Creativity Is Not Innate

Throughout my life, I’ve always regarded art as a talent rather than a skill. Who could blame me though. It’s the way everyone else around me looked at it too. It’s as if everyone sees art as some innate skill that is only gifted to a select few when they’re born and that’s that.

Recently, however, I was reading a book about the entire concept of artistic design and creativity. Ultimately, the book said that creativity is a trainable skill just like any other skill you can think of. I wholeheartedly agree after examining the idea of art as something that can be worked at.

Heck, the book mentioned a guy somewhere in Montana who had never painted anything in his life but decided to paint a single picture every day until he was able to sell his art. While at first he was quite broke and his wife had to pay the bills, within 3 or 4 years he started selling his works for a profit. And to this day, the man has made far more money than he had ever anticipated off of his art.

This man’s story is a testament to the idea that creativity actually is not innate. Rather, it’s something that has to be honed and worked at. It’s not a whimsical inspiration, either, where you can just pump something out when it hits you and that’s that. A real piece of work takes time and effort and thought, and sometimes you have to revisit it after awhile.

So while I consider myself not very artsy, even if I were to do crafts with basic office and packaging supplies, I realize now that it’s an acquired skill, not an innate talent. Even though I tell myself I’m not good at it, knowing that creativity can be acquired is at least a positive thought rather than being discouraged by the idea that “I’ll never be good at drawing” or something like that that you’ll hear many people mutter.

The other thing to consider for me, though, is that I don’t have many supplies even if I wanted to get good at drawing. So for now, if I wanted to practice, I’d have to gather together a ragtag bunch of packaging supplies such as cardboard, sharpies, tape, and the likes. While it’s a more abstract approach to art, it’s something that could work in the meantime while I wait to accumulate more cash for fun things like being creative.