by Rosario Buenaflor

Created on: October 23, 2007   Last Updated: February 22, 2011

You come up with some brilliant ideas and it makes you wonder where on earth these ideas come from.  Do you have to be in a creative space to come up with such brilliance?  Does your environment feed you with some sort of creative juice?  Where does creativity come from?  Does it come from the inspiration we get from our environment?  It is easy to forget that many of our creative abilities come from our parents and other hereditary influences.  Certainly, environment plays a big part in shaping what we create and produce.  Independent from outside forces, each one of us is overflowing with creativity that no one else can express.  Besides, no one is you-er than you. 

Can creativity be enhanced or heightened?  For the most part, that is why human beings developed systems of doing things.  It is called the Arts and Sciences.  Say, for example, you're keen on developing your skills at defending yourself physically, you might study martial arts.  We generally think of creativity as something that is performed often observed by many; it is something that needs to be developed to be useful.  It happens when one is inspired or when one's imagination is expressed in a useful way.  While, that is all true, creativity is instinctive, more so than learned or acquired.  The most basic and simplest things we do require creativity.  Just being alive, for example, require breathing. Breathing is creating, creating us in the simplest of terms.  It's easy to take breathing for granted because it seems to happen without us deliberately doing it. Sophisticated things do come from little and simple things.  The unconscious act of breathing is the conscious act of living. 

Subconsciously, you have the knowledge as ancient as your prehistoric ancestors; you can survive and protect yourself instinctively; you inherently know how to nurture a child.  These creative energies are generally not considered a form of creativity because we have taken the little things for granted too long.  Consider the animals, now, these creatures know their worth in the whole scheme of things. In a simple way, animals are creative: dogs, for example, can sense fear in strangers more than any psychiatrist; lions hunt for food like a confident professional; they protect their young like a highly-paid bodyguard.  Each life form behaves a certain way, learns a certain way and survives a certain way. Simple things are beginnings of greater things - that's universal and constant.  Creativity is everywhere.  Needless to say, it does not depend on education, heritage, age or environment.  

You are unique and so are all your creations because no one is quite like you. We, human beings tend to measure everything including creativity. Who's better or who's more this or that.  In its own context, any piece of creation is a masterpiece.  Comparing yourself to others is like jumping into a pond where you don't belong.  You are your own judge and critic, because no one can be you better than yourself.  

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