I was born CREATIVE, but raised DUMB

During my childhood days, for festivals, my grandmother used to give each of Rs.10 and asked to spend it to our wish.  Since it was a small amount, our parents did not try to interfere with what we wanted to do. It was so exciting to have some money at our will and wish in our hand. Each of us had different ideas. One of us wanted to go to a movie, the other wanted to go have some fast food(Samosa Chat, Ice-cream), so on and so forth. Given the circumstances, each of us tried to "think" what the best came up to one's mind and then compare with other's ideas before finally agreeing to one idea.
     
Through comparison, we understood, why the other person's idea was superior and that prompted us to "think" more and more creative every time such situation arises. The superiority and creativity of an idea happens as a result of the level of maturity and knowledge one person has. Sometimes these ideas appear foolish. But, it being foolish is only an aftermath of an idea. Only when the creative idea fails, it can be termed as foolish.

The IQ levels are based on individuals' span of thinking and understanding. Most of the times, those who follow others, rather than acting independently end up being dumb. When they always see an answer in the other person, their questions remain unanswered when the other person is not present. 

The creativity is at its best when we are born and as we grow up, it gets killed, perhaps diluted. When we observe any new born kids growing, each of them tend to act differently in the surroundings that they grow. Their acts are a direct observations of what they encounter. Parents patiently wait until they rollover,crawl,sit,stand, walk, etc... The parents let them learn all of these on their own. The outcome of their creativity is sometimes, funny, amusing, scary etc. yet, that's how they learn.

As they slowly grow up, parents try to teach various things and in the process, sometimes overlook if the kid is trying to do something new and prevent him from doing it. For eg. A kid is given a toy and even before he figures out how to play, the parent try to teaches him how to play. For that moment the kid is happy for already knowing how to play, but the opportunity to be creative and play on his own is killed. Even if he breaks the toy(which is probably $10 worth, its far less than the creative parent who blows up few thousands in the stock market ;-) ), which again is never his intention, it is still an art of learning. 


When someone is doing something new, there is always scope for failure. If one can excuse the 7 million gallon worth of oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico for "A BP investigator indicated to the lawmakers that the fundamental mistake may have been made because heavy pressure on the drill line of 1,400 pounds per square inch (98 kg per square cm) was an "indicator of a very large abnormality." , why bother a $10 toy

As this keeps on progressing, the kid slowly leaves behind the art of trying and simply waits for help. Anything that is tried, either hurts the kid or spoils the thing he is meddling with. The parent denies everything and anything the kid wants to try on his own. They expect to simply follow what was being told. Thereby the kid grows dumb. This causes an inherent fear being developed right from that tender age and as they even grow up to be mature adults, it compounds to a stage where the inherent fear is now named as risk. Risk is a superlative form of fear. Risk occurs when one loses the belief and courage to be creative. If one is so scared of failures, then its too hard to be creative. 


At the same time as Azim Premji, quoted, if one is always successful, it shows that he is not trying something new. Without being creative innovation doesn't happen. If only man did not thought about how to fly like a bird, this whole world would have been a lot different.


For anyone who experiences anything for the first time, they are bound to have a lot of questions. When it comes to kids, it is even more. They learn a lot from the questions that arise through observations. Just by shutting them off or by asking them to follow, an inherent fear is slowly grown by the parent himself. They always like to imitate what the others do. 


I wish I was guided more, than taught all through my childhood. If only that had happened, I would have been more creative.


Though it appears harsh, I couldn't resist to push the blame on my parents to say, "I was born CREATIVE, but raised DUMB