Questions are an essential ingredient of moving forward whether it’s in politics, science, business or art. Without interesting questions, we have nothing to explore and nothing to create.
Michael Crichton once said that he began every novel with a question.
In the video I posted yesterday from Charlie Rose’s series on the brain, the panel also addresses the issue of curiosity as a stimulus for creativity.
In How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci, Michael Gelb writes about the seven Da Vincian principles of which curiosity is the first.
Although he expressed an intention to organize and publish them [his journals] someday, he never got around to it. He was too busy searching for truth and beauty. For Da Vinci, the process of recording questions, observations and ideas was of great importance.
Though she doesn’t address it directly, Julia Cameron’s essays, tools and tasks also point us in the direction of curiosity.
The more I consider this, the more convinced I am that curiosity is an often ignored but vitally important aspect of creative process. We take classes to learn the skills of our craft but we’re rarely taught to ramp up our curiosity in service to our creativity. We’re usually taught to express an opinion, take a stand or claim a perspective. What would happen if we shifted our focus to the question?
As I contemplate this relationship between curiosity, imagination and creativity, I suspect that many creative blocks can be eliminated rather quickly by focusing on the questions rather than on the end product. So rather than mucking around in all that fear, maybe we could just focus on being more inquisitive.
Below is a conversation Navé and I had recently on this subject. It runs a little over 6 minutes. I think you may find it interesting for the content, and for a little behind the scenes on how we create together.
Let us know below what might happen to your current project if you brought more of your curiosity to it.
Talk soon,
Photo Credit: Celia Enders
