Growing Up Creative in America
The Broadway musical How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying contains a song—“The Company Way”—in which a young executive questions a company veteran about how to remain in the company. The young executive asks what happens if one has a “genius idea” and the veteran quickly informs him that the “genius” is quickly let go from the company.
It seems that from the time we are children to the time we are adults we ask advice about how to succeed and are often advised “don’t rock the boat,” “let sleeping dogs lie,” or “be a team player.” We are very rarely given the sage wisdom to “always question the status quo,” “activate the apathetic,” or “pursue individuality.”
While teaching children to function in society through cooperation we may be snuffing out their natural creativity. It is true that society needs cooperation from its individuals to function and sustain itself, but it also needs strong individuals to predict and define change and to lead societal growth. The challenge then is, “How do we raise strongly creative children to be strongly creative adults?”
As a composer I often talk with people about their experiences with music. Many people tell me that they can’t sing. When I ask them about their childhood I learn that someone, often a teacher, told them they couldn’t sing. Everyone can sing. It’s just that we all sing differently from each other. The mistake which stifles the singer in us is telling someone who doesn’t have a cherubic voice and who doesn’t easily carry a tune that they “can’t sing.”
The key is in the definition of “to sing.” What does it mean “to sing”? It simply means to raise one’s voice beyond speaking. Yet often the definition of the term lies in the domain of the singing leader who has a specific singing sound in mind. Rather than create contexts for many kinds of singing, the leader tells those who don’t fit the one context that they can’t sing.
Perhaps this is an example of how we stifle creativity in children. Instead of creating contexts for individuality, we force individuals into a single context. Yet if we were to take the other extreme—to create as many contexts as there are individuals—we could never come to a consensus and establish a norm on which to act. Where are the answers?
First, one must understand that creativity and talent are different. Talent has definition and flourishes through discipline and method. Creativity has no definition. It is energy. So a creative child is just that, a creative child who may have talents by which he or she may define creativity.
In my own case, my creative energy was channeled into two rather rigorous disciplines: learning to play the piano and learning to race sailboats. Both demanded daily practice and were constantly challenging to me. They took a great deal of time in preparation, practice, action, and maintenance. They gave my creativity a context in which to function and grow. Through them I learned to build systems and make them work. I didn’t find this kind of context in school. There the norm was too easy and to move beyond the norm meant that I caused problems in the classroom. So I spent my time thinking about music or strategizing races while I intently stared at some reading or math problem I had quickly completed. The key is that I had something to think about. Since creativity is nondirected energy, it needs to be directed and disciplined to be effective. Guiding that direction takes time and effort on the part of parents or teachers, or management. From the point of view of the manager it may be easier to maintain the status quo and dismiss the creative employee than it is to recognize the creative person, listen to ideas, and channel the creativity to productive use.
As I see it, there are four important points to directing creativity from a managerial point of view. First, the company has to want creativity as part of its mission. This means the company must want change and be committed to changing. Second, the company must create a context for creativity. Management must be eager to hear new ideas, eager to try them out and let them grow and change, eager to implement the product. Third, the company must create a context for change. Many creative ideas get stopped in middle management where managers go by the book. The creative context for change means that “the book” is being rewritten to facilitate change. Finally, the company must maintain the creative mind. The company must find a way to balance valuing the creative mind and adapting the creative ideas to purposeful use. If these four points are kept in the foreground—be it family, singing group, school, or company—I believe the creative mind can find its place in society.
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Elizabeth Larsen is one of the world’s most promising young composers. She lives and works in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where the Minneapolis Symphony has showcased several of her compositions.
The difference between reading Ms. Larsen’s brief article and attending her talk at Creativity Week VIII is like the difference between looking at the score of one of her musical works and hearing it performed live by a full orchestra. So I shall attempt to describe a part of what is missing. (I wish I could do justice to her style and impact.)
Her opening remark was “Most classical music was written by old, dead, European men. I am a young, living, American woman.”
She went on to point out that being “liberated” or “empowered” by your organization to exercise your creative individuality does not guarantee that you will. You have to be ready to run some risk. It is like learning to ski. You prepare for it, learn the basics, and then the time comes when you stand on the brink of what may look like a monstrous, killer slope. You are committed to push off, but you still have to reach within yourself for that final bit of courage.
There are no medals given for these invisible heroic acts. Perhaps Aaron Copeland’s Fanfare for the Common Man is the only tribute we have to this kind of heroism. The manager who wishes to encourage creative action must try to find ways to acknowledge these quiet acts of heroism when they occur.
This would help overcome one serious obstacle to the development of a creative idea, product, or way of doing things: audience acceptance. A composer is typically interested in trying something new. But people mostly come to concerts to bathe in the sound of beloved favorites. The composer must find a way to gain acceptance in this situation.
The irony is that, to the first audiences, many now venerable crowd-pleasers sounded horrible and unmusical—like bedsprings being dragged down a staircase. For instance, at the premiere of Stravinsky’s Rites of Spring, the Parisian crowd revolted. Now, we smile nostalgically and tap our feet while listening to it.
Composers call this the “accessibility” problem. Creative efforts in most domains involve problems similar to it. A really new concept or product can be too far ahead, which guarantees no market acceptance.
When rending your garments and gnashing your teeth over insurmountable problems, try comparing notes with your neighborhood composer, artist, or playwright. In commiserating over your shared frustrations, you may discover that each of you is holding a piece that is missing from the other person’s jigsaw puzzle. DAH.