Genius, the game changer.

Genius, like creativity, is a word that we see all the time. It is also one of the terms that we use nonchalantly, but when we are asked to define it, we struggle. To me, a genius is a game changer. If you think about it, there is someone out there who changes the way we see things. Babe Ruth changed the game of baseball; The Beatles altered the sound of music; Edgar Allan Poe composed a new genre of novels; da Vinci painted masterpieces and changed the way that art was perceived. Everything, not just "creative" activities, have different game changers; they all have a genius that alters our own perspectives.

Does Education Kill Creativity?

       It's been argued before that education kills off creativity. The main focus of schools is to educate us on what we should expect to know in the future, and they constantly better the newer generations compared to those previously schooled before. School focuses on mathematics, sciences, literature, and writing. It only dabbles on the fine arts such as art, dance, and music. This can be justified by the fact that throughout my education in high school, I had to take one credit of the fine arts compared to three or four years of general education courses, like science, history, math, and literature courses. 

       Personally, I would say that school does help to kill off a person's creativity. Because we aren't taught to explore the side of us that whispers, "what if this happened?", we are deprived of expanding our creative mindset. We are forced to accept that the fine arts are less important compared to the other subjects. If they were more important, if we were supposed to focus more on the creative aspects of life, then why do we barely note them in our education? 

       Throughout school, I was blessed to be given the chance to better explore the more creative sides of who I am, which helped me to become more of who I am today. From middle school, I partook in band as a flutist and had the chance to have an art class one per year for a semester. In high school my schedule was loosened because I no longer played in the band. From freshman year through to my senior year, I was granted the chance to have at least one course per semester that I could take which was focused on creativity. I had creative writing courses where we had focused on particular elements of literature, but could write anything we pleased as long as it played to the element in discussion. I took various art courses, which gave us a main topic to focus on, like the emotions, and granted us to paint whatever came to mind when we thought of that topic. I had even been given the chance to take a multimedia class, where we made our own movies and posters using photo shop and Microsoft Movie Maker. 

       Because I had been given the chance to further explore the more creative parts of myself, I took the opportunity outside of school to allow that part to grow. I had bought the equipment needed to do the things I had learned at school in my spare time, and it had really helped me to develop my creativity. Although schools don't focus primarily in the creative aspects of life, we still get a small taste of what it's like to play on with those parts of life. If we enjoy them, we have the chance to care for them outside of education. I do believe that education malnourished our creative portions but we cannot blame their deaths solely on our education. We must take the time to care and mend for them. 

The Importance of Revision

Revision is a huge part of the creative process despite what many people believe. There are a lot of people who would argue that by revising one of your pieces, you're also cutting down the level of creativity it possesses. They would say that by moving around selections of your article or by ridding it of unnecessary and repetitive information, you're destroying its imperfection, the part of it that makes it original and different compared to other pieces of literary work. Although this is the dominant argument, it is not the actual truth. Revision is really important because it doesn't only allow us to move pieces of what we're writing, or possibly selections of audio or videos, but it helps us to organize and refine our project into its most perfect form. By revising, we can better transition both individual topics and the entire piece as a whole, as well as organize what needs to go where in what order (chronological, spacial, etc). Revision also allows the audience, readers, or listeners to better grasp what exactly is being said in the piece, and understand the context better. So by revising, you're not "ruining" a creative piece. Your story, article, video, or audio is like a diamond in a rough--if you don't refine it, it will never come to be at its full potential. This is why refining is a major portion of my creative process.