Amy Tan: The Sources of Creativity

in Creativity, Literature | March 19th, 2009 1 Comment

The TED con­fer­ence has fea­tured sev­er­al talks about cre­ativ­i­ty in recent years. Eliz­a­beth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love) gave a lit­tle spiel about “cre­ative genius” at this year’s con­fer­ence. Before that, famed psy­chol­o­gist Mihaly Czik­szent­mi­ha­lyi spoke about the rela­tion­ship between cre­ativ­i­ty and hap­pi­ness. (It all boils down to “flow.”) And now we fea­ture nov­el­ist Amy Tan (The Joy Luck Club), who locates the source of her own cre­ativ­i­ty, espe­cial­ly when writ­ing, in her fam­i­ly his­to­ry and big exis­ten­tial ques­tions. The talk runs a good 24 min­utes.


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  • mike gibbowr says:
    February 3, 2010 at 11:50 pm

    Amy Tan, is insight­ful and down to earth in her pre­sen­ta­tion… but what impressed me most was her incli­na­tion to ques­tion WHY… and to explore where ever that might take her. If you want to know how cre­ativ­i­ty works… you have to be will­ing to risk the unknown and be pre­pared to dis­cov­er a Uni­verse beyond your present state of mind. Cre­ativ­i­ty… begins, is nur­tured, and finds expres­sion in the ques­tion…

    It’s Time…
    Copy­right 2008 Michael Gib­bowr

    Who am I ?
    What is my Pur­pose in Life ?
    Is there an Answer ?
    What is it… ?

    As to the First Ques­tion…
    You are among the Most Unique With­in Your Species
    An Irre­place­able Spec­i­men of Poten­tial­i­ty
    Capa­ble of The Most Con­se­quen­tial Achieve­ments
    Ever Con­ceived by Mor­tal Man

    Sec­ond­ly, You were Designed
    With a Spe­cif­ic Thought in Mind
    To Pur­sue Expres­sion of What Resides In You
    Not To Mim­ic Another’s Attrib­ut­es
    But To Dis­cov­er Your Own Pur­suits

    To Do What It Is That You Do Best…
    To Ques­tion, Chal­lenge and Explore, an Unyield­ing Quest
    To Look into The Look­ing Glass of Life
    And Cut Through the B.S. like a Razor-Edged-Knife
    Going Beyond the Per­cep­tions of the Con­ven­tion­al View
    To Reveal That To Your­self, You’ve Remained True…

    And That In Its Entire­ty
    Is What Pur­pose Has Intend­ed For You To Pur­sue
    With­out Qual­i­fi­ca­tion
    Pay­ing The Price Required Of You

    Third­ly, if up to now The Answer hasn’t been Clear
    Pur­suit of Your Per­son­al Best means Fac­ing Your Fears
    In spite of Dis­ap­point­ments, Heartache or Tears
    Yes, Pur­pose Requires Resilience From You
    Giv­ing Your All, In All That You Do

    Fourth, and fine­ly…
    If You’re Coura­geous Enough To Stay The Course
    You’ll Learn to Find Mean­ing
    Amidst Cel­e­bra­tion and Loss
    You’ll Live Life On Pur­pose…

    Know­ing Your Pur­pose
    Is Unique­ly Your Own
    With an Unsat­is­fied Sat­is­fac­tion
    In Hav­ing Ven­tured Beyond Your Com­fort Zone
    More Impor­tant­ly, you’ll have Expressed Per­son­al Gifts
    As Only Your Per­spec­tive Befits

    Who am I ?
    What is my Pur­pose in Life ?
    Is there an Answer ?
    What is it… ?

    Well, now you Know…
    So off with You…
    It’s Time to Do…
    And Be…
    And Grow…
    ~

    Reply

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