How to Be More Creative

How do you become more creative?

It’s a trick question.

Creativity is often perceived as a trait seemingly gifted on artists, writers, poets, and innovators, and other “lucky ones.”

Many perceive it as a mark of genius. They view the creative process as one that is shrouded in mystery. A skill to develop — if only you could figure out how.

If creativity feels elusive and mysterious, perhaps it’s only because it’s so obvious and simple that we overlook it, the same way we don’t think much about the individual cells and tissues that comprise our bodies.

Creativity is not a skill to develop. You don’t need to take a class in how to be more creative, just like you don’t need to take a class in how to pump blood through your body.

It’s not a skill or a special talent. It is who you are.

Creativity is a natural function of your being alive and human.

Asking how can I be more creative? is like asking how can I be more of who I am?

It’s the wrong question.

You can’t be more of who you are. You already are all of who you are.

(Whether you can express more of who you are is a different question, and a topic for another time.)

You are creative by virtue of being human. You express your creativity in dozens of ways every day, from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep.

Every decision, every action, everything you eat, every word that comes out of your mouth or that pours from your fingers through the keypad, everything you observe around you or notice within you is an expression of your creativity.

Human being = creative being.

Creativity isn’t some elusive trait that exists in others. It is in you. It expresses through you. It is you.