The Importance of Creativity & Collaboration

Creativity comes from the soul. It is a direct representation of who you are; it gives others a sneak peak into your most prized possession: your mind. Being creative could be one of the most vulnerable things one can strive to be because what you create is up to immediate interpretation and judgement. Despite this, you create what you want because your work is a physical reflection of yourself. Without even realizing, what you create is a concrete entity of your mind and being. Writing this article is a form of vulnerability because I’m letting you into my thoughts and sentiments that I have within myself. You are currently viewing me in the form of words.

Hi, nice to meet you. 

Being a true creative thinker is appreciating everyone’s thoughts, ideas, and values. With that comes being able to express yourself without fear of judgement from others. No one creative person is a carbon copy of another, thus you must be accepting. While creativity might involve just yourself, it often involves other individuals. Creative collaboration is when true magic happens because multiple ideas can come together. When two or more completely different beings with contrasting visions unify together, they give their best in order to make the best content. The Point Magazine is a direct example of just that. Without creative collaboration, The Point would quite literally not be in existence. In my opinion, creative collaboration is the most beautiful, pure exercise there is. It creates an environment where each individual wants to bring their best selves to the table and embrace others to make something greater than themselves.

Creativity is not a selfish task, in a way it is almost selfless, if you ask me. Even if you are working on something alone, you are creating for someone else’s enjoyment. A notion that often gets tainted is posting on social media and how that can be deemed egotistical or superficial. Sharing images, once again, is sharing a part of yourself with your followers. I share photos to inspire others. It is as short and simple as that. My notion is not, “I want them to think of me in this way,” or to receive any type of validation from others. It could be something as small as sparking a slight interest in the visual they are viewing to completely inspiring them, or even providing a small pocket of bliss to their day. I want people to feel something positive while viewing what I share. The concept of aesthetics can easily come into play here, for the notion of aesthetics is to examine the judgements of sentiment in regards to art. Sentiment and art go hand in hand. In the words of David Hume: “All sentiment is right; because sentiment has a reference to nothing beyond itself, and is always real, wherever a man [or woman] is conscious of it.” Despite all sentiment being true and right, posting to Instagram to receive likes or count comments of heart eye emojis is immoral. In fact, it degrades the art that is yours because at that point you are imitating something that is not your true, genuine self. While this can be a modern day relation to Hume’s concept, it is very much true and relates to his original ideals of imitation and mimicking. 

Being creative sometimes feels like a full time job, and any other fellow artistic person could attest. Creative energy is something that cannot be misused, and sometimes feels like a curse rather than a blessing. Despite the occasional moments of weakness, creativity is the most powerful gift of them all and we must cherish it. Creative minds come in multitudes of different forms and we should all come together and be one, as collaborators. 

Karli Williams