Creativity for New Normal - Where ideas come from in times of Corona
How does creativity looks like today? How do creatives work successfully and effectively under these circumstances, the “New Normal” - between quarantine, social distancing and home schooling? The past weeks, which we spent more or less at home and limited to our own places, definitely can be seen as a lab or social experiment. A situation necessary to keep as many people as possible healthy and safe and a study which revealed in an exciting way what creative people need for ideation.
We are supposed to learn from crises, so it is worth pausing briefly to reflect on what is crucial when we are looking for something new.
Focus and distraction
The first thing that was lost in the lockdown was concentration. Full attention was suddenly on infection rates and pandemic curves, on the announcements of politicians, on the explanations of virologists and doctors. Instead of focusing on our jobs, we stared at social media, TV news, newspapers, and chats, to check latest developments on the pandemic. We let ourselves be distracted and drifted in search of good and bad news. It seemed almost impossible to concentrate on our own tasks. Which, moreover, seemed suddenly banal and unimportant in the face of a worldwide catastrophe. Moreover, everyday life became a challenge, so where did concentration, focus and energy come from to brainstorm creative and new ideas?The second thing we lost is the exact opposite of "focus". We lacked digression, stimulation and inspiration. Every day at home, every day alone or with the same people, every day the same procedures and rituals at home. Many people take some positive from the shutdown. A strict rhythm of life gives stability and consistency. For creative people it is hell. Because we miss new impulses, inspiration and serendipity We miss the randomness and spontaneity which spark and ignites creativity. Plans and structures are perfect for the R&D department. They - looking for innovation – need to be sorted and organized. Creatives however need some chaos and messiness – just to kick of new ideas.
The New Normal
So we missed focus and chaos. We missed concentration and distraction – what a contradiction. But it looks like that the whole “New Normal” is a time of contradictions and paradoxes.And it is these paradoxes that determine how we search for new ideas today. On a small scale as well as on a large scale. We redefine our small worlds, our everyday worlds at home, with friends and at work. And we readjust our large systems, companies and organizations, industries, economic areas, even nations and political alliances. In doing so, we rely on two principles: We search for ideas either "Outside the box" or "Inside the box".
Outside the box
Never before has this all-encompassing creativity principle "out-of-the-box", which we have heard so often but seldom followed, been applied as today: "Think out the box" is the new motto for creative people, entrepreneurs, project teams, mayors, parents - in fact for everyone in this world. Covid-19 turns everything upside down: it means "Think the unthinkable". What was once a crazy creativity technique is now reality. Never before have we seen so many new and unconventional ideas conceived - and so bold ideas implemented so quickly. All rules seem to be suspended and things are possible that were not even conceivable in the past. Schnapps distillers produce disinfectants, McDonald helps Aldi, Dirndl tailors sew protective masks, and schools and exhibition halls are converted into hospitals – all in just a few weeks.Inside the box
At the same time, the opposite is true. Welcome to "the new normal." While everything seems to be possible, we are also limited to small space, to home schooling and home office and social distancing. Every walk outside becomes a hurdle race. We cover our faces with masks and keep our distance. Airplanes stay on the ground and the big, wide world which we traveled to much in the past - becomes unreachable. Every day new rules, regulations and commandments are added. Nothing is the same anymore. Gone are light-heartedness, spontaneity and ease. Where does creativity flourish here? In the small, inside the box. In search of distraction, joie de vivre and new ideas germinate in micro-environments - in private apartments, on small balconies and in tiny gardens. Ski lifts are built at home, concerts are given across balconies, art is recreated at home. User Generated Content, the unloved grubby child of social media, which had been reviled and despised in recent years, is gaining new fame. It´s these little stories from home and from everyone - told "inside the box"- we want to hear, because we ourselves are all in(side) this box.So this is it
This is what drives us creative people: the contrasts. The calm and the excitement, the planned and the random, the big and the small. And that's why this is our time now. It must be, because this "new normality" needs many new ideas.All right, you creative people out there, let´s go to work!
Photo by Nick Bolton on Unsplash
