The Spring of Our Creativity
Dr. Pfister visits the Cleveland Museum of Art with his mother.
Wow, this weather has been something else!
I forgot how great the sun looks in Northern Ohio. Did you enjoy the Ice Festival last week? Finally, the weather cooperated and boy did the people turn out! It was a great shot in the arm for local businesses on Medina Square. I did miss watching the ice sculptors doing their magic as they transform blocks of frozen water into dramatic pieces of art. If you watch them closely, in a trance-like state, they almost become one with the ice. The only other time that I have witnessed such focused determination is at the Medina County Fair with the chain-saw artists, carving stumps and logs into works of art. This total immersion of one’s self into one’s work is so intriguing to watch. It puts a visual definition to the word passion, as we watch creativity at its finest.
As humans, we seem to do our best work when our hearts are in it and we feel passionately inspired.
But let’s be honest… this doesn’t happen all the time. The majority of our lives are filled with the routine day-to-day “stuff” needed to pay the bills. As we go from school to our careers… then marriage and a family… pressures to produce and succeed take over and we now have entered the “rat race” called life. An individual usually stays in the race until retirement, unless certain unforeseen events (such as severe illness, winning the lottery, or an accident) causes one to exit prematurely. And then you see these individuals struggling with the question of, “What am I going to do with the rest of my life?” Some of these individuals take up a new hobby or sport if physically able, but others turn to exploring parts of their cerebral make-up, the frontal cortex, that is the hub or center of creativity.
Painting, sculpting, and even crafting are creative outlets that have been compared to meditation due to their calming effects on the brain and body.
Forbes magazine ran an interesting article (July 25, 2018) on how creativity can improve your health. They found that simply gardening or sewing causes the brain to release our natural anti-depressant, dopamine, which reduces our levels of stress, depression, and anxiety. The human body is amazingly adaptive to situations and conditions when confronted with them for the first time. Just look at how we have dealt with - and survived - the Covid pandemic.
As we are approaching our first anniversary in dealing with Covid, many of us have received the vaccine, masks are routine, social distancing is fairly adhered to, and we are moving on with life…
But wait! For those of us not retired (and who didn’t win the lottery), we found ourselves in a hiatus from the rat race for six weeks last Spring! Heck, there was no race at all. There was a World Shut Down, hopefully never to be experienced again!
But how did you react to being quarantined? I felt like what one must feel like when sent to prison… the rationing of toilet paper (and most paper products for that matter), while also scrambling for makeshift masks and, in some instances, experiencing boredom.
But wasn’t it interesting to be forced to slow down? It took a global pandemic for most of us to grind to a halt and break from our normal fast-paced lifestyles. And after a couple of weeks, “Ok, this Covid thing isn’t going away.” We were forced to stay home and maybe, for once in our lives, be creative.
They say we only use a tenth of our brain. I have to feel that a large part of what we don’t use lies in that frontal cortex!
I hope many of you started new hobbies, projects, maybe even doing puzzles as a family. I have a dentist friend, who loves woodworking and, after this past Spring, he now turns out 6-8 wooden pens off his lathe a week. He said he always wanted to do it but never had the time! Thank you Covid!
I was a biology major at the College of Wooster, but I wrote play and theater reviews for the Performing Arts Department. The chairman wanted me to change my major… said I’d be a better writer than scientist. I quit writing after my Doctoral Thesis and never resumed until one morning in early April last year. I was having coffee and looking at a pen and legal pad laying on the table… and I truly don’t know what came over me… but next thing I was writing a blog.
This current Friday Pfister Fix is number 48, and I’ve enjoyed each and every one immensely, as these blog entries have released my inner conversationalist.
I feel relaxed - with a sort of artistic satisfaction - when I finish each.
So I challenge each of you, as we emerge from the clutches of Covid, continue to tap into your frontal cortex’s creative release.
It may be through art or music, or… if you’re really having trouble connecting… go to the Temple of Creativity - Hobby Lobby! Man, I love it there. Buy yourself a sewing kit, muscle car model, learn to whittle, or take up painting. The hardest step to being creative… is the first step.
You may remember my talking about the Four Pillars of Life. And you may remember that Pillar #3 is stress management. Well, creativity is a true stress reliever! Truly I believe (and I know the research will substantiate my feelings) that we need to release the power of the other 90% of our brain through our creative pursuits. You don’t have to be Michelangelo painting a ceiling, da Vinci painting portraits, or Jimmy Page and Robert Plant caressing out Stairway to Heaven. Just be yourself and let it rip. We have too many brakes and inhibitions on our creative soul (probably put there by society or our own lack of self-confidence). As they say, “Life begins outside the box.” Or, “Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.” Either way, don’t let the Covid pandemic end without you taking some time to find the creative you!
This weekend, get out and enjoy the weather, get a breath of fresh air, and create something.
- Dr. Pfister