In Praise of Creativity

What is creativity?  Does every human being yearn to create?  Are we all capable of being creative? Is creating things a necessary component of our happiness or is it a rare gift that only a small percentage of human beings possess?

In our culture the adjective ‘creative’ is used as a way to identify especially gifted people who excel in music or the visual arts or sometimes, in business.  The implication is that some people are creative, while most are not.  The creative ones are setting the cultural agenda, while the rest of us are spectators and followers.

The result of this application of the concept of creativity is that most of us give up any claim on creativity and abandon our creative efforts early in life.  We cease learning that musical instrument, we stop drawing or painting, we tear up our early efforts in story writing or essays, we only sing when inebriated or in the shower, we give up on acting or mimicry, and we meekly submit to the dictate that tells us we are the audience and the ‘creative’ are the creators.

We can hardly be blamed for our retreat from these creative pastimes.  The pervasive evidence of our mediocrity compared to the virtuosity of the cultural icons insidiously robs us of our motivation to cultivate our own skills unless our talents are glaringly obvious or our drive is indomitable.  Why even try?  We will never attain those heights, so what’s the use?

But wait, the creative impulse still burns within us, and it often finds an outlet in other less culturally intimidating ventures.  We create interesting meals, we bake bread, we work in our gardens, we perform creative handyman tasks, we do woodworking, we refurbish old cars, we arrange and decorate our houses or apartments.  There are a thousand hobbies and avocations that we undertake to provide some means of ‘creating’ something.  We are clearly creatures who need to create!

Perhaps the biggest impediment to our creativity is the idea that our creative efforts must command an audience or be at a competitive level with the superstars we see on social media.  If one sits down and writes a song or a story, or paints a watercolor landscape, does it really matter whether the result is seen or heard by others?  It may be helpful to get constructive criticism or guidance from others to hone one’s creativity, but I believe that the creative act is worthwhile even if it is only experienced by the creator.  Most of the rest is vanity.  Perhaps creativity without reward is even purer and more satisfying in some basic spiritual way.

Think of all the creative output that has gone unnoticed and forgotten over the millennia.  There are probably moments of genius that never reached the public, never gave joy to others.  But they, and all the other billions of creative acts, from ingenious to trivial, gave joy and a sense of accomplishment to their creators.  We betray ourselves if we surrender our creativity because we will not be recognized or celebrated for it.  Most celebrity is short-lived.  And even the brightest stars are extinguished over time. 

The essence of human life is creation.   We should allow our hearts and our native curiosity to direct our passions and be indifferent to whether any acclaim comes our way.

Of Normites, Neanderthals and Neo-Luddites

A while back I did a crash course in woodworking.  Not wanting to spend a lot of money before I determined whether the hobby would persist, I made several pieces of furniture using mostly hand tools.  (The term furniture is used loosely here – my pieces won’t win any awards!)  In my Internet searches to understand how to use these tools I came upon a very interesting cultural phenomenon:  The rift between ‘normites’ and ‘neanderthals’.

Normites are named after the well-known PBS woodworker Norm Abrams, who hosted This Old House and the New Yankee Workshop for many years.  Norm had a power tool for every possible application.  Normites, like Norm, are woodworkers who love power tools and will always prefer to use a power tool over a hand tool to make life easier and make the project go faster.

Neanderthals, on the other hand, are named after the prehistoric predecessors (and apparently distant relatives) to homo sapiens who would have only used hand tools, if indeed they used many tools at all!  Modern woodworking Neanderthals eschew all power tools and almost exclusively use hand tools.  They search all over for old hand planes, chisels and dovetail saws to restore and bring back to life.  They are perfectly happy sacrificing time and efficiency for the joy of working wood by hand and avoiding the noise and dust that are inevitable byproducts of power tools.

As I researched the techniques and tools that Neanderthals used and perused the various online discussions and blogs, I made an interesting observation.  Many Neanderthals were computer programmers or university professors.  This seemed counter-intuitive as first, as you might think that well-educated technology professionals would use the latest power tools.  But apparently these Neanderthals perceived their woodworking hobby as an escape from the oppressive onslaught of technology, a refuge of sorts.

This dichotomy between Normites and Neanderthals is in some ways quite similar to the difference in mindset and philosophical inclination that influences many of our choices in pastimes, entertainment and sport.  The sailor versus the motor boat fanatic, the cross-country skier versus the snowmobiler, the cyclist versus the biker, the hiker versus the hunter, the book reader versus the TV watcher, the chess player versus the video gamer.

Technology fascinates us, but it can also repel us.  Each new wave of technological innovation pushes us further from direct contact with some aspects of our world.  It makes life easier, faster, more efficient, but does it make it better?  My iphone seems indispensable these days, and on the rare occasions when I forget it at home, I feel quite adrift.  But would I be better to sever that umbilical cord and live a different sort of life?

The Luddites were a secret group of artisans and craftsmen that destroyed machinery in the early stages of the industrial revolution.  They feared the loss of their livelihood and being forced into low wage, low skill industrial jobs.  The movement was very harshly suppressed, and machinery destruction was made a capital crime punishable by execution or transportation to penal colonies.  Lord Byron, the Romantic poet, was one of their few champions in English society.

It is clearly romantic naivete and self-indulgence to wish for a less technology-saturated world.  Agricultural machinery and fertilizer chemistry have made it feasible for the world to be fed reliably without constant fear of famine (though we have yet to master the political and social skills to achieve it).  Medical and pharmaceutical technology, sanitation and other advances have extended life and health dramatically.  Our entertainment and activity options are vastly greater because of the many technological innovations.

Yet there is a certain contrarian allure to being a neo-Luddite, that amorphous and undeclared modern movement that seeks to find metaphysical and spiritual solace in time spent away from our technology addiction.  Working in one’s garden with a hoe and spade, reading a good book in a dusty library, walking through woods without air pods, or yes, working wood by hand without the whine of a table saw or an orbital sander.

We will never willingly return to a simpler, less technology-driven society, though the current assembly of dark clouds on the horizon may signal some significant unwilling changes in the near future.  But individually we may find it restorative, and even necessary, to occasionally unplug and embrace the world without the encumbrance of our devices and machines.  Perhaps it will help us to feel less estranged and disoriented in this crazy world.

Neo-luddites of the world unite!  You have nothing to lose but your anxiety!

The Sad Appeal of the Modern Gladiator

Sometimes, during the rare occasions when I am reading about sports online, videos of UFC fights or other MMA or boxing matches appear on the screen.  These short videos typically depict a particularly vicious set of punches or kicks.  One of the fighters is being pummeled over and over with absolutely no mercy or relief. The videos are clearly intended to appeal to the type of men who are attracted to such brutality.  I have to look away.

I am no prude, nor am I averse to physical challenges.  I wrestled and played soccer throughout my life and could hold my own in rough play.  But I find it sickening to watch human beings battering one another with the sole purpose of proving physical dominance and causing pain or injury.

Many men are fascinated by combat sports, just as they are fascinated by the exploits of SEALs or other military superstars.  Football, hockey and a few other non—combat sports also feature plenty of brutality, which is a large part of their allure. Attempts to limit particularly violent or dangerous hits in football or to eliminate fights in hockey have been stymied by the public’s bloodlust for these aspects of the sports.

Why are many men (and it is primarily men - women seem much less interested) so bewitched by this kind of savagery?  Are we biologically programmed to seek and celebrate violence?  Is this a kind of evolutionary attribute that was ‘naturally selected’ to allow us to survive and prosper in a violent world?

After all, nature is violent.  Predator and prey – one animal is another’s meal and means of survival.  The beautiful world around us appears to be an idyllic natural setting but is actually a deadly war zone with every creature on full alert either seeking out something to kill or hoping to elude death for another day. 

Watching a nature program can be just as unsettling as viewing an MMA fight.  I find it very unpleasant to see one animal attacking, killing and then devouring another.  But that is the way life remains balanced in the natural world.  No lions are lying down with the lambs yet, and if they did it would require a rather dramatic shift in the eating habits of all the earth’s creatures.  Maybe we need to initiate a worldwide carnivore to herbivore animal counseling and conversion effort?

 

But are human beings destined to remain mired in the same ‘survival of the fittest’ primordial bog that the rest of nature inhabits?  Isn’t the whole history of human civilization one of a gradual rejection of our violent and warlike traits and a cultivation of new, cooperative attributes – technology and invention, collaboration, artistic expression, sport, industry, spirituality, humor, humility?

During the Roman Empire the people flocked to see men fight to the death in gladiatorial combat.  The Romans celebrated warfare and the ability to kill because their empire was built on conquest, subjugation and slavery.

Our modern gladiators are our football and hockey players, UFC fighters and boxers.  There are elements of sport and skill in their combat that allow us to pretend that we are not watching with only a morbid interest in the violence, but the gleeful way we celebrate the bone-crunching hit in football or the gloves-off pugilism in hockey belies this self-delusion.  There is no illusion at ringside for the UFC or boxing matches.  They are pure gladiators and the spectators are the bloodthirsty Roman mob.

One might argue that this type of combat sport allows men to satisfy their crueler instincts in a controlled, less harmful environment and thus hopefully avoid the lust for actual warfare and combat that has characterized so much of our history.  And of course, there will always be the need for combat-trained people with a willingness to employ ferocity and rage to fight evildoers.  But hopefully ever fewer men should be needed in this type of role.

Is our fascination with violence, as evidenced by much of our entertainment and game industry, an indication that we are by nature violent creatures and that any attempt to wean us from this diet of savagery is doomed to failure?  Our anger and volatility, the emotional allies to violence, are clearly visible in our daily lives – the road rage, the bar fights, the domestic violence.  Is our penchant for violence simply another of the contradictory and inscrutable aspects of human nature that will never be fully understood or controlled?

I choose to believe that we are malleable machines with a noble spirit that can be cultivated to reign over our intemperate components.  We may not be able to completely subdue those parts of us that hearken to brutality, and perhaps we need a certain level of unpredictable emotion and passion to make life interesting, but I also believe that we are doing ourselves no favor by delivering an endless stream of cruelty and violence in our movies, games and sports.