Creativity comes in many forms- and there are even classes/ courses/ books that teaches people how to develop them. Most people associate creative people as dreamers. Let’s just extract some names from history:

• Albert Einstein and Thomas Edison are creative people. They daydream of what they want to create- Einstein dreamt of riding on a beam of light. Many of the world’s most famous inventors are people who broke out from the norm and created history.
• Famous creative people like Jimmy Choo makes lots of money from doing the things they love.

There may come a time in your life when you felt the spark of creativity lights up your heart. Do you nurture it or dismiss it as hocus pocus time waster? Perhaps you find that there is no place in your heart for any indulgence that does not fit into your ‘grand scheme’ or your planned route to corporate success. Years ago, at the height of my pre university examinations pressure, the creativity spark first arose within. There I was, trying my best to force in boring topics into my overloaded brain when suddenly, instead of scientific formulas, visions of beautiful beaded and ribbon hair clips haunted my mind. Of course, my Mathematics teacher played a role- she used to come in the most beautiful Evita Peroni hair clips. Desperately needing a break, I retreated into my own little world. In my little world, I produced detailed and creative hair clips. Making hair clips took my mind away from the worries of exams. Those early work (with beads and later ribbons) were very detailed and until today, it is not easy for me to replicate them. But working with colors and seeing my beautiful creations come into life, and worn onto my hair and those of others made me feel joyful. That took a lot of stress off. After I emerge from my little ‘retreat’, I approached my books with a more refreshed vigor. And I passed all my papers and got a place in my local university. Crafting remained my favorite hobby for many years. When I was working on shifts a few years back, I find comfort making hair clips from ribbon roses while watching MTVs in the afternoon, right before going to work. I felt contended and happy, making clips by blending various designs and colors. Most often, the hours just go by unnoticed.

Later, amateur web design became my interest. I started a website in 2002 initially to post my work online after being inspired by other crafters. After which, I was engrossed with the world wide web and learn to work around limitations that I have (technical knowledge and money). This eventually helped in my current role- managing a intranet for my company. To me, creativity seems to occur in a ‘flow’ state. It’s hard for me to describe but from the initial process of conceptualization / visualization to the final stage of ready made product/results comes almost smoothly in a ‘flow’ state. If you have the habit of nurturing that ‘flow’ in you, by dabbling in creative hobbies in your free time, you’ll find the ‘flow’ become quite natural in other aspects of your life. So when you are presented with a difficult problem at work, your creativity helps you to search out of the box for a solution. When presented with a challenge, you learn to work with your limitations and achieve results. You are no longer limited only by logical and deductive thinking. This, I speak sincerely from personal experience. Creativity is not only limited to arts and craft. I had a Physics tuition teacher- she had genuine love for physics. Her idol was Richard P. Feynman and her dream was to enter California Institute of Technology (Caltech). But because physics don’t exactly go down well with ambitious but poor parents, as an eldest child, she was forced to take up more ‘popular’ courses- she finally settled for engineering. But because she loved Physics so much, she gave tuition on Physics- her schedules were almost one of a superhuman. She had a very demanding day job as an engineer- and she taught Physics tuition always every evening with back to back classes that goes past midnight. In fact, she never used our school textbook or local reference book as she considered it to be too easy. When we were pre university (Form 6), we were using Fundamentals of Physics by Halliday, Resnick, Walker: textbook for American first year Engineering students. Sometimes, our classes ends only at 2am and we had school the next day. And she still have to rush to the next batch of students. She told us that she’s lucky if she can catch 4 hours of sleep per day.

What I remembered most about her is her infectious passion for Physics- she even made many of us like the formidable topic. She ignited our imagination with interesting simulations involving our solar system and galaxies far, far away. We learned how to calculate diameters and angles in roller coaster designs in order to ensure the roller coaster does not fall off from its track. Most of the problems that she required us to solve involved the ability to think-out-of-the-box and adapting the basic fundamentals of physics into our daily lives. As the eldest sibling, the proceeds from her tuition classes funded two of her sisters to study in overseas, with one of them doing medicine. Today, I see a lot of so called creativity courses being offered out there in the market. Sorry to say but I personally think a lot of courses on creativity out there are more restrictive instead of expansive. I have attended so-call creative thinking courses that talked about various creativity theories. What it seems to me is that all the instructors are trying to theorize the concept of creativity- and most of the time, I do not find participants any wiser after that. I have to admit that I have a habit of asking deep probing questions to gauge the skill of the instructor. Last year my boss sent me to a 2 day course that was supposed to teach someone to be creative. Naturally yours truly did not hesitate to post some challenging question related to thoughts and experience. When the instructor could not answer my questions well, I decided not to waste my time showing up the next day. Anyway, after that course, I decided that I would rather go for technical courses in future. At least, I have managed to apply fundamentals from a recent powerpoint course that I have attended to benefit others. My heartfelt wish to you is that- allow yourself to be creative. If you love painting, writing, craft work, cooking, photography, etc, make time for it in your busy schedule. A few hours of your own time in the weekend or getting up earlier to persue that interest. Today, instead of spending one hour eating breakfast, I finished my breakfast quickly, took out my ribbons, needle and thread, and started stitching a rose pattern while still sending time catching up with my family.

If you try to kill off the spark every time it arises, constantly switching to logical and analytical/critical left-brain thinking, you are seriously limiting yourself. Being creative naturally increases one’s ability to look above conventional canned solutions. A person who adapts and figures our solutions easily in challenging situations survive much better (and happier). Teach/encourage your kids from young to be creative. I will always be grateful to my parents for funding and giving me space to express my creativity.

Everything we does are interconnected. The creativity and genuine interest that you put in when you dabble in your favorite craft or dishes will influence your problem solving skills and ability. And you don’t have to take a course in creativity to ‘force’ yourself to be creative. Instead you just may want to identify an area of interest. Consider taking a course to learn more about your favorite hobby/ interest. Or else, you can read up on your own and join a community library where you can spend more time on self learning. You will realize that at the end, you become happier, more fulfilled and balanced (work and play). What’s more, that creativity that you have nurtured will bring out the best in other areas of your life.

Yin Teing writes from the heart and enjoys sharing her knowledge and learnings with others. For more of her writings, you can visit her blog at http://teingdesign.blogspot.com/