Mo problems, mo creativity
I saw an old friend last week and they reminded me of the importance of words and the stories we tell ourselves because something that starts out as just a silly comment, if unchecked, can become fact. Thinking about this on the way home led me to a realisation.
Somewhere along the way someone decided that creativity was defined as things like drawing, making music, or writing. Creative things were deemed different to science or engineering and it became common to deride or reduce the importance of some creative work. I’m guilty of this, I say as much at the end of the Two Strangers episode that making the podcast is “better than a proper job” and Maggie quite right jumps in with “it’s a proper job”.
We also see it in every day terms like “Creative accounting” which associate creativity with breaking or bending of the rules rather than the correct way to do something. In response and to ensure that there are two sides, because we do love for there to be two sides, folks in the arts have been culturally granted the go ahead to say that maths and science are boring and soulless. These are broad examples and I’m not saying everyone feels this way but it’s there. The words we choose matter and sometimes what we say isn’t deeply considered, it’s just filler, but just nodding along perpetuates the stereotype.
Some of you reading this learned to cook in a “Domestic Science” class at school. Skills associated more with home makers and carers were somehow lessened, as if someone said “we can’t possibly call it science! Let’s shove “domestic” in front of it to make it clear it’s not real science.” The reality is, it’s chemistry and mathematics just like tuning an engine or falling in love.
In any area of human endeavour, we make progress because of our problem solving ability. An unexpected connection here, a creative combination there. That’s how we move forward individually and collectively.
I delight in making unexpected connections even if they’re small. This little creative activity breaks me gently outside of the every day of making dinners or getting vehicles booked in for an MOT and I like the way it feels to flex your brain and put things together.
I’m not an engineer or designer, but I get a kick out of getting the glue gun out to fix something for the boys or modifying and customising like when I recently picked up some orange stretchy chord to add webbing to my beloved Three Peaks backpack. It’s an extra feature that was cheap at about £5 for the chord, but I felt like a bad-ass cutting the ends and then neatening them up with a lighter, a particular thrill as I’ve never smoked so never got to play with lighters or matches.
Whatever our field, we problem solve and that’s creative work whether it’s tinkering with a bag, fixing something or working out what to cook with the ingredients you have in the fridge so I encourage you to open up to noticing because it might just make you feel good and remind you that you’re always being creative.
Fine orange webbing on a fine Three Peaks bag