“Building a satisfying life is itself a creative endeavour. Developing good moral theories is a creative endeavour. Understanding physics is a creative endeavour. Building good relationships is a creative endeavour.”
– Sarah Fitz-Claridge
From the archives: Posted on 5th January 1997
“My interest, frankly, is less concerned with the ‘creativity in problem-solving’ outcome than in other possibilities. There is something about the process of non-coercive interactions that I believe is meaningful to a variety of different outcomes. Creativity in problem-solving may be but one outcome. Life satisfaction could be another.”
This is to misunderstand what we mean by “creativity”. Building a satisfying life is itself a creative endeavour. Developing good moral theories is a creative endeavour. Understanding physics is a creative endeavour. Building good relationships is a creative endeavour.
Creativity is the (subject-specific) meta-knowledge of how to solve a problem. A problem does not have to be conscious, explicit, or mathematical, say. Creativity plays a part in all improvement in each and every area of life. Coercion impairs creativity. This is not limited to the narrow sphere you seem to be referring to.
Hope this helps.
See also:
- My Taking Children (and myself!) Seriously story
- Solutions are created at the time
- The word ‘theory’
Sarah Fitz-Claridge, 1997, ‘Creativity is involved in every area of life’, https://takingchildrenseriously.com/creativity-is-involved-in-every-area-of-life