Creativity is one of those all-important life skills. The need to express ourselves creatively is a basic one. It doesn’t require any special equipment and can be enjoyed and exercised in the simplest of ways. No matter what you do in your day-to-day life, creativity will help you to approach challenges with a fresh perspective to find innovative solutions.
A creative hand improves our cognitive function. It evokes emotional responses making us more self-aware and it can help us regulate our anxiety and mood.
Builds resilence:
We become more resilient as we create. When things don’t work out quite as we planned we adapt to new circumstances; learn to reframe challenges as opportunities, and gain acceptance with the end result. In reality you may find that this allows you to navigate real-life challenges where you are able to recover quicker and move forward more easily.
Opens your mind:
Creativity provides us with a path to be more open-minded. It makes us more willing to accept different ideas and look at scenarios with greater depth, which makes us better thinkers and more prepared to take on significant challenges. Without preconceived ideas we embrace the outcome, perfect or not.
Confident decision making:
By valuing what you are creating you learn how to make decisions. Simple projects may need many small decisions that lead to larger ones. As you make more decisions your comfort in the outcome and how to deal with your decisions eases. This can translate to making decisions in your everyday life with more confidence.
Encourages a quiet mind:
The average person has about 60,000 thoughts running through their head each day. The very act of creating can help calm the nervous system and provide an outlet for built-up emotions. Any form of creative expression encourages you to be fully present in the moment with what we’ve come to think of as ‘mindfulness’.
A good creative project can put you into a ‘flow’ state. It becomes a type of meditation and you can lose a sense of time passing. It reduces anxiety, boosts your mood, and even slows your heart rate.
Turns down the volume on pain:
Creativity can rewire the nervous system’s pain routes. It can move the brain’s circuits to other creative areas instead of getting ‘stuck’ in the pain circuit. Psychologists sometimes refer to this as our ‘sticky neural pain loop’, but the good news is that we can learn to ‘unstick it’ ourselves through engaging in any creative pursuit by offering us a healthy coping strategy.
Beware the artificial environment:
Over use of technology in our busy lives can diminish creativity. Scrolling through endless images, text and social media posts might seem engaging but at the end of the day it filters down to our brain not creating anything meaningful.
The use of AI weakens the creative process because it basically uses a formulaic approach. It cannot replace human imagination which is inherently unpredictable and falls short when emotional intelligence and novelty are key, which is unique to the human brain.
If you’re ready to embrace creativity in your life, here are a few simple steps to get started:
Keep it easy and fun: Start small. You don’t need to dedicate hours of your day to being creative. Try drawing for ten minutes or journalling for a few minutes at the end of the day. Bake a cake. The key is to make it enjoyable, not a chore.
Try something new: Don’t be afraid to experiment. Try painting or doodling, knitting a scarf or writing a blog. Sign up to a night class. You might discover a hidden passion. Regardless of skill level it's the taking part that counts.
Let go of perfection: Creativity isn’t about being perfect. It’s about expressing yourself and enjoying the process. Embrace imperfections: they make your work uniquely yours.
Create for yourself: Your creative activities are yours. Don’t worry about what others think or how your work compares to theirs. This is your time to unwind, and be true to yourself.
Make it a habit: Set aside a little time each day to be creative. The more you engage, the more benefits you’ll feel.
Get comfortable with taking risks
Creativity often entails moving past your comfort zone. While you don’t want to take risks that damage your business, risk-taking is a necessary ingredient of innovation and growth.
See mistakes as opportunities
A team needs to have the freedom to innovate without fear if their ideas don’t work. Some of the best innovations in history were the product of many failures. View failure as an opportunity to learn and improve for the future.
Take time before measuring results
Patience is an important element of creativity, so don’t try to measure results too quickly. Give people the freedom to improve and experiment without the pressure of strict time constraints.
Maintain an open mind
Innovation requires constantly working against your biases. Continually ask questions and be open to the answers you receive.
Collaborate
Embracing a collaborative environment is vital for innovation. When teams work together, and everybody has a voice, innovation blooms.
Encourage diversity
Diversity fosters creativity as each individual brings a unique outlook as part of a team. Getting people to step outside their comfort zone is an effective way to encourage innovation.