My Creative Inspiration.
"To live a creative life we must lose our fear of being wrong."

 The word creativity is too often linked directly to arts and crafts.  However, creativity is a very abstract word that can only be defined by individuals themselves as it differs geatly from one person to another. Everyone is creative to varying degrees in their own ways – they just have to recognize where their creativity lies. Once their imagination and inspiration have been sparked they can allow their creative ideas to take over. Unfortunately many people tend to underestimate their own creativity due to the traditional belief instilled in them that creativity is limited to visual art, music, dance, theatre and drama. That is not true; common activities such as cooking, playing with children, planning an event or fundraiser, or something as simple as thinking and problem solving are all ways of being creative that many people tend to take for granted and overlook. When I think of the word creativity, I think of expression of oneself which alone can take many forms.

During my childhood my expression of self was mostly depicted through the traditional forms of art with black and white sketches, paints, pencil crayons, clay and water colors. I was the kind of girl who spent way too much time on the not-so-important designing component of an assignment – erasing, redrawing, restarting until I was completely satisfied with the final product - rather than focusing on the key element. Come to think of it, as a child whenever I was asked to be ‘creative’, I was just given a whole selection of art supplies. But as we all know, creativity extends far beyond what a pencil and a piece of paper can do. As a child not only did I have the opportunity to express myself through the traditional arts, but also through play. Chairs, blankets, pillows were rearranged to create a fort, stuffed animals sat neatly in a row before me while I took attendance and took on the role of a teacher, construction papers were turned into crowns and paper towel tubes were transformed into rainsticks. I even remember handmaking 20+ penguin Christmas cards for all my friends in grade.6.  Needless to say, creativity was part of the way I lived as a child; simply everything I did was, well, creative. The way children portray creativity is different from the way adults do simply because they're not afraid to do something unique, outrageous, or outside the norm. They`re not afraid of being wrong, or being different. As I grew older I began to explore various outlets of creativity in which I could use to express myself whether through journaling, photography, designing/organizing my own space, tweaking DIY projects to fit my liking, and completing things that I find value, fun, and joy in doing.  Recently I found a growing interest in photography - it's one of my biggest inspiration. What I find most captivating about photography though is not the array of effects or lenses to choose from, not the camera itself, nor is it the object of the photo. In fact, to me, the most striking thing about photography lies in the process and aftermath of the shoot. Let's take traveling for example (something I love) and place that side by side with photo taking. The places we go, the places we visit had been, and continues to be visited by people of all different backgrounds and walks of life. There's bound to be the same landscapes, monuments and buildings that ends up in someone else's photo, but interestingly, no two pictures are alike. The outcome of the photograph is a result of the creativity that lies within the person behind the camera. Photographers all look at life through completely different lenses – they appreciate and notice the smallest details that others view as plain, dull or ugly.

Every individual possess an infinite amount of creativity within them. It’s time we all find where each of our own creativity lies.  Be spontaneous; that's creative.

**All 3 photographs were taken by me**