Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Your Elusive Creative Genius




Gloria Hansen here.

This is a favorite TED talk that I shared on my gloriahansen.com blog more than a few years back.  It's by Elizabeth Gilbert – author of a favorite book, Eat, Pray, Love, on nurturing creativity.

In my original post I talked about how Elizabeth Gilbert muses on the impossible things we expect from artists and geniuses — and shares the radical idea that, instead of the rare person “being” a genius, all of us “have” a genius. It’s a funny, personal and surprisingly moving talk.

She talked about the success of her book and people now asking her “Aren’t you afraid that you’ll never live up to your prior success … that you’ll be a failure?”

She goes on to discuss how creativity was originally looked upon as an outside entity that visits one and graces it with a bolt of inspiration.  The Romans referred to creativity as genius.  Again, an outside force that would possess one with inspiration.  At one point things changed.  “We went from having a creative genius to being a creative genius.” And with that comes a lot of pressure, suffering, and despair.  She talked about the “painful reconciliation” people go through when success comes along and then wanes.

I periodically watch this video because it's a gem. It reminds me that rather than sitting in that painful place where I feel like I'll never be creative again, and playing in my mind all of those dark thoughts that can quickly sabotage good energy,  I just need to get busy and do the work.  Here's to showing up, doing the work, and finding your elusive creative genius.

4 comments:

Carol Sloan said...

Thank you for posting this Gloria! This is the first time that I have heard this. Awesome TED talk.

Gloria Hansen said...

I'm glad you liked, Carol. I need to listen to it on a regular basis! :)

Liz Kettle said...

Gloria, that is one of my favorite TED talks too! It is so freeing to consider her perspective rather than the modern art perspective that artists are somehow gifted with genius that others aren't. Great post.

Natalya Khorover Aikens said...

this is great! thanks!