Creativity = Creation

Why do we create? Why do we all feel that we need to contribute something to the general welfare of our fellow beings? I don't claim to have the answers, but I do know that everyone creates something - good or bad. Most creations are good. They can range from the mundane to the sublime. Some examples would include: cooking a meal with love for your spouse and/or children; or perhaps doing the laundry - folding their clothes neatly because you are doing it with love and therefore you enjoy the act of the task. A step away - perhaps composing a lullaby for your child to soothe away the night terrors or strumming a guitar or lap harp to bring a small amount of beauty into this world for a short time. Planting a garden can be another act of creativity (one that I'm afraid I don't have any talent for at all even though I adore plants and flowers dearly). Writing a poem, short story, or novel requires creativity - choosing words that will ring with clarity, chosen carefully from hundreds of options, weighed and either discarded or placed carefully next to other words which will allow them to resonate in a chosen harmony.

What other types of creativity exist? There are certainly the "standards" that many people think of when faced with defining creativity. Things like painting or drawing a picture, composing a symphony, or playing an instrument professionally. Craftspeople are creative - jewelers, potters, leatherworkers, etc. They have the ability to take disparate parts and combine them in ways that will make an incredible finished product. All of these examples, and many others, are the good side of creativity.

But there is also a bad side because this world is marred and evil exists. There are those who will use their ability to think of creative solutions to cause pain, to steal, to abuse, to terrorize. There are those who will do these things in the name of a deity, there are others whose actions prove that evil exists among us. I take it as my duty, when I have the opportunity to participate in the creation of beauty, to try and keep negative thoughts from my actions and my art. In this fashion I can create white light which dispells the darkness, at least for a time. And if enough of us can create this white light, we can overwhelm the world with positive actions and begin a long and slow walk towards minimizing evil and hatred in the world. Create love today in your personal way.