Deconstructing Creativity

Thinking of the notion choices, ones we make and the ones that are made for us, either by design or by happenstance. Then the idea around what those choices could have been. I chose to walk to work instead of taking the bus...what did I miss? Which led me to the Robert Frost poem "The Road Not Taken." Now, I don't remember reading this in high school or any other school for that matter, which doesn't mean I wasn't supposed to...I just don't recall reading it. Either it didn't stick with me or I simply did with this the same as I did with other things I was "supposed" to do...ignored it and winged my way through. Told you I had an issue with authority.

I ended up on YouTube listening to someone read the poem, and as I am wont to do while listening to something I scroll through the comments to see what people were saying. One comment that made me stop and ponder went something along the lines that this narration gave a whole new meaning to the poem for the listener. The pauses and inflections gave this fellow some new insights, a better appreciation. Another person had written that they remembered studying this poem in school and resenting it because they felt forced to study it. They didn't appreciate the work because they had to study it...had to.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference

I wonder if maybe the education system, and by extension society, do a good job of killing creativity. Learn the meter, learn the words...memorize the words and study the history of the author. What of the meaning? And not the meaning that the system wants you to know. Knowing that is fine, but maybe what is more important is knowing what it means to you. What does that poem, song or painting mean to you? How does it move you?

The other day walking through the store I saw a young couple dragging their little son behind them, looking entirely unimpressed with his choice of parents at the moment. When the little tykes hand was released he wandered off looking at something or other and a smile crossed his face...he was free. He had a moment of wide-eyed exaltation. And his experience ended abruptly with dad grabbing him looking towards the shampoo aisle. That, in a nutshell, is society and creativity.

I'm not for a moment saying that the kid should be free to run amok, I have three kids and I know well enough the trouble they can get into. What I am saying is that I think we need to do more to encourage free thought and play and creativity. In all things and for all people. Work to live or live to work?

"There is a connection, hard to explain logically but easy to feel, 

between achievement in public life and progress in the arts. 

The age of Pericles was also the age of Phidias. 

The age of Lorenzo de Medici was also the age of Leonardo da Vinci, 

The age of Elizabeth also the age of Shakespeare, 

and the new frontier for which I campaign in public life, 

can also be a new frontier for American art."

JFK

I am often in awe of the artistry that I see all around me. It means something to me and I hope that more of us can see more of it. There is beauty, there are answers and there is simply the appreciation of the passion that is there for the grasping.

Photo courtesy of my very creative friend, Margo