Learn how to be creative anytime and anywhere. Creativity Explained is not an easy thing, given creativity is an intangible thing (you can’t pick it up and put it neatly into a wheelbarrow). What’s the best way to do this? Rather than give you a long long scientific explanation of what is creativity, let me give you an experience of it instead. In particular, a direct experience of a creative moment. And the best way to do this is to play a game.
Games are fun, right? This game, I call The Martians Game. The aim of the game is to see the world as a Martian or alien might.
I’m going to describe an everyday situation. But I’m going to describe it as if I’m a Martian or an alien. I’ll describe what I’m seeing and hearing in a literal way – without the usual labels we have for things. And your challenge is to guess what the situation or thing is that I’m describing.
Now if you’re with a group of people watching this video and playing this game it’s important that you don’t blurt out the answer here. If you do, you’ll spoil this for everyone else.
Based on these clues, see if you can work out where I am.
Did you get it? What was I describing?
Hopefully, you’ve worked out I went into a restaurant and had a meal. Let’s debrief what just happened.
Have you worked out what I’m describing? It’s a game of tennis. Now if we play those clues backwards, they all make sense.
The heart or core of creativity is a realization. At one point you didn’t know what I was talking about – and then you did.
That’s why a light bulb is a common analogy for creative insights. We go from dark to light. From not knowing to knowing.
That’s creativity – and you can apply this to any situation – whether it’s your work, your art or your life.
I think this quote from French painter Claude Monet says a lot…
To see, we must forget the name of the thing we are looking at.
The Martians Game is based on language. And Monet cuts to the heart of this – when we can look past the labels we have for things we can see them in fresh ways – we can have creative moments or creative insights.
You can use this to be creative in any situation – anytime and anywhere. All you need to do is describe your current situation as a Martian or alien would see it. The key is to look for an objective or factual interpretation of what is happening. Describe what you see without the interpretations or the labels. For instance, ‘I sat on a piece of wood’ as compared to ‘I sat in a chair’.
Your creative challenge – if you choose to accept – is to create your own examples of Martians.
For instance, how would describe:
Then share this with a friend or colleague and see if they can guess it. When I’ve played this game in my Being Creative workshops, participants have given feedback saying this was the most fun they’d had in a long time.
Plus, I’d love to hear about your creative moment.
Add a comment below and let me know what your experience was in playing The Martians Game.
If you want to be more creative, here are a couple of other videos that can inspire you.
If you would like to be more creative in your life and at work, then you might like to read these posts next:
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