Creativity is about curiosity, courage and confidence as much as talent. As you engage with Arting Conversations you’ll open yourself to it by:

• exploring without judgment
• listening for and following what engages you
• being willing to go where you haven’t gone before

You can start by trying a range of ways to transcend that sense of anxiety that comes when a result is not predictable. Instead of experiencing the emotion as a barrier, see it as a link to creativity. What’s uncomfortable is often worth pursuing.

Go beyond the conventional, what’s generally rewarded. You may have been lauded for accomplishments that reflect your skills in communication or effective organization. Schools and many employers rate people by such typical criteria.

Whether a course of study or career, you are often required to start at the bottom. This linear approach supports institutional controls and hierarchy as well as employment for people who help you move up.

Not that such controls aren’t important or logical. But they don’t necessarily foster creative behavior which:

• asks original questions that challenge the status quo
• is intrigued by exception
• sees different connections
• is often disinterested in what everyone else is doing
• moves in nonlinear ways

Instead of repeating back what experts say is important, proceed more playfully. One way is to revel in the process rather than focus mostly on results. Another is to allow or encourage surprise rather than seek comfort or safety. Still another is to see paradox as a potential opportunity rather than a limiting problem.

For fun:

• Stay open to discovering something new.
• Be intrigued by the unfathomable.
• Embrace the unexpected.
• Rub shoulders with people who have different interests and backgrounds.

If you’re curious about science, move beyond its literal meanings to how biological metaphors can be used. What do the mechanisms of movement of such one-celled animals as amoebas and paramecia suggest for new approaches to human practices? Amoebas jump forward by shooting out pseudopods; paramecia swim around by moving fine, hair-like appendages.

For example, instead of taking a beginning course or starting at the bottom of a hierarchy, imagine propelling yourself forward to a more advanced place instead of going step by step. You may find a more engaging subject or set of responsibilities than you’ve considered. Then build bridges between what you know now and what you need to make the move. Are there people who will champion you? What new skills and abilities do you need to learn? Alternatively, see what progress you can make with very small, coordinated movements like the subtle cilia of paramecia.

Just watch children play to see what thoughts and feelings emerge. Perhaps you’ll get insights into team development and issues as well as how to relate to peers in creative ways.

Maybe daydream or do nothing for ten or so minutes, breathing deeply, slowly and regularly. Allow anything to bubble up from the seeming void in your mind. You’ve no doubt experienced how new ideas and connections emerge when you’re in the shower or doing another unfocused activity.

If you think about only the messes of the day, quiet your mind again. Visualize a calming landscape or repeat a simple word such as ohm or shalom to turn off your internal chatter.

Dreams and doodles can produce images that lead to fresh insights. I remember reading that Francis Crick, one of the explainers of DNA, visualized the double helix in a dream; Albert Einstein had a vision for one of his early theories while using public transportation.

To promote such concentration and receptivity, you may need to modify some of your habits such as multi-tasking, developed to survive in today’s overly busy world. Studies have shown that instead of being more efficient, split attention may lessen efficiency by about 50%.

Let your thoughts stay in neutral as data flows naturally. To encourage fresh insights, resist pre-conceptions and judgments. Don’t assume anything until the information you uncover suggests something. That’s quite different from conventional scientific method which requires a hypothesis and orderly proof or disproof.

Though such quantitative analysis has its value, collecting qualitative information provides more opportunity for seeing what’s truly there — not just what’s bounded by a hypothesis. Better suited for social science, of course, it’s far messier. And so is real life.

A qualitative approach does not preclude tough-mindedness, logic, nor evaluation; it just means that information is gathered without pre-conceptions. That open process can exist in parallel with conventional studies. Both are respected, each is used appropriately.

Instead of thinking “outside the box,” try throwing the box away altogether. Ask:

• What connections between what’s known and respected and other realities emerge?
• What information and insights make you question your assumptions?

You may discover that the unclear, dynamic, nonlinear actions of one-celled animals seem closer to the humanity’s social flux than a neat “objective” method does.

Use different media to visualize anew. Ideas and data are mostly captured by words and other symbols such as numbers and diagrams. That makes them static because they are presented in two-dimensions on a page or verbally, left hanging in the air like the fading image of the Cheshire cat.

Yet think about how people interact, organizations “work” and projects proceed. Do static organization charts capture the reality? Or would a dynamic mobile come closer? Maybe develop a computer model that captures interaction. With these possibilities in mind, can you imagine how to make fresh connections and promote understanding by using images and motion?

What might venturing into the worlds of engineering and architecture teach you about disciplined imagination? If you wonder about that, Google architect Frank Gehry to see his curvilinear buildings. Enjoy Simon Calatrava’s soaring creations that resemble flight more than grounded structures. Explore recent uses of cement, including a new translucent product. Among other things, the appeal, richness and efficacy of such creations lie in the tension among inspiration, practicality and fresh vision. These builders of beauty don’t seek what’s known to work but how to make their vision work.

To understand the realities of how such large-scale efforts get born, learn also about how long it took Gehry and Calatrava to bring making a living and their visions together. Read about Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas’ continuing struggle to spark his unique process of group creation. You’ll see that most of the work goes into process; the result is what observers appreciate more.

To appreciate a wider range of your capacities, identify your multiple intelligences. You may use Professor Howard Gardner’s categories:

• linguistic
• logical-mathematical
• musical
• visual-spatial
• interpersonal
• intrapersonal
• bodily-kinesthetic

You’ll see these expressions of original capacity all around you, in entertainers, artists and sports figures, as well as mothers, fathers and poets — certainly in many architects and engineers. In yourself too!

As knowledgeable people have said, if you keep thinking and acting as you have, you’ll likely continue with the same approaches and ideas. If you want to move beyond, take fresh note of what’s around and within you in order to start a renewing voyage.

Combine courage with curiosity. Exploration beyond what’s comfortable benefits from the solitude that provides calm and time for new mental trips. But don’t expect everyone to share your ideas and discoveries with the same enthusiasm. People who benefit from the status quo could feel threatened, though such feelings may be expressed through disdain or silence.

In earlier times, scientists who saw beyond, such as Galileo, faced imprisonment for departing from conventional explanations. Today, people who don’t conform in groups are called “deviants.” The challenge for the creative deviant is to use interpersonal skills to build bridges among group members rather than impose one view, manipulate or leave. Though Thomas Kuhn’s study, The Nature of Scientific Revolutions, shows how long it takes to accumulate exceptions to common belief before new ideas are accepted, the luxury of time probably won’t suffice today.

I wonder how Leonardo DaVinci got away with his amazing visions. Did he develop good relationships with Church and other authorities to avoid recrimination or keep his notebooks secret for us to appreciate their prescience about anatomy, flight, engineering feats and much more centuries later? Or both?

Honor emotion for your thoughts depend on it. There is a tendency to denigrate emotion as a distraction from clear thinking or objectivity. Yet neuroscientist Antonio Damasio has learned through careful study and testing of the neural underpinnings of reason that emotions have a fundamental role in rational human behavior. He found that the absence of emotion and feeling can “break down” rationality, as he writes in Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason and the Human Brain.

Instead of compartmentalizing feeling and thinking, what would happen if you integrated them? And what means would you use to do so? Experiment with options from the arts, for example. Put your feelings on paper using markers, crayons or paint. Sing songs of fear and joy to yourself and others. Use your body to express emotion.

Be open with people you trust in order to hear your own voice; encourage creative conversation and feedback. Can you know what you think or travel new paths without hearing what you say out loud? Just playing with and writing about your ideas could lead nowhere.

Emerge from solitude to hear and assess your ideas in respectful conversation where everyone attends to what’s being said. Instead of reacting to others’ judgments, seek a synthesis. Play with the inter-relationships.

Listen well to different perspectives in order to focus what you say, to transcend your own thoughts. However inspired you are, you will refine and improve your ideas in concert with others. Connecting also cuts down on the loneliness that often comes with being original.

When useful, seek or create informal groups and project teams that join people who have differing approaches and opinions. If you develop basic ground rules to promote effective listening and mutual respect, you’ll likely have a great time arguing and creating — if your egos can be put in escrow.

Enjoy paradox, embrace ambiguity. In sum:

• Can you be a productive, responsible rebel?
• Can you be curious and rambunctious as well as disciplined?
• Can you be funny, playful and serious?
• Can you have neutral expectations while you act as if the best outcome is possible, for quite a while?
• Can you take pleasure in what you’ve accomplished, question it and then take off into the unknown again?
• Can you expose your original ideas to others in understandable ways — and truly listen to what they say?

If you can do just some of these things, you’re likely to open the doors to your own creativity and nurture it in others too. What fun and possibilities for contributions!

To explore further, appreciate the intrinsic artistry in some “ordinary” activities that are likely part of your daily life:

• Cooking: experimenting with new combinations and flavors; attention to texture, color and presentation
• Entertaining: imagining the chemistry and interpersonal connections in dyads and groups for promoting interesting sharing and communication
• Dress: combining color, texture and fabric weights to flatter your appearance and suit situations
• Parenting: imagining how to encourage growth, maturity, good health and family cohesiveness for mutual benefit.
• Home designing: bringing together color, placement, textures, costs to match a vision for a satisfying environment.
• What would you add to these examples?