I have always loved creativity, from a distance. As a kid, I would spend hours at stationary gifts shops, perusing handmade cards and crafts with sheer delight and curiosity. I admired the originality and eccentricities of these creators who artfully translated their vision into artifacts of joy.
My own journey into creativity was more timid. I was akin to the kid who dreamed of swimming with the giant sea turtles but merely dipped her toes in the water and occasionally allowed a few rounds of hide and seek with baby waves.
I had sparse memories from my childhood when I stitched together grand mansions I had envisioned from cut out pieces of magazine papers or dressed up my Barbie dolls with my own haute couture. Those were the days I simply created, without an attached outcome. Somehow, as I grew older, the joy of creating became a nice-to-have rather than a must-have. While I delighted in the act of creating a hand-crafted birthday card or baking a lavishly decorated cake for friends, I often felt guilty when it came to my own creative pursuits. Every time I thought about sitting down to create, my mind raced to my backlogged list of to-dos. Creativity challenged my practical paradigm as I sought after means of making creativity more “productive”.
In graduate school, I fell in love with the course Problem Finding, Problem Solving that taught MBA students how to think like a designer. It was my first introduction to the design thinking process and I found myself spending hours in the design studio with my team, completely enraptured in the process of solving complex and intricate problems with sticky notes, white board drawings and a burst of creativity. I’d walk away from every session with ideas buzzing through my mind.
While the design thinking process was fascinating and enlivening, it took a few iterations in my career pursuit to marry this creative process with my left-brained work. First, it was the three-day design thinking workshop held at the heavily process-driven German company I had worked for. As I reconnected with creativity at work, I got into the magical state of flow where time and space dissolved into the background. My three days of work became three days of play.
Having witnessed this powerful process of turning creativity into productivity, I began to design creativity in my own work. Over the next few years, from marrying design thinking with the conceptualization of novel biotechnologies to spearheading a five-day design sprint to pave the path for digital health frontiers, I immersed myself in the exhilarating and enlivening design process of creating innovative solutions.
But something still felt off. Although I sat at the seat of creating the vision for future innovations, I still felt a degree removed from the actual process of creation. While I relished at the final deliverable when a team of engineers and designers brought my product vision to life, at the depth of my soul, I yearned to become a creator. I even dabbled here and there, from creating wireframes to coding, just to get a taste of the thrill of creation, but I was still on the sidelines, like the lifeguard sitting on the chair, wistfully watching all the kids playing in the pool. That was when I realized that I did not want watch from the sidelines. I wanted to immerse myself in the act of creation.
My big epiphany came at the brink of Burning Man when I rediscovered my sense of wonder, awe and fascination with the art of creation. As I marveled at the magnificent architecture, sculptures and art cars roaming around the playa, I felt something reawakened in me and came back from the festival with a deep desire to connect to my world through art. I bought my first annual membership to the SF MOMA, frequented art galleries around the city, and even took a spontaneous trip to NYC for a special art studio tour in Chelsea. My body yearned to waltz with the delicate strokes of paint and merge with the raptures of vivacious colors and tones coming to life.
As the joy of creativity reawakened in me little by little, I felt inspired to buy my first watercolor set and dabble in my own masterful creations. As I put strokes and lines on paper, it was as if my life became enlivened with its own vibrant colors. Dance came next. From ballet to ecstatic and belly dancing, I found creative expression and flow in my body. One by one, my five senses started to unfold to what Elizabeth Gilbert famously termed, the Big Magic. From launching my first podcast to writing in this 30-day challenge, I had to face some of my deepest fears and overcome the limitations that held me back from choosing the path of creative living. Yet, by giving myself full permission to create, I chose the path of freedom, to become a conscious creator to fill my life with Big Magic!