Personal growth: Eric Hoffer on the essentials of creativity September 22, 2017
Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Personal Development and Creativity, The Creative Process.Tags: creative process, Eric Hoffer, life, personal development, philosophy, psychology, self-actualization, writing
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Eric Hoffer writes that “…tinkering and playing, and the fascination with the nonessential were a chief source of the inventiveness which enabled man to prevail over better-equipped and more purposeful animals.”
He describes earliest “man” as “the only lighthearted being in a deadly serious universe,” a universe whose other living creatures were driven by a “grim purposefulness.”
Hoffer takes this further in his frequent assertion that the essential driver of human creativity is playfulness rather than high purpose.
“It is a juvenile notion that a society needs a lofty purpose and a shining vision to achieve much…one must be ignorant of the creative process to look for a close correspondence between motive and achievement in the world of thought and imagination,” he states.
If Hoffer is right, it makes one wonder then, if being overly serious and having excessively lofty goals in our artistic/creative efforts could actually be hampering our inventiveness, originality, and overall creativity.
Note: Quotations are from Hoffer’s book, Reflections on the Human Condition
– Dennis Mellersh
Personal growth: Confucius on the self-improvement of leaders September 21, 2017
Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Concept of personal growth.Tags: Confucius, inspiration, life, philosophy, psychology, self-actualization, self-improvement, writing
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If we aspire to being a good example to others within our sphere of influence, particularly if we are in a position of potential leadership, we obviously need to develop an overall personal character worthy of receiving respect.
Confucius teaches this lesson in The Analects by referring to the behaviour of rulers and the consequences of their behaviour.
“A ruler who has rectified himself never gives orders, and all goes well. A ruler who has not rectified himself gives orders, and the people never follow them.” (1)
If we look at the idea of rectifying oneself from a personal behaviour point of view, Confucius would have us correct ourselves by working at removing the erroneous or faulty aspects within our patterns of behaviour.
(1) As translated by David Hinton in his book, The Four Chinese Classics.
—Dennis Mellersh
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