7 Day Positivity Challenge Day 2 : Beauty in Creativity
Hi everyone,
How often as a child, when you were coloring, did you hear, "stay within the lines"?
How often have you heard the words crazy or weird when referring to artistic or creative people?
Probably more than once, BUT, how often were you told, "Dance like nobody's watching; love like you've never been hurt. Sing like nobody's listening; live like it's heaven on earth?"(Mark Twain)
Probably not as often.
Our world and especially our school systems are not designed for the creative, the eccentric, the artistic, and many suffer because of it.
Today during a walk around Playa del Carmen, I came across this Muffler shop and noticed the oddities on the roof; the oddities that made me smile, and made me want to know more about the owner of that place. The guy who really was an artist, but was forced to make his living fixing mufflers.
The guy who thought he would make a tin man and a half canopy look pretty darn awesome on his roof.
The guy who figured out that two ceramic frog planters, one donning a hard hat, would look great in front of his building.
A few streets away, I came across this old rusty bike, the basket used as a flower pot, on the second floor ledge of an apartment building.
I wondered if either of them had been admonished for colouring outside of the lines.
I began my Positivity Challenge yesterday, talking about "Memories", and @swedegis' comment triggered today's post.
@swedegis (46) · 8 hours ago
Love the memories. Brought back mine of taking my daughter to the Boston Museum of Art on her birthday then having lunch in the cafeteria there. A day off from school but a full day of loving art!!
Creativity in any form should be celebrated...cooking, painting, sculpture, photography, or even just the act of acknowledging and appreciating the beauty all around us.
Life is Beautiful !!! And we should all be screaming that from the rooftops :)
ok, that's a little weird, but you know what I mean.
Appreciate it. Love it. Acknowledge it. And acknowledge those who are truly blessed with the ability to create something beautiful.
I was fortunate to have taught at a Fine Arts School for many years, and I was continually in awe of my students and their amazing abilities. Art, music, dance, drama, photography. Most of them had attempted to "fit in" at a typical high school, and arrived at my school with horrible tales of bullying and feelings of not being accepted. They all breathed a sigh of relief and eventually came to the realization that there were others exactly like them, and that there was nothing wrong with them after all!!
This is an amazing TED talk by Sir Ken Robinson about how the public school system is killing creativity in children. The entire video is awesome, but for those with short attention spans, fast-forward to about the 14 minute-mark. He talks about a girl who was brought to the doctor by her mother because she was always getting into trouble at school; It was before ADHD was discoverd, so basically, this girl was accused of being hyperactive, but the end result is the doctor told the mom that her daughter didn't have a learning disability, she was just a dancer. That girl turned out to be the choreographer for the musical CATS, among other big name hits!
Embrace your creative side folks; you never know what you have buried deep inside of you until you search it out. Pick at that side of your brain that was told for years to behave :)
The Rules:
The 'rules' are fairly simple, but truthfully, I would encourage all of you if you don't, to live your life as if you're entering a positivity challenge every single day. It really does take more muscle movement and energy to frown instead of smiling ;)
- Write a post about something you have to be positive about today - this could be anything from being thankful for your current situation, someone being nice to you, being thankful for your friends and family, or even being thankful for the opportunity you have been given here on Steemit - just keep it positive :)
- Do this for 7 days in a row if you get nominated (with my life, I won't be doing it seven days in a row, but you can be sure I will write seven posts :)
- Mention three people who should do this on each day.
- Tag it with #7daypositivitychallenge and include these rules at the bottom of your post
- Include a picture of something positive (related to your story if possible)
Today I nominate:
@bala41288 and @kchitrah who both showed an interest in joining after my Day 1 post :)
Proud Member of :
WHAT a great analogy!
And yes... I can remember teachers always telling me to color within the lines, or my mom telling me to always make sure to wear clean underwear... all those little phrases made me kind of OCD in my adult life
hahaha yes, I always got the "clean underwear" bit too, but it always followed with, "because if you're ever in an accident, you don't want doctors to see dirty ones!" Does that even make any sense?? :)
I guess we're a product of that time when women were supposed to be perfect! Who were they kidding?!
Thank you for your comment @goldendawne ;)
@lynncoyle1 these are amazing. I still really love the mural you posted a bit ago.
School and the medical community are to blame. The great news is Mental Health professional are really pushing art therapy. After watching 'Loving Vincent' it affirms it to me more, that a lot of our past artists of all sorts where 'tortured souls' meaning they suffered from illness not yet diagnosed. They had to live with the demons in their head, they knew no other way. The only time the could 'quiet' the demons was to create...paint, music, sculpt and the like.
So now days we throw a pill at something to deaden that part inside of us. With schools..'we don't have the money' Then they need to examine why not.
So true @tryskele. I've always imagined what our world would really look like if only we nourished and encouraged that "part" of kids. Imagine!!
I completely agree. Colouring outside the lines, whether it is while being creative or just in life in general will make you unique. Often we are too afraid to do it, because we’ve been indoctrinated our entire lifes. But how can one find himself when always staying within the borders others other people determined.
The strength of being able to color putside of the lines is what defines us as a person.
(FYI, I was never good at it. Don’t know if it was a coincidence or just stuborness, lol)
hahaha probably a bit of both I would think, although I'm leaning more towards that Belgian stubborn streak I seem to know well :)
Hahaha, you’re probably right ;0)
You know how this resonated for me: the school I went to really boxed folk and one of my best friends was a very talented child. She came from a very talented family and was totally stifled by school and more so by boarding school. I watched her progress from drawing what she actually saw to what she perceived. She went on to become a fantastic graphic designer.
I went back to that school when I did my teaching diploma (English teacher too.... ) and had an interesting epiphany: that somehow, creative kids manage in spite of the rigidity and the boundaries. However, like my friend, they can nearly kill as they did with her, and most certainly did with me. Until a few years ago when I began to let myself be and allow my creative side to emerge.
The pressure to confirm rather than just be is sooooo awful! And people, especially kids can be soooo mean. I am learning to colour outside the lines - since I turned 50. Go figure!
I didn't know you were an English teacher too! yes, yes to all of this :)
With age comes wisdom! By the time I hit 40, I finally knew who I was and by 50, life is grand :)
Thanks for the great comment @fionasfavourites! Are you Canadian by any chance...I always mean to ask you that just based solely on the fact that you have a "u" in your name :)
Trained to teach English (and Geography) but spent most of my working life doing some sort of writing, adult education and training and research in the post school sector.
Nope, not Canadian. Born in the UK of a Scottish father and English mother and have lived in South Africa since I was 3. Explains the "u"? 😁
That's interesting; I dabbled in adult ed for a bit, but for whatever crazy reasons, really loved teenagers 😅
Nice to have the "u" cleared up haha
Creativity can be learned.
Watch how even the "Boring, straight-laced Line" can be inspired - especially when romance is involved - in this award-winning production...
"The Dot and the Line: A Romance in Lower Mathematics (1965)"
Based on the book by Norton Juster from 1963, this 1965 short film won the Academy Award for Animated Short Film. Created by classic animation artist Chuck Jones, the story was inspired by a the Victorian novella "Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions," in which the protagonist visits a one-dimensional universe called Lineland, where women are dots and men are lines.
Namaste, Jaichai
LOVE it!! There is no room for rigidity in this woman's life :) Thank you so much for sharing that!
I think those kids must have been lucky to be around someone as receptive and positive as you are. Always a lift reading your blogs.
Thank you so much @agmoore! That's so nice of you to say. Actually, there are many past students who I continue to stay in touch with, some are even having kids of their own now....so I guess that says something :)
Hi lynncoyle, I believe that if the average teacher was like you we would live in a better world
Thank you very much for saying that!! I really did take my job very seriously; in fact I quit teaching when my husband @briancourteau got sick and I could no longer give it the attention it required. I used to get so angry watching "those" teachers who really didn't seem to care, and often wondered why they were in it in the first place. I truly loved my students and cared about their well-being. Like parenting, if teaching is done right, it is one of the most rewarding "jobs" to do :)
haha years later, I obviously still feel strongly about it :) Thank you again @creepyturtle!
I really didn't have a niche in high school. I kind of floated between niches without really belonging to any. There were about a half dozen of us who fit that bill, and we would hang out with our sack lunches and never really fit in with each other either.
I probably could have used a fine arts school, but instead, made due bouncing between the really smart folks, the athletes, the popular kids and everyone else that eventually either ended up in band or in drama. I can't say that I ever felt like I belonged, but it did get better towards the end of high school. I wish I'd figured it out before I graduated and life took me elsewhere that it wouldn't really matter and that the likelihood of holding onto any friendships or associations would be hard with distance and time between them.
But that's okay, too. Live and learn, and try to be as creative as we can as often as we can.
Yep, it sounds as though you would have been a perfect fit at my school 😅
What an excellent way to inspire others!
Thank you. That's cute :)