This new series of posts is intended to help teachers, parents and children integrate more creativity into thier lives and learning.  The goal is to give you reasons to pursue a path of creativity for yourself so that you are better equipped to pass these traits on to your students and children.

We are going to begin by taking a short journey.  As you read, let your mind create the world presented.

I want you to use your imagination to put yourself in someone else’s place. Imagine you are an educator in a regular classroom with gifted student clusters, the year is half over, the winter is getting long, there have been too many cold days, it is gray and dark outside most everyday.

Your classroom has two gifted kids that are getting disruptive, Tim has troubles at home with his parents, who are going through a divorce and he tends to get put in the middle of their conflicts, Charlie gets pressured at home by his parents to get high grades – both of them are heading down the slippery slope of underachievement. They are distracted in their work and distracting to others. Nothing you try seems to work to get them under control or to help them. They are beginning to take down another gifted student, Sam, who is highly sensitive and is exhibiting nervousness more often. The disruptions are beginning to affect the entire class, and you.

The parents of the Charlie – the ones that put a lot of pressure on their child – have come to you repeatedly insisting that you do something to make his slipping grades improve. They claim no responsibility to help, they view that as your job.

The gifted coordinator provides some assistance, but her position has been reduced and barely has time enough to visit all the schools. The pull-out programs were cut out of the budget and it is up to you to provide the gifted kids with all they need to survive and thrive. In addition, you still have the rest of the class with diverse needs to attend to.

Your own life has been in transition. You have recently ended a significant relationship and you are trying to help your own child with her struggles. You have been experiencing health issues and there seems to be no time for friends or interests of your own.  You are really feeling the stress. You are overwhelmed, overworked, and under pressure to turn it around.

One day, you are trying to lead a creative thinking and problem solving unit with the gifted cluster. You barely have enough energy to deliver the lesson, much less try to keep their attention and manage behavior. As you attempt to get through the lesson, the irony hits you -

You THINK to yourself – I am trying to teach these kids to be creative and think of creative solutions to problems, BUT I can barely make it through this lesson. What am I going to do now?

This scenaio is among typical circumstances that can make us feel fenced in.

We all have bad days, pressures, budget cuts and times when the kids seem to need extra attention. And, times when our own lives need extra attention and some creative problem-solving.

How do we FENCE OURSELVES IN?

What is our response to difficult situations and challenges in life? Do you feel the contraction of energy? The feelings of being trapped, with no way out? The feeling of wanting to run away and hide?

This may often be our first reaction. But hopefully, you feel the instinct to find solutions when you become challenged.

Let’s continue with our scenario.

Something sparked inside as you read a creative thinking workbook. You knew you had to do something. You searched through the resources you had gathered over the past couple years from workshops and conferences, and searched on websites.

Then . . .you found what you needed.

You have found someone to be a mentor and a coach. This person is someone who will help you with your personal and professional goals, give you ideas, resources, and challenges to assist you in becoming more satisfied in your life and in your career. Your mentor will challenge you to discover your talents and strengths, inspire you to explore, stimulate your creativity to discover new possibilities, help you find ways to invigorate your energy and inspire hope and optimism in the future.

This mentor is very busy, and has a lot of clients – sometimes you attend classes with others, sometimes you have one-on-one time. But even though the time you have with them may be limited, you have found that the benefit and value of that time is immeasurable.

When your mentor speaks to the group, you feel encouraged and inspired because they seem to speak from a place of compassion and wisdom.

Your mentor is someone who listens to you with their full attention, is unhurried when you talk, is just as concerned about your emotional needs as your professional goals. Most of all, you feel you can trust your mentor.

After working with your mentor for a few months, you feel lighter and more grounded at the same time. You are happier and more patient with others. You feel more relaxed without the previous feelings of agitation, anxiety, and nervousness that arose when trying to cope with the never-ending challenges, pressures and stresses. You realize that other people are there to help and support you, you just didn’t realize how much, until your mentor showed you ways to notice.

Life is more meaningful, your inner purpose is clearer, your life is on a self-correcting path. Your relationships have improved, your career is looking brighter, and most of all you are hopeful, optimistic and resilient to the changes that come your way.

Your mentor did not do the work for you. They did not change your life circumstances. They guided you on a path of new perspectives and new possibilities.

The mentor was mindfully attentive to the your needs. They modeled resourcefulness and adaptability by showing you how to get out of her “stuck” ideas, feeling, beliefs and thoughts.

This is the essence of creative thinking. And, in order to teach students creative thinking, it is important to model it for them so they can experience it in action.

True creative thinking does not just produce a product or new solutions to a problem,
true creative thinking affects your entire mind, emotion, will and relationships.

You cannot think your way to becoming more creative. You have to allow space for it to arise. You must embrace reflective skills in your life, and in the classroom. You have to develop a trust in the creative process. You need patience and to practice creativity over time.  You will be pleasantly surprised with the results.

When you get on the path of creativity development and begin to practice it, you feel creative thinking, you experience creative thinking, you become the embodiment of creative energy which opens a channel for creativity to come in to your life.

When this happens- you are motivating to other people, your students experience the change, they become your partners and collaborators in creativity. They imitate you, give you ideas, and begin their own creative change.