Creativity

I have been listening to some new music composed by my partner in Music2Work2. I have practically worn out the cds of his music that I have had for a while. Such beautiful music!

It is totally amazing to me how someone is able to have the creative ability to go through the same process over and over and have the results come out differently. The notes or keys to be played are the same every time, and I know they are not played in the same order or at the same tempo, but how is the sound, the feeling, the mood, different each time.

I've never tried to compose music but I think if I came up with an original melody that would be all I could think of every time I attempted to compose something else. Kind of like when a song gets stuck in your head and for the rest of the day, that's all you think of or hear!

This exercise in writing is an attempt to enable me to be more creative. I don't have new and different ideas. I have never been able to easily come up with solutions to problems or situations. I spent months thinking of all the problems I would encounter when I had to start using a wheelchair - how would I go out a door and be able to close it behind me? How would I be able to walk the dog? How would I be able to cook my meals? I could think of a million problems but not the solutions. I only knew how to do things the way I had always done them and the way I saw others do them - the normal, acceptable way.

Thank goodness I had people around me to help with the solutions. In most cases, left on my own to figure those kinds of things out, I would probably had spent the rest of my life inside my house being miserable and hating the world!

I have been reading about developing creativity. Most of the time I feel like I have never had an original thought in my life. I saw a quote again tonight that I'm sure explains the major part of my problem, "An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail."

Throughout my life, my actions and my thinking have been determined by my fear of failure. I have been afraid of looking foolish, or sounding stupid, so I haven't allowed myself to be original or even have original thoughts. The fear that whatever came out of me would not be acceptable to everyone else has prevented my willingness to try. So risking failure, even though a terrifying thing, is something I realize that I am going to have to do in situations other than just writing this blog. But, this is a beginning.