What creativity is trying to tell you: Jonathan Tilley at TEDxStuttgart

so before we dive in, let's turn on the lights and connect a little bit, raise your hand if you have, if you consider yourself a creative person, raise your hand if you don't consider yourself creative at all and okay, yeah, okay. Well, raise your hand if you've done one of three things: cooked a meal, sat on the couch in your living room, or gotten dressed. trick question we are all creative we have all created a meal we have all created the interior design of our living room and we have all created an outfit now these are just some of the questions I asked hundreds of people about

creativity

and their relationship with it and I would like to share the results with you tonight because

creativity

is this individual as it is universal, I have had a long relationship with creativity at the age of nine.

I was cast as a shopping mall in Mendelssohn's operetta Amahl and the Night Visitors at a local community theater and I was performing on stage and I got hooked. I knew that

what

was here had to be shared out there and for the last 30 years I have been a student of creativity performing on stage as a dancer, singer and actor in productions of Mamma Mia Cats 42nd Street in A Chorus Line and also working behind the scenes as a director, choreographer, author and playwright and also as a voiceover artist bringing words to life behind a microphone in a soundproof booth for television commercials, corporate story

tell

ing, e-learning modules and even applications on your iPhone and Android and through the years that I have known. other creative people and we share wonderful conversations about our individual but universal relationship with creativity, but in order to share with you tonight

what

creativity really is, I try to

tell

you my idea that is worth sharing, we must first have a common understanding of what it is really creativity.

Miriam Webster The dictionary defines creativity as the ability to do new things and think of new ideas, oh those are so boring they don't even scratch the surface, so through this research hundreds of people were asked how they define creativity , this is what they said that creativity is a feeling creativity is a force creativity is a secret creativity is love creativity is God creativity is the source creativity is an energy that is trapped in time and space and It flows through us but it also carries us creativity is an entity like the wind you can't see it but you can feel it you just know it's there so the ability to do new things versus a force the ability to think of new ideas versus love, so for the next few minutes let's take a deeper journey into creativity and find out what it is.

I'm really

trying

to tell you some fun facts that came out of the research. There is a mutual agreement that the creative process has a beginning, a middle and an end. Now, depending on the medium, it depends on the length of the creative process, so cooking a meal starts in the middle and ends 10 to 60 minutes writing a book six months to three years would also emerge from the data is that there is a mutual agreement that creativity is necessary and has needs but what fascinates me is that no one said that they were taught the creative process or told creativity is necessary and has needs was simply something that had to be experienced for itself and it was and It felt like known here is again creativity is as individual as it is universal so the creative process always begins with a thought but we are having thousands and millions of thoughts a day why aren't we creating all the time?

Sorry, Miss Manners, but it's not just the thought that counts, it depends on the environment the creative thinker is in, is the creative thinker in a negative shaming and harmful environment or is the creative thinker in a positive, healthy and respectful environment? creativity needs a sacred space being in a sacred space can gently push that creative thought into the air like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly some examples of sacred spaces are lofts and studios where painters and sculptors go to work on their art and They work with a friend of mine who is a writer and works from home.

I was getting really frustrated, so I said go to the library, which is a sacred space where other people appreciate the written word and love silence. It's where she could open up and let the creative juices spill onto the page and our stressed face gently relax into a gentle smile. It's even more wonderful when that sacred space can be shared with others who understand the creative process. gently push that thought into the air true story I was working with my speech coach deb monroe on a copy about Tuvalu, a Polynesian island that is no more than five meters above sea level and due to sea level rise, these islands are going to be completely erased by a serious documentary and as he can see I'm a little quirky and creative and a little silly, getting a little deep and serious, it's not something I do a lot and Deb knew it so she said: Get very close to the microphone.

Come up to this, it will feel intimate, but that's okay, that's where this story lives and she gave me permission to be vulnerable in this sacred space to let that creative thought flow and this is what we recorded, but now it's said that Tuvalu It's disappearing. Scientists have told the people of Tuvalu that their home will be underwater in the next 10 to 15 years. This is a story about the people of Tuvalu told by their hopes, dreams, thoughts and their vision for the future of their nation. person without a country and how can a nation disappear completely, then creativity needs a sacred space to be vulnerable where thoughts become things, a painter, the studio, the library, a quiet corner in your home, so If creativity needs sacred space, creativity is

trying

to tell you to cultivate that sacred space so that the thought has a place to evolve, which brings me to the second phase of the creative process, once you have honored that thought, you have You have to play with it, sculpt it, shape it, mold it, make it more tangible, bring it to life, but to do it you have to fall and get up again fall and get up again fall once again and get back up creativity needs mistakes throughout of history at the age of 24.

I was cast in the musical Cats and back then. that was the show all the dancers wanted to do and I was so grateful to be a part of it. The first day of rehearsal I sign in at the stage door, change into my dance clothes and start warming up in the studio one by one. The dancers begin to enter the studio and warm up next to me. I am slowly but surely building our own sacred space within our bodies for a full day of dancing. It's 10 o'clock, the associate choreographer enters the studio and quickly greets me.

He tells her to grab our lot to follow her well. I thought the building was on fire, but no, she was taking us to the stage, the largest scale of a sacred space for an artist and she said, although there is a lot of choreography to learn. She would reciprocate if we went on stage and improvised like cats. Very reluctantly we got down on our knees to roll around them on the floor like cats to give them a taste of the cat scene backstage. In the center is a large tire that at the end of the show, Grizabella, the glamorous cat who sings memory, alone on the moon, climbs on and is thrown through the roof of the musical theater, so the tire returned to the stage and a friend of mine was on his knees circling around the The sound of the tire like a cat, very reluctantly, goes around and around and then, out of nowhere, loses its balance and falls right in the center of the tire.

Well, he obviously made a mistake on the first day of rehearsal. The sacred space. I thought she was going to get fired, but she used the time and space she was given to create a wonderful moment. He stuck his head out from behind the tire, looked around, shook it, and created this wonderful cat-like character who was curious but also clumsy. I made a mistake, this improvised moment was the catalyst for us, the dancers gave us permission to lean into that vulnerability, we made mistakes and we played like cats, so creativity is trying to tell you to get dirty, make mistakes, fall, get back up.

Get up, you embrace the f-word. failure I haven't heard of anyone who could walk the first day they were born, so why do we set all these unrealistic expectations on ourselves to never fail? I failed hundreds of times. I have lost thousands of euros and dollars. I've lost friends, I've lost businesses, did it hurt me a lot? Yes, I learned something mm-hmm, so it is from those mistakes that our creations are much more powerful than that original thought. It's where your creation begins to take on a life of its own. begins to breathe which brings me to the third and final stage of the creative process once you have honored that thought played with it molded it shaped it made mistakes you will have this feeling that you could know it is done so you stop adding let it be and release it into the world creativity should be shared true story in 2002 a friend of mine gave me a book called Sea of ​​Tranquility by Paul Russell and he said this book should be made into a play and I read it from cover to cover and I was resonating with this book.

There was even a character called Jonathan, like me, quirky and creative like me, and I say this book should be turned into a play and the idea was there to turn the book into a play, but I didn't give it the sacred space that I needed until 2005, three years later, I was packing my suitcase to go on vacation for two weeks, completely alone. I desperately needed space to think and breathe, a sacred space. and lo and behold, the book lands right next to my laptop in my suitcase, you can guess what happened the next two weeks, sacred space, all alone.

I got a first draft, baby, whoa, fly back home, let it sit on my laptop for another three years until Stagnant 2008 arrives. I have this weird feeling in my stomach and it's not going away, so I start working on the piece and I start to feel better. Until I realized, damn, I need to tell the original author what he had done. so I approached Paul and told him about my adaptation of his book into a play and when I hit send on that email it was like jumping into a bottomless pit. Scary but exhilarating. Thank God.

Paul responded to me and we cultivated a wonderful friendship and began to collaborate. in the play until we both got stuck, that play was at a crossroads, once again we needed actors to act in it, so I flew to New York to meet my favorite author of all time, write him, move him and bring him this plate of life. actors in a staged reading so after this creative moment in my life I fly back home and we decided to watch it later with fresh eyes 2013 yes, I have that funny feeling again so I start working now on the final draft, I make some little Corrections and then say listen, I have to share this with the world and give the play permission to find its own sacred space, find a theater to produce and find actors to perform in it, find an audience to see it and that's when I realize.

The biggest secret of creativity creativity is cyclical creativity is trying to tell you to share your creations with the world and in doing so, giving your creations permission to find their own sacred space to inspire others to stir to move to nourish to grow nothing is original, we all know that. which is all a rehashed remix tree discontinuous recycled but filtered through our own creative process and put out into the world. I, for example, am greatly inspired by Brenda brown Marie Forleo Danielle Laporte Jonathan field Tim Ferriss I am inspired by my friends inspired by other works of art that I see triggered by each of these people who spoke tonight.

I'm inspired by you or inspired by the internet, but it's all filtered through my creative process and shown to you right now. creativity this is individual as it is universal even now me on stage you out there us in this glorious sacred space I hope you take something from tonight and integrate it into your own creative process give it the sacred space it needs make mistakes with it until You can't contain yourself and share it with the world. I wonder what a slide was that caught your attention this afternoon, the color of the shirt of the person sitting next to you or me rolling on the floor like a cat or what's up with this moment, this extraordinary stillness where we all know anything is possible, so I leave you with this, we are all creative, no matter what you think, whether it's cooking or conducting a symphony, we all need sacred space.

To do it in the weather, drawing outside the lines in kindergarten or acting too emotionally in a performance scene, we need to make mistakes and understand the limits of our creations, whether releasing a digital product or displaying our sculptures in an art exhibition,we need to share our creations. with the world and in doing so we give our creations permission to find their own sacred space to inspire others to maintain that cycle again, but sometimes we need a gentle nudge, sometimes we need a good kick in the butt, so I don't know , let me. I know that for you in your gift bag tonight you have a permission slip and I learned this from Brenda Brown.

She gives you permission to write permission slips for the things she always wanted to do. Now she takes this permission slip and you can do anything. want with it put it in your vision or carry it in your back pocket put it in your wallet or bag or make 147 copies and share it with strangers and friends alike on your permission slip it says this I give you permission the best green lights to hear what the Creativity is trying to tell you, create something truly spectacular and share it with the world, individual but universal, so what are you waiting for?

Go create, thank you.