It has a high benefit for us and our brain and can positively impact many areas of your life. Creativity is the secret power to improve your quality of life.
What is creativity, how to ultimately boost and develop it and why does it matter so much to your life, job, and health?
Creativity is the ability and activity of creating new ideas, ways, views, possibilities and solutions. It is a core skill for a better life full of prosperity and mindfulness. Furthermore, imagination is not only good for your job, it is also beneficial for your mental health and wellbeing. Developing a flexible mind allows you to become better at problem solving and to think out of the box.
Creativity is the representation of your imagination that supports you to express yourself. It makes you more flexible in mind and throughout life situations. Imagination helps you to adapt better to new contexts. It is something you get value from. To sum up, creativity is something intangible and helps you carry a vision.
Research about creativity and its benefits:
Einstein said real advances in science are marked by regarding an old problem from a new angle. Einstein also explains that the formulation of a problem is often more challenging than its solution. Studies have found that individual artists and designers have also yielded interesting insights from changing perspectives. They have shown, for example, that creative ideation involves the elaboration of a “core idea” that takes shape through the ongoing interaction between artist and artwork.
Often if you read about creativity you will hear about the 4 p’s: person, process, product, and place (Rhodes 1961). There is a lot of research about creativity and the latest research that is interesting for us is focused on the process, the personnel state and the environment.
Furthermore, as many might think, anxiety and stress have a negative impact on creativity outcomes. Developing your creativity is a great way to overcome such daily issues and set yourself into a healthy routine. A new study published in the Journal of Applied Psychology presents a practical and encouraging answer to the issue of whether we can or not improve our creativity. A team of researchers has found that creativity is a skill that can be developed and sustained over time — even in the most unexpected places.
Find out more below where creativity comes from, how it is expressed, how to boost it, and what it is good for.
Where does Creativity come from?
Creativity was the first expression of the soul in history. The link between humans and creativity is not something new. Already in the late Stone Age, as we can see with the paintings of the Lascaux Caves, our late ancestors used their creativity to make something out of nothing. Developing our senses and our imagination, getting the satisfaction of achieving and creating something you can look at. These are all elements that we have been progressively losing in the digital era.
Mobile devices like tablets and smartphones have transformed the way we experience boredom. Most of us are becoming more and more passive and are always consuming faster, more hypnotizing content. Even us at Soulside cannot help ourselves to watch Netflix relentlessly. We no longer feel stimulated to engage and use our own creative thinking to spend time. And many have complained that they felt like they were not being inspired anymore by anything.
However, Technology also enables us to achieve incredible things and to offer completely new experiences. No longer is a wayward computer forced to play Snake or Tetris, occupying themselves in a hardly satisfying, and utterly pixelated virtual reality. The tablet or smartphone travelers can now immerse themselves in an entire library of art and culture-related distractions, finding comfort in everything from a Monet game to a digital version of the Louvre.
How can creativity help?
Backed by Science and research:
Scientific research has proven the effectiveness of creativity and its benefit across a wide range of daily activities. In 2010, the American Journal of Public Health published a review called The Connection Between Art, Healing, and Public Health: A Review of Current Literature. It aimed at finding the connection between creativity (creative practices, creative training,..) and health and wellbeing.
The research showed extreme strong links between art and mental health as well as physical health benefits. The researchers found that creativity and constantly developing it helped people on various levels, both personally and professionally, such as increased mood, decreased anxiety, heightened cognitive function, reduced risk of chronic illnesses and improved immune health.
The multiple benefits:
One of the most known benefits of doing creative practice is that it elevates your mood. Many people do not understand why creating new stuff makes them feel good. Everything that comes with it, such as overcoming tricky situations, delivers dopamin and hence joy to the person having used his or her creativity.
Having a creative outlet has positive impacts on cognitive health. Researchers and academics have found proof as to how creativity affects the brain. Musicians, for example, have been studied for the heightened connectivity between their left and right brain hemispheres. This strong connection is believed to be one of the reasons why Einstein was a genius. His mastery of the violin allowed him to effectively use both sides of his brain simultaneously. Hence he could benefit from thisit in his work.
Lastly, one of the long-term benefits of training and boosting creativity is its ability to prevent degenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Clinics in the United States looked at how middle-aged and older adults who had a creative practice of any kind, such as crafting, sewing, woodworking or painting, had a reduced risk of cognitive decline. The key question is to know how to boost your creativity to get all the benefits mentioned above.
How to boost it?
Research, as well as experiences, have shown that creativity can be trained and that we can enhance it in various ways. First, you have to think of creativity as a muscle that you can exercise. The key is to encourage yourself and the people surrounding you to recognize that creativity is an acquired skill and provide ongoing opportunities to learn from creative experiences.
Firstly, research shows that when people try to think more creatively, they almost always can — and those effects are both significant and repeatable. So one sure way to boost creative thinking is to Try. No, really! “Creativity isn’t made out of a magical fairy part of the brain,” the researcher Green says. It’s essentially using all the same tools that go into doing everything else … but applying those tools in creativity-specific ways. However, this requires a lot of self-discipline so do not worry, there are other ways!
Secondly, pay attention to — and record — new ideas that come to you. As people age, the number of creative ideas doesn’t necessarily decrease, but they tend to capture fewer of them. When an idea comes to you, start making it a point to preserve it. Write it down on your phone, in a pocket-sized notebook you carry around or sketch it on a napkin. “Capture now, evaluate later,” says Epstein. His research confirmed over and over that capturing your new ideas is the most valuable aspect of boosting creativity.
Lastly, You need to keep on challenging yourself. This might seem easy but the will to constantly challenge yourself in new and different activities is an amazing way to develop your creativity. Choosing to experience new activities and to prove to yourself that you can keep learning is extremely rewarding and will help you develop.
If you want to learn more about Soulside and what we do to enhance your creativity with specific tools and features, read our next blog article here.
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