Creative Confidence

Two brothers, Tom and David Kelley, wrote Creative Confidence, Unleashing the Creative Potential Within Us All, “To give future innovators the opportunity to follow their passions.

They have been working in this field for years and wanted this other way “To help individuals and organizations unleash their full potential – and build their own creative confidence.”

Many people think you are born creative or not. They and others believe this is a myth. Everyone is the creative type. It’s a natural part of human behavior and can be unblocked with new skills and mindsets.

The Kelley brothers give examples of businessmen, soldiers, technicians, developers and others who have used their strategies and developed creative strategies that made money, saved lives or just improved lives.

Their innovation programs stress three overlapping factors:

*             technical factors, including feasibility

*             business factors, such as economic viability,

*             human factors

They believe you can apply creativity to any challenge. Some examples given were of Doug Dietz, and Steve Jobs.

Dietz, a developer of high-tech medical imaging systems, saw that young children were afraid of the large machine and often had to be sedated. He worked to develop a child-friendly Magnetic Resonance Machine (MRI), a prototype of what would become a prototype of the “Adventure Series” scanner. Most hospitals (who use them) are pleased with the new machines and now few children need to be sedated for the procedure.

The authors state that “intentionality” was one of Steve Jobs defining characteristics. “Steve had a deep sense of creative confidence. He believed – he knew – that you can achieve audacious goals if you have the courage and perseverance to pursue them.”
To gain creative confidence, they recommend starting with a growth mindset, “the deep-seated belief that your true potential is still unknown.” You aren’t limited to what you did before. You can expand your capabilities through effort and experience.

I am still reading this book and want to delve more deeply into what they consider creative confidence. So I am limiting the discussion at this point and will probably blog about it again in the future.

In June of this year, I wrote a blog about the book A CURIOUS MIND, The SECRET to a BIGGER LIFE by Brian Grazer and Charles Fishman.  Grazer “Good storytelling requires creativity and originality; it requires a real spark of inspiration.” He believed it acted as a spark for creativity and inspiration.

Julia Cameron described herself as a writer-director, who taught creativity workshops. People doubted that you could teach creativity. Her books include The Artist’s Way, A Course in Discovering and Recovering your Creative Self and It’s Never Too Late to Begin Again. So don’t think you are not creative. Check out these and other similar books.