Here is a powerful and nuanced article by Amanda Enayati looking at one of the fundamental paradoxes of creativity: Though creativity is outwardly celebrated by people from all walks of life, creative ideas are often rejected in time of uncertainty precisely because they seem strange and foreign. I found this read to be illuminating:
Creativity has taken center stage in recent years, with a slew of books, articles and TED talks extolling the virtues of imagination and exhorting young and old to go out and exercise their creative muscle.
Creativity also matters to our emotional well-being as we find our way in an uncertain, rapidly shifting world. Imagination underpins our ability to remain resilient during difficult and stressful times since creative people tend to be more tolerant of ambiguity and better able to come back from defeat.
And yet, despite its growing importance, creativity suffers from an odd sort of paradox. According to psychologist and Wharton management professor Jennifer Mueller, research shows that even as people explicitly aspire to creativity and strongly endorse it as a fundamental driving force of positive change, they routinely reject creative ideas and show an implicit bias against them under conditions of uncertainty. Subjects in Mueller’s study also exhibited a failure to see or acknowledge creativity, even when directly presented with it.
For Amanda Enayati’s full article, “Is There A Bias Against Creativity?” click here.