The Creativity Journey
On this page 7 headings
Start here Every creative journey is like a train ride. It leaves the station called Problem and arrives at the station called Solution. If the train never arrives, you can’t call it creativity.
This course is not about art or pottery. It is about creativity in problem solving, which is where students use it most.
From problem to solution
- Creativity starts with a problem and ends with a solution.
- You find the solution and implement it. Only then can you call yourself creative.
- It is not a one-time thing. Every day might bring 5 problems and 3 solutions. The journey never ends.
What is a problem?
Ask yourself these questions:
| Question | The professor’s thoughts |
|---|---|
| What does a problem look like? How does it feel? | You can’t touch it, but you feel it: anxious, frustrated, sometimes joyful. |
| What types of problems are there? | Big, small, family, friends, water, buying a car… All of them fit into Maslow’s needs. |
| Why are some easy and some hard? | It depends on the problem, the information you have, and other people. Finding a pencil is easy. Ending poverty is very hard. |
| How do we usually solve problems? | There is no ready answer, but we do solve them, well or badly. |
| When are you happy solving a problem? | He is happy teaching this course, because he wants students to reach the top. |
| Which problems bore or irritate you? | Housework; checking the gas and locks before going out; shuffling two cars in a narrow car park every day. |
What is a solution?
- A solution is the way to solve a problem.
- Closure means the problem is actually finished. Shuffling the cars is only solved when both cars are back in place.
- Most everyday solutions are copied from others or come from past experience (“How did I solve this two years ago?”). Copying from nature is called biomimicry.
- Some problems, like poverty, need extra creative effort.
Creativity is a choice. When a problem or a competition comes up, be the first to say “I want to solve it.” Don’t shy away.
How to start your journey: look for problems
Finding a good problem is the hardest part. Even top managers in the Tata group found it hard to name problems. Generating ideas is easy; implementing them is harder; defining the problem is harder still.
Fall in love with problems: take care of them, understand them, listen to them.
Way 1: Use ready-made problem lists
The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) list 17 goals, such as no poverty, zero hunger, good health, quality education, gender equality and clean water. Pick one and start practising. You can also ask friends or your organisation, “Give me a problem to solve.”
Way 2: Use empathy
Empathy means putting yourself in someone else’s shoes and looking at the problem from their point of view. It is the easiest way to find problems, because problems belong to people.
Lecture example — the empathy walk at IIT Madras Students go on an empathy walk around campus, wearing an imaginary “empathy hat”. At the campus hospital, one student sees a mother and her child in a long queue for the doctor. There are 12 people ahead of them, and the child is getting hungry and cranky. The student imagines being that mother. Now a clear problem appears: “How can parents handle children’s hunger and crankiness while waiting in a queue?” The goal at this stage is only to find the problem, not to solve it yet.
The hard part of empathy: you must stop being yourself and truly become the other person.
In one line: Creativity is a never-ending journey from problem to solution; find problems through lists like the UN SDGs or through empathy, and choose to solve them. Exam words: creativity journey, problem, solution, closure, biomimicry, creativity is a choice, fall in love with problems, UN SDGs (17 goals), empathy, empathy walk.