Robert E. Franken defines Creativity as the tendency to generate or recognize ideas, alternatives, or possibilities that may be useful in solving problems, communicating with others, and entertaining ourselves and others. Creativity is all about coming up with new ideas and implementing them to see the results. It is a quality which can be present in an individual or it can also be developed by an individual by referring to various creative work and using own cognitive power to create something, discovering ideas or possibilities in a novel way.
Creativity is unique. Why? Because each individual thinks differently and wants to put in their own variations to a particular task to make it creative, thus making it unique. There are two main components attached to Creativity which are originality and functionality. Creativity portrayed by each individual is their original version with their cognition and efforts. It is not an extension of something that already exists, but something new. Functionality is the factor which portrays that the creativity needs to have some usefulness and it needs to actually work.
Coping is a process of using strategies that refer to the specific efforts, both behavioural and psychological, that people employ to master, tolerate, reduce, or minimize stressful events. Coping is a term mostly used in the field of psychology. Coping means to invest one’s own conscious efforts in order to solve problems in life. It is known as coping mechanisms in psychological terms, which means one uses their inner mechanism in order to cope and be resilient in a particular situation. Using different coping strategies or coping skills help in building up of self-confidence and self-esteem in order to move forward along with facing various challenges. Coping skills are the ways people adapt to, for gaining psychological relief. It helps is reducing stress levels and anxiety levels. It helps in analysing a situation in a better way and through various perspectives. Coping helps in keeping the mind peaceful and mindful. Coping depends on the individual personality traits as well as the social environment, for example how stressful is a situation. There are positive and negative ways of coping. The positive ways help in reducing the stress in a particular situation, whereas using negative ways of coping is maladaptive which can lead to development of other negative factors.
The relation or connection between creativity and coping is that, creativity is one of the positive ways of coping on a day to day life. Creativity in the form of art, dance, music etc are coping skills used by general population in order to reduce the level of stress they go through. Sketching, painting, singing, learning to play an instrument, colouring, mandalas, stitching, making best out of waste are all the ways in which coping can be done. Creativity can be portrayed in every small or big thing that one does. One can portray creativity by cooking a new dish and plating it with a attractive presentation. Using creativity helps to calm one’s mind. It helps in thinking in a rational way after the stress is reduced. Engaging oneself into creative work helps in increasing the focus on doing the particular task as well as works as a positive distraction from the stressful event for brief amount of time, letting one take their time to process the whole situation. It also helps in understanding a situation and thinking about it, and then reacting to the situation.
Researches have shown that ‘Mandalas’ have great coping elements which calms the heightened emotions of an individual. Drawing and colouring Mandalas, using different colours tells about the mood of an individual. There are other researches which say that learning an instrument helps in increasing attention span, patience and decreasing levels of anger and anxiety. Photography is another form of creativity which helps in connecting better with people and to the nature. Sketching helps in building up confidence by portraying new ideas on paper. It also builds up the patience level of an individual majorly. Writing poems help in expressing the emotions and thoughts of an individual. It helps in regulating the emotions understanding self in a better way. Unique coping ways like practicing beat boxing is a creative learning process as a part of music. It helps is increasing amount of curiosity and dedication in an individual. Having hobbies, learning new things, implementing new ideas, discovering something new out of curiosity are all creativity of an individual portrayed in the best way possible for coping.
Inculcating self with healthy coping strategies help in leading a smooth and well organised day to day life. Channelizing negative thoughts and emotions into positive one’s are very important. This helps in building optimism and positivity in an individual which in turn uplifts the self-confidence and self-esteem of the individual.
“The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul”.
-Dieter F. Uchtdorf
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