Coaching
and the creative mind
Just as the world of Coaching broadens
and deepens its involvement into social issues such as Recovery and
Education (the coaching of teachers for example), my concern is that
this is just an attempt to clean up a mess rather than avoiding it,
and its consequences, in the first place.
So my talk addressed the issue of
creativity and how this God given gift is threatened and virtually
eliminated during childhood. And the paradox is that, currently,
respected institutions such as the RSA and the TED series and
business and industry everywhere are pleading the necessity of
creativity in our daily and working lives, at the same time as (in
UK) they have decided to test children at the age of 4 and 5 for
competence in reading and arithmetic. (And its laughable and ironic
that the younger the age at which they decide to force this tyranny
on children, the worst their performance becomes.)
So I took my group at conference back
to the age of seven in their imaginations and it is astounding how
easily adults can and want to make this imagined leap. They are tired
of being adults and want to play and laugh and work
together...........And this is what happened.
They plundered materials, pushed each
other aside, made a mess and produced images which were indeed almost
exactly the sort of image children of that age would make. And how do
kids of that age draw and paint? Why, exactly as their teachers have
instructed. Shouldn't you put some birds in the sky Susan, and
shouldn't your mummy be in the picture too? Dangerous stuff, because
this interference programmes the child to conform and seek praise.
Here I showed them a short clip about
parents and teachers in Australia who leave their kids alone to paint
without any judgement or interference-
look------- Aelita Andre painting
http://youtu.be/23hWMvSrZx8
Then I launched the group into drawing
and painting ferociously on the floor, turned them into animals with
face paint and introduced them to their daemons (mystic creatures
which watch over us and our creativity in our lives) and most
importantly of all, watched them plunge into the parallel world of
the Creative Collective; (what I call the garden of NOW) those
magical currents of genius which await us always, if we were but
awake enough to see.
Here I showed them a video of a
murmuration, this is the Autumn flight of starlings in Europe where
they fly in thousands making art in the sky and I likened this to the
feeling and thrill humans get too when they combine their creative
minds and work as one. That you do not lose any individuality when
you work together with others. On the contrary, the experience
heightens individuality and creativity.
Look------- murmuration
http://youtu.be/iRNqhi2ka9k
The talk was all, and more , of this
ilk but essentially it was a plea for Coaching to address creativity
and about my intention to launch in 2015 a training course, in a
small way at first, for those who wish to become Creativity Coaches;
to take themselves firstly into the collective genius and to
learn how to open this wonder to others.
Finally, it was a plea too (and this I
hope to address in an Education Group with Martin Richards)
to launch a sort of underground
concept/movement, 50:50 I might call it, which sees the value
of both creative and rational learning as being of equal value; essentially play and innovation. Not
as separate divided issues but merely representative of the two sides
of human nature which should in no way be in conflict but instead
blend and flow together.
Kids love this sort of learning
Teachers would too.
Michael Eldridge.
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