“The one thing all the creative people had in common is that at one point in their life they chose to be creative” — Tom Kelley quoting Dr Robert Sternberg
Imagine I asked you to draw a quick self-portrait of the person next to you — you would pick up your pencil and begin, sketchily (pardon the pun)… time runs out too quickly and when you are asked to show it you might be apologetic and embarrassed about your drawing.
When I ask my child to do the same exercise, he enthusiastically embarks upon the exercise and victoriously shows his creation to the group — proud that he’s managed to get something out of his head and onto the paper…
Kids love to create, they are wired for it, wired to play and to discover, to revel in the adventure. However, as Tom Kelley says in this TED Talks video, “Creativity is not typically the default setting for the adult human brain”… which brings me to the quote at the top of this blog…if we want to be creative then at some stage we have to make a choice.
On Thursday night at Team Night we launched The 100 Day Creative Challenge.
The 100 day creative challenge is a choice. It’s a line in the sand, a dedicated period of time. A quest to set aside 100 days between now and Vision Sunday (a day in the life of Hillsong Church that marks the start of the year)…
- to create
- to set aside our fears of what people may think
- to create quantity, not just quality, in order to get the creative juices flowing
- to try new things
- to improve our current skill level
- to dream and imagine
- to collaborate and invite people to look differently at the world
- to look differently at the world
- to sharpen ourselves spiritually so that our creativity is not just influenced by the world, but by the Creator of the world
For us in Australia, this is the ‘Summer Season’ (for you it might be the Winter/Holiday season), where we generally rest and relax, put our feet up and go easy until the New Year starts…but this year we are re-imagining it and taking 100 days to challenge ourselves to see more in the season. To use the days to be refreshed as we stir creativity in our team. It is my hope that when we re-group together in February we will be richer, stronger and better because of a concerted, disciplined effort to practice our crafts and create space.
So… many of you are asking to join in on the 100 days so here is what you can do
- Download the poster and print it out
- Let some of the ideas on the back of the poster inspire your own creativity — theres no real rules on what or how you should do this — it’s a creative challenge☺…
- Share your work — #100daycreativechallenge on Instagram
- Read the 89 chapters of the Gospel narratives with us (that means you can miss 11 days and still make it), and journal the jourey and prayers that mark this season for you
- Follow this space as we share from many different creativities on how to use these 100 days well
Cass
Jun 27 2014
