# 155: Creative Abundance or Depletion?
Story behind the Passage
If there is one life-long research project (that I am saving for some time in the future), it is finding out what creativity actually is. Usually, when I have a question about a term, I check the etymology dictionary. But with creativity, I know that this would not make sense. At least not for me. It will not satisfy me, no matter what is written there. So, I will simply reflect a little bit on this because it is on my mind right now. And not just on my mind. If feels like the world is longing to become more creative again. Now that people have realized that no mathematical models can predict a pandemic — not to mention defeating it — people are calling out for solutions. Since solutions for complex problems do not just fall from heaven or can be generated by some computer program, humans are pondering a lot over creativity and inventing all sorts of funny workshops to make people creative.
I do not think this will work, by the way. It is ridiculous.
Yes, this might sound surprising because I am the one talking about education a lot. One part of application-oriented and project-based education is that it uses and develops the natural creativity of human beings. But I do not think that this will automatically produce a lot more super creative people. I guess, this is the difference between talent and practice. Nature seems to want it that way that outstanding talent in some art is not diffused over humanity in abundance. But there is abundance for those who are creative and talented in some craft. Does that sound confusing?
What I mean, or rather, what I am thinking about, is the “quantity” of creative capital in one person, if you want to call it this way. I mean, whenever there is something, no matter what, there is always the question of: Can it disappear? Will it ever run out? Is that not natural to ask? Is it not human to worry about this? With every resource, there are questions of depletion, right? So, why would this not apply to creativity (whatever that means)? But I am not raising these questions to just ask questions. I am raising them to share my own mini theory on this. Yes, I do have one!
Several weeks ago, I took a walk with a friend of mine and when we came to talk about personal talents and strengths, I explained that my theory of maximizing creative potential is really based on human laziness. I think, humans are energy savers by nature. It is our evolutionary legacy. Any activity that runs counter to or does not meet our natural strengths causes us to lose more energy. Hence, we avoid it, at least in the long run. At the other end of the spectrum, when it comes to aspiring extraordinary performance, e.g., in business, when founding a company, the same holds true. If you want to really scale a company, you will have to work on this 24/7 for a few years. Here, the same logic applies. I think, you can only do so if your major work really is based on your core talent. This talent does not necessarily have to be “creativity” in any artistic sense but at least, it will somehow be related with manufacturing something with your ideas and hands.
All this made me choose Schwarzenbach’s biography today. I am not even sure if I blogged about her before? I should remember, at least, I know. But I doubt that I did because Schwarzenbach to me is like heaven and hell for different reasons that I am not going to get into now. Let me just say that she is fascinating and when I thought about the question of whether or not creativity in the particular field that someone in talented in, can be depleted, I was reminded of the passages in her biography which talk about her obsessive writing. Sometimes, in more or less good times when she was in good health, she wrote dozens of texts in a few weeks, especially on the way back from her trips while still on board of a ship.
With Schwarzenbach, there is no doubt that she herself doubted everything about her creative talents. And she had enough people around her who worried about her worrying all the time. In the end, all this did not save her. Still, I wanted to share just one among the many passages that I could have chosen from he book which describe her abundant writing talent. Writing was her life, if she even had a life. And I think, writers can understand. I do not think that other people can understand what writing means to writers. But it is the same with every creative trade. I guess, that is the core difference between artists and non-artists, between highly creative and less creative people. One side does not know what the other values. That is not special about creativity but I still think it is kind of outstanding in the relationship between artists and non-artists. When looking at Schwarzenbach’s writing, not all of it is “artistic” — which does not matter, I think. This is just a label.
My Learnings
“Zeitungsartikel und Prosagedichte. Eine Welt liegt zwischen diesen beiden Formen des Schreibens, so wie der Kongo die beiden Städte trennt, zwischen denen er hindurchströmt.” / “Newspaper articles and prose poetry. A world is between these two formats of writing; just like the Congo River separates the two cities that it runs through.“ This sentence is so revealing because it is actually not revealing at all. Yes, I understand that the metaphor is nicely chosen by the author of the biography. And, please, do not get me wrong. It is a wonderful biography. But the point is: I do not think it makes a difference what you write as long as you write. If you have the creativity burning inside and writing is your talent, an outlet, like painting to the painter and singing to the singer, then it does not really matter what you write.
There is hardly any writer or painter or singer who only creates one type of art, right? But there are critics and readers who always like to categorize — works of art and their creators.
The point is, I think, depletion can enter if you are constantly forced to write formats that run against your creativity. And for me, I think, this would be journalistic writing nowadays. As far as I can see, journalists are operating in very tight corsets these days. But, of course, journalism is not the most creative genre anyways — it should not be. Journalism is about writing up facts; as objectively as possible. What I mean is that writing will still flow easily, if it is your creative talent, but there might be limits. Not in the sense of no writing is possible. But less compelling writing might come out of it. It is not the writing itself that limits the outcome, it is simply the fact that much of this does not come from the well of your creativity.
The mere fact that Schwarzenbach was able to produce dozens of texts and many book chapters in a short amount of time — insanely short amounts of time — underlines her creativity. But it did not help her, obviously. She never trusted herself, one can suspect. Well, that might not be true. I think, she did like what she wrote sometimes. The mere fact that all this keeps flowing — in whichever format — is usually a sign that the writing is good — according to your own standards and the standards of publishers. In her case, many articles never got published by the newspapers she had actually written them for. Some never reached the addressees because they were lost after she sent them from Africa or her other destinations. Some were not compelling enough for the papers. It hurts to read this. So much brain and so much talent on paper — but people rejected it.
This keeps happening, of course. Every day, works of creative imagination are simply rejected for taste and/or commercial reasons. And that is also why it is so funny — no, actually, so tragic — that we are seeing all this nonsense about mobilizing creativity among people who are forcing themselves to draw little puppets on whiteboards and preying to Scrum gods. Yes, I do think that creativity can make the world a better place and that it can lead to solutions. But please let the people do it who love it. They will not run out of ideas, never, they carry creative abundance inside. But let them do what they are good at. Do not force them to think small and write stupid stuff just because stupid people do not understand.
But maybe, stupid is the new creative…
Reflection Questions
1) Do you think the creativity of one person is limited? How can depletion be prevented?
2) Is it possible that crises cause people to demand more creativity to find solutions to social problems?
3) In how far are you a creative person?