TEDTalks: Amy Tan on Creativity

This TEDtalk was inspired by an episode of the television series "Seinfled." More specifically, the episode entitled "The Sniffling Accountant."

I thought this was a marvelous talk. I thought she did a great job of defining what creativity is ... to her. According to Amy Tan (and I agree) it's how we interpret and share our world. And in order to do that we have to seek out our purpose and understand that we don't understand everything. Creativity isn't just a zingy piece of copy or a radical new idea, it's us. It's how we process and view the world in the context of our experiences. Great message! One day I hope to be in that audience.

I am a big fan of Amy Tan, and enjoyed this talk for the most part. However, maybe I set my expectations just a bit too high and was hoping for a bit more on creativity. I appreciate the lessons in randomness, chance, and luck. I just feel like she may have let this one get away from her. If not, then perhaps the profound revelation went right over my head. Unless of course, letting the small dog out of the bag was the profound revelation, and creativity stems from cute little terriers.

I don't know if it's indicative of creativity or not, but almost everything she talked about it was something I pondered at at least one point in my life. The importance of childhood, randomness, the idea that once something sparks your eye, you notice it everywhere, and most importantly, moral ambiguity. It's almost tedious, living like this, a simple question like should I donate money to the homeless man on the street leads to an existential crisis.

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