Creativity vs Creative Thinking
Imma just come out and say it: There are two kinds of creativity and they are so different, they really should have different words.
Type 1: Self-expressive or artistic creativity.
This is the kind of creativity everyone thinks of when they think of creativity. Art, music, poetry … anything that expresses the soul’s truth. This is the famous creativity, the one we think of when we say, ‘She’s so creative!’ or ‘I wish I could be more creative!’ Turns out, it’s also the kind of creativity that is far easier for AI or ChatGPT to do.
Type 2: Problem-solving or strategic creative thinking.
This is the kind of creativity we use far more often, but it doesn’t get the cred it deserves. This is the creativity it requires to start a business, market a product or create an advertisement, feed your kids vegetables, reach across the aisle and create a connection with someone with a very different viewpoint to your own. This is also not the type of creativity that ChatGPT will be able to do — hopefully for at least another 10-20 years.
Type 1 and 2
This is why I think I love stand-up comedy and humor writing so much; it requires both types: self-expressive (creativity) and problem-solving (creative thinking?). I do think most of what we do doesn’t fall exactly into one camp or the other, but for me, at least, some things lean very heavily in one direction or the other.
When are you using your self-expressive creativity? When are you using your problem-solving creative thinking? How are the two different for you?
For me, the perfect explanation for both is in poetry vs comedy. When I write poetry, I’m not trying to ‘solve’ anything. I’m just writing down — in poetic, pretty, artistic-y sounding language — how I feel. Poetry is about expressing myself.
But comedy? Comedy comes far, far more from the problem-solving, creative thinking brain. For me, comedy is about finding what’s wrong in society, and pointing it out in an artistically palatable way. I use self-expression to pretty up the language or create an image, but the impetus for wanting to write a comic piece or do stand-up comes from wanting to talk about a societal wrong.
I’ve yet to figure out how this matters, but so far I’ve found one very clear reason: Creative thinkers have been put down as ‘not creative’ by self-expressionists for a long, long time. Creative folk don’t see problem-solving or strategic, creative thinking as 'creative’ as artistic self-expression. But that’s about to change. ChatGPT can already write a completely functional article about anywhere in the world. It might not be especially pretty and there’ll probably be some errors, but an editor would pay for it.
But can AI get your kid to eat their vegetables yet?