Tuesday, September 09, 2008

Get Creative

I love being around artist because of their creativity. Unfortunately being an "artist," has become a professional title. So the arts have been relegated to the standard fare of visual mediums, music, plays, etc.

I believe everyone is an artist. I don't mean this in some wishy-washy-hippie-inclusiveness. In Alan Hirsch and Michael Frost's book The Shaping of Things to Come, they refer to "the death of art," being the absence of creativity. From an organizational position these authors argue to embrace the imagination. But I want to bring it to a personal level.

In Marva Dawn's book, A Royal Waste of Time, she describes everyone as being an artist. Everyone in the church helps with worship because we are all artist. The Holy Spirit gifts everyone in unique ways and when we exercise those gifts, passions, talents, we are really worshing God. Our acts of creativity are ways to celebrate our created self. The act of creating/creativity is our particpation with God, our ability to play along with the Trinity. (Eugene Peterson, Christ Plays in 10,000 places). When I am most creative I am most faithful to God.

Here are some ways that I have seen people be creative...

Cooking
Telling Stories

Writing a Blog
Doodling
Asking Questions

Repairing cars

Reading
. Reading taps into your imagination and as Einstein said, "Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world."
Having conversation. Some conversations are the typical, where are you from? what do you do? But beyond that a lot of conversations are just fun to listen to as people exchange stories, ideas, suggestions.
Organizing social events. Again this is all about the imagination.
Taking photos. Obviously that is a standard "art," but with the increase of digital cameras photography has become a more accessible art form.
Dressing. Ok, I know everyone wears clothes but everyone exhibits their creativity with how they dress.
Traveling
Gardening
Styling hair/facial hair


Leave a comment and tell me some more if you think of them

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I totally agree- everyone is an artist!

Anonymous said...

here's a few more i can think of (some of them are even serious!):
- The way one decorates one's house/arranges one's furniture/etc.
- The way one "pimp's" one's "ride."
- any form of teaching should include imagination and creativity
- I know you said cooking already, but I just wanted to throw my support behind that statement by pointing out that subway employees are referred to as "sandwich artists"
- If Mary Poppins has taught me anything it's that everything in life (even cleaning your room) can become a game (so, creativity, etc)
- If High Fidelity has taught me anything, something as mundane as rearranging one's record collection can be artistic (he arranges his autobiographically! What does that even mean!)
- Heck, even choosing an blogger identity (or a fantasy sports name, etc) is artistic/creative
- Obviously the way one sets up their facebook/myspace page is an outlet for artistry/creativity

I think I'll stop now. I enjoyed this conversation, keep up the good work.

-- Rick

Anonymous said...

Hi,

I mostly visits this website[url=http://www.weightrapidloss.com/lose-10-pounds-in-2-weeks-quick-weight-loss-tips].[/url]Plenty of useful information on watchinggravity.blogspot.com. Do you pay attention towards your health?. Are you really serious about your weight?. Research shows that nearly 90% of all U.S. grownups are either fat or weighty[url=http://www.weightrapidloss.com/lose-10-pounds-in-2-weeks-quick-weight-loss-tips].[/url] Therefore if you're one of these individuals, you're not alone. Infact many among us need to lose 10 to 20 lbs once in a while to get sexy and perfect six pack abs. Now the question is how you are planning to have quick weight loss? Quick weight loss can be achived with little effort. If you improve some of your daily diet habbits then, its like piece of cake to quickly lose weight.

About me: I am writer of [url=http://www.weightrapidloss.com/lose-10-pounds-in-2-weeks-quick-weight-loss-tips]Quick weight loss tips[/url]. I am also health expert who can help you lose weight quickly. If you do not want to go under painful training program than you may also try [url=http://www.weightrapidloss.com/acai-berry-for-quick-weight-loss]Acai Berry[/url] or [url=http://www.weightrapidloss.com/colon-cleanse-for-weight-loss]Colon Cleansing[/url] for effortless weight loss.