Creativity

A while ago my brother-in-law, who was doing an assignment for the University of Texas, asked me of my opinion about creativity…here are my answers to his questions…

What is creativity?
Creativity is a state of mind.

How would you define it?
Creativity is releashing one’s full potential, and doing things that you are good at.

How does a person become creative?
Hang around with kids, drive home different ways every time, try different things, try different sports, go to the opera, theatre, brainstorm, start writing things down in the night, read bios of creative people, study your
subconcious mind, hang around with gays, punks, homeless, CEOs, africans, latinos,….

What jobs would you consider are creative?
Everything and anything, where you are empowered and have the authority to be creative, there are no limits to any position specifically. Well, you cannot be so creative when you are a doctor doing heart surgery…

How do you know if someone is creative?
She is doing things she is good at, she is producing results, she is producing value to the customer and shareholders, she is unique, she is ready to try contionusly new things and ideas, and also to fail.

What is innovation? How would you define it?
Innovation is a new idea, a new thing that has not existed in that form before. It can be completely new, or it can be an existing idea brought to the next level (see computers). Best business ideas are mostly innovative ideas. In todays world, there are copycats to any innovative idea within few minutes/hours/days.

What do you think it means to be gifted?
We, people, are results of a) our genes and b) our childhood experiences. You can be intelligent ie. have high IQ (genes) but it doesnt mean you will automatically become successfull in life, especially if you have had miserable/bad childhood experiences. We all have the inner power (our subconcious mind) and can decide whether we want to be successfull in life, or not. And we all define success somewhat differentely. Success for me, is not the same, as success to you. So being gifted is a mixture of IQ (intelligency quotent), SQ (social quotent), EQ (emotional quotent), and CQ (change quotent);Daniel Coleman

How do you know if someone is gifted?
S/he has a talent on what s/he does. She is better in what she does than everybody else.

Are these ideas similar to what others from your culture would think? 
No. People in Europe incl. the current school system are not focusing on strengths and finding talent.
It is focusing on getting everyone through at mediocore, punishing failures, and not rewarding successes.