Living with balance helps you achieve greater creative success

The last date I went on, I was 10 minutes late, running into the café with wet hair. My canned response, “Sorry I’m late,” came as my date was already eating his food. I later texted my mom and joked, “Every date I go on, I come in late with wet hair.” Refreshingly, my date that night said that people who tend to run late enjoy life more because they go with the flow. And I couldn’t have agreed with him more. As a writer, musician and healer, I consider myself a creative.

Now I’m not saying all creative people are late, messy and unkempt like myself. However, highly creative people tend to represent traits that keep them “in the zone,” or flow, more often. This usually requires periods of activity and rest and not adhering to a strict, tight schedule. Here are four traits you’ll find in creative people:

They live in a nice balance

Between exertion and rest, discipline and playfulness, creative people give themselves space to recharge, so they can come up with those creative ideas – and this usually involves taking care of their body or giving themselves a break on timelines.

In a Psychology Today article, The Creative Personality, Jacob Rabinow, an electrical engineer, explains how he uses creativity to reshape his relationship to time: “When I have a job that takes a lot of effort, slowly, I pretend I’m in jail. If I’m in jail, time is of no consequence. In other words, if it takes a week to cut this, it’ll take a week.” He adds, “What else have I got to do? I’m going to be here for twenty years. See? This is a kind of mental trick. Otherwise you say, ‘My God, it’s not working,’ and then you make mistakes. My way, you say time is of absolutely no consequence.”

Creative people are both intelligent and childish

According to psychologist Howard Gardner, who is leading a cultural discussion on creativity, you need to achieve a certain level of knowledge within your field to achieve true creativity. Yet, children are often more willing to try new things and make mistakes, which is another key element.

But Gardner believes there’s also a piece of historical luck to true creativity: “To put it in plain English, somebody does something new that initially strikes people as odd or unexpected, but rather than being rejected is accepted by people who know something about the topic. The acid test of creativity is whether the domain in which it finds itself is changed as a result of that creation.

Creative people may have a high sex drive

According to the chakra system, our second chakra, the sacral chakra, located in the reproductive or sexual area, is our powerhouse for creativity. Researchers from University of Newcastle upon Tyne and the Open University find that professional artists and poets have approximately two times the number of sexual partners as the average person. According to the study, the average number of sexual partners increases as creative output grows. This could be because the desire to be creative, expressed in whatever form, coincides with the primal desire to have sex.

Creative people are both introverted and extroverted

There are many famous creative introverts, such as Emily Dickinson, and many famous creative extroverts. Often, creative people tend to be introverted, and they express themselves through their writing, music or art. Many people need alone time and introspection to receive creative ideas, while others need other people, experiences and community to get inspired. Oftentimes people are one or the other; with creative people, we often see both introversion and extroversion.

 

There is no right or wrong way to be a creative individual. But slowing down and being prepared to receive a burst of creative insight at the drop of the hat is a good strategy when you are trying to balance your creative side.

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