mindset, the inspiration,…
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Ain’t Nothing Creative There
Satan has no creative ability. The ultimate in creativity is the ability to create something out of nothing. Only God can do that. We as humans have the ability to create, using the materials God has given us. We’re creative because we’re made in his image. Satan would like to convince us of his creativity. So, what can Satan do? Have you considered making a deal with Satan for something? Don’t fall for it. You think you might be getting what you want, but you won’t, and you can’t. Those are empty promises. In reality, you’re being played by playing yourself. Although Satan can’t create, he certainly can lie, and…
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Coloring Inside the Lines, and Other Tips to Enhance Creativity
1) The first tip for enhancing creativity will feel counter-intuitive: color inside the lines. It may be artistic heresy to say it, but you’ll find your creativity enhanced when limits are placed on you. Limits will force you to think and respond creatively. Study art or artists who function within restrictions. Film director Orson Welles said, “The enemy of art is the absence of limitations.” Peter Gabriel’s insistence that no cymbals be used on one of his albums helped lead to the pioneering use of the gated drum effect.* Check out the drums on “Intruder,” the first track of this album. After he recorded it, Gabriel said, “Artists given complete…
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What Becomes of it?
It started with a vision Of the future in my imagination Idealized, romanticized, and perfect in conception Pure and lovely in visualization Brought forth, broken through the wall That separates mind from space Thought from senses Real from imagination And then it morphed Into something different And I’m not as sure of it I don’t know it as well It’s kind of like how I imagined it would be But kind of not Different, altered, changed And this is the reality Of something we release into the world Something that others touch and experience Their interaction with it causes The change, the evolution, the application Now it belongs to the…
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We Wouldn’t Practice Without Infinity
We practice in an effort to improve, to grow. To get better at music, relationships, work, life. Why do we do this? Because we’re not there yet. We’re not at our best, our most fulfilled, with all of our potential realized. Is there a limit to how good we can get? Some would argue that there is. However, I think there’s always possibility for growth. Here’s why… You’ll likely get incrementally better by practicing over a set period of time. “Incrementally” may not seem like much, but you are, in fact, getting better. Can you read, watch, study others to learn from them? If so, you’ll improve. If not, you’re…
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Artificial Intelligence for the Human Creative
One of the benefits of computer artificial intelligence (AI) is that it gathers together the collected knowledge of the computers that have come before it. AI comes pre-loaded with any knowledge we want to place in it. In addition, AI tests, learns and grows. It constantly takes the information it, and other computers has learned and integrates that knowledge into its memory and algorithms. So, what does this have to do with human creativity?Well, it turns out these same two benefits apply to creatives. First, you have as much access as you want to the creative work that has gone before you. Although you can’t experience everything that has flowed…
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Self-Diagnosing Your Creative Roadblocks
God has placed us in a universe in which creativity can flourish. A virtually limitless palette to draw from as we go beyond imagination. But due to a variety of factors, our creative output sometimes declines. What detours can you take around roadblocks to improve your creative quality and quantity? Here are some questions you can use for self-coaching. To get the most out of the questions, be sure to either write down your answers or have a friend ask you. Share your thoughts in the comments section or contact me directly. It may be that you’ve tapped your creative well and there’s not much left. What steps can you…
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What does God-led Creativity Look Like?
This is the fourth of 7 blogs on releasing your creative potential. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. Ephesians 2:10 We are God’s creation, his poem, his work of art. We’re carefully, lovingly created and formed for his exquisite pleasure and our deepest joy. We’re created and formed for God’s purpose. His purpose is always good, although sometimes it does not feel that way.
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What is the Connection between God and Creativity?
This is the first of 7 blogs on releasing your creative potential. What does God think about artists? Does he care? Does he even notice? If everything was right, if we could clearly see the brushstrokes on the canvas of the created world, then the first words of the Bible would inspire endless creativity, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”
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What’s Your Creative Lever?
The process of creativity can be daunting. There’s so much raw material to choose from, and things can get complicated fairly quickly. In music, for instance, there is a near infinite selection of note combinations, melodies, harmonies, rhythms, counter and polyrhythms. How’s it even possible to be creative under such circumstances? For Bill Bruford, the answer is listening to the space between the notes. Bruford was the drummer for Yes, King Crimson, Earthworks, and numerous other bands and projects.
