Our topic of the month in October is Creativity. If you wish to explore this topic – here you will find some book recommendations.
Creativity: Where the Divine and Human Meet.
MATTHEW FOX
Matthew Fox attaches a great responsibility and power to human creativity, that he considers “a space where the divine power of creativity and the human power of imagination meet and join forces”. Get in touch with our creativity means take on the responsibility to be truly human beings, act a higher and broader mission, about big ideas as well as daily facts and activities. Through a full expression of creativity can we find innovative solutions to the main problems of our contemporary society, often caused by non-inspired human beings.
Matthew Fox, the founder of the Friends of Creation Spirituality: “Meditation is calming the reptilian brain. We have all got three brains in us: One is a reptilian brain, which is about 420 million years old, our mammal brain is half that old, and our most recent one is the intellectual creative brain. The reptilian brain is very prominent; it runs our respiratory and sexual systems; it is action and reaction. We have to calm this reptilian brain so that the mammal brain, which is the brain of compassion and is here to bring kindness and kinship and bonding, can function.
I mean, reptiles do not make good lovers; that is not their thing. Meditation allows us to treat the reptilian brain well: ‘Nice crocodile, nice crocodile.’ When we calm the crocodile, then the mammal brain can assert itself. Meditation is not just for professional monks; it is a survival mechanism for us all, especially in this time of crowdedness and rubbing shoulders with people of different faiths and traditions. We all have to learn to calm our reptilian brain.”
Oprah Winfrey put him on her list of “seven men who are transforming the world”
Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention.
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is a Hungarian-American psychologist. He recognized and named the psychological concept of FLOW, a highly focused mental state conducive to productivity. He’s book “Creativity” is about capturing those moments that make life worth living and study what leads to these moments.
Based on nearly one hundred interviews with exceptional people, from biologists and physicists, to politicians and business leaders, to poets and artists, as well as his thirty years of research on the subject, Csikszentmihalyi uses his famous flow theory to explore the creative process. Most important, he explains why creativity needs to be cultivated and is necessary for the future of our world.
When do you feel creative? Where does creativity come from? Dr. Csikszentmihalyi reviews the common traits of creative people and introduces the “Systems Model” of creativity, which describes the types of environments that foster innovation: Watch the video of Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Lecture: The Creative Person and The Creative Context
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