The process of creation starts with a thought – an idea, conception, visualisation. Everything you see was once someone’s idea. Nothing exists in your world that did not first start as pure thought ~ Neal Donald Walsch, American author of the series “Conversation with God”
[featured-image single_newwindow=”false”](Image courtesy of Dollar Photo Club)[/featured-image]
I have always been fascinated by the phrase ‘creating something from nothing’. This may mean nothing to you but it does resonate with me.
I look at the world around me. All I see are the things that were not around a few years ago suddenly being the things that everyone is using or talking about. You know some of these things:
- The selfie stick
- The electric car
- The smart watch
- The hover-board
- The driverless car
Yet it’s easy to look at these gadgets and think of yourself as a non-creative person simply because you have not invented a world-changing device.
Create
To create is to cause to happen, bring about; arrange, as by intention or design (dictionary.com).
And this gives you and me the license to create and to be creative.
Take a look at the selfie stick. A stick you can extend to hold your phone further away from you thus enabling you to take a selfie of a larger number of people. Rather than put wide angle lenses in a phone (which would have made the picture look really funny), someone was bold enough to use their imagination and combine an extensible pole and a smartphone holder. No doubt they had some technical or practical hurdles to overcome.
Turn on your imagination
We all have thoughts and ideas all the time. Many of us spend a lot of time daydreaming and letting our imaginations run wild. And we keep it all to ourselves. We are so scared of looking and sounding stupid that we let the creative part of us go into a deep slumber.
The echo of words like “get real” or “that cannot work” makes it too scary to even try anything different or out of the ordinary.
Perhaps we are simply caught up with the demands of everyday living that we have no time to dream up a better or different future for ourselves and for the people around us.
There is also the unwillingness to risk failure on a new venture or idea, and so we settle for the routine, the boring and the repetitive life we live.
The world has changed
Wake up! The world around us is a changed place and there are too many of us doing the same thing in the same way. We the consumers now have so much choice that we find it difficult to choose. So we let the price comparison and the dating sites do it for us. And we take up their recommendations without thinking.
It’s time to rearrange things differently and see what that looks like. It’s time to find new approaches to some of the old problems that you have.
It’s time to take a new approach or have a new perspective to an old problem. If you do something different to solve an old problem and add some value to your life, you have made good use of the creative part of you.
Now think of finding a few people who have the same problem or need as you once had, and you can use the lessons learnt from your solution or even apply the same solution in exchange for some form of reward. You just might have the seeds of a successful business in your hands.
Forget about your big world changing idea and start with solving some of your every day problems such as getting to work late. Find something at work that could benefit from being done differently, and you be the person who comes up with the solution.
5 reasons why you should wake up the sleeping giant of creativity that is in you
- There is too much of the sameness in the world around us and we need you to stand out so that we can have a clear choice.
- The cost of failing is low. There are a lot of inexpensive and affordable ways to try out your new ideas. You can start off your business by co-sharing rather than spending money to rent an office. You can outsource a lot of the work without taking on full-time employees.
- The reward for success is high. Just think about it, what if it works? What if you are successful with your idea. What difference will that make to your future? This seems to me like a no brainer. You do the sums. High reward minus low cost!
- The more you do the better you are at doing. Creativity is a numbers game. There is also a learning and growth that comes with doing that makes your future attempt at a creative endeavour less challenging.
- You give permission for others to follow. Think of the ripple effect on those around you who suddenly become emboldened by your success. If your contribution was not world changing, maybe the contribution of those inspired by you may turn out to be world changing.
Why settle for less when you can get the very best? Rediscover the creative you. Do something new and get a different outcome. You might just make a bigger impact than you think.