Creativity and Liberty
OBJECTIVES
My life seems to have two objectives.
To inspire people towards Creativity and Liberty.
The kingly virtues
Because they're so important I feel that the ideas behind them get obscured too often.
Dethrone the kingly virtues like these by removing the meaning behind the symbols. And soon we're marching in the streets and waving flags just because we've always done it.
CREATIVITY
Creativity = phenomenon whereby a person creates something new (a product, a solution, a work of art etc.) that has some kind of value.
Creative solutions are what I admire most. But I think that all 3 aspects of creativity interelate and empower the mind and the person.
I think it is a capacity we can grow and I think that this capability that should be stressed more than ever.
Creativity can lead to a more capable life... capable of achievining and attaining more liberty.
LIBERTY
I think Liberty is one of the greatest of gifts that God has given us. It is known by many names. Freedom, Free Choice and Free Will to name a couple.
Often there are so many cliches attached to the concept and we are in danger of really grasping the importance in our hearts how necisary it is.
I believe that the first conflict among men was fought over the theme of Liberty and I believe we still must fight for it and I believe that in the future this will be the crux of the fight as well.
This is still God's world. The forces of evil, working through some mortals, have made a mess of a good part of it. But it is still God's world. In due time, when each of us has had a chance to prove ourselves--including whether or not we are going to stand up for freedom--God will interject himself, and the final and eternal victory shall be for free agency. And then shall those complacent people on the sidelines, and those who took the wrong but temporarily popular course, lament their decisions. To the patriots I say this: Take that long eternal look. Stand up for freedom, no matter what the cost. Stand up and be counted. It can help to save your soul--and maybe your country.
and
“Of course, the war in heaven over free agency is now being waged here on earth, and there are those today who are saying ‘Look, don't get involved in the fight for freedom. Just live the gospel.’ That counsel is dangerous, self-contradictory, unsound…Now, part of the reason we may not have sufficient priesthood bearers to save the Constitution let alone to shake the powers of hell, is because unlike Moroni, I fear, our souls do not joy in keeping our country free, and we are not firm in the faith of Christ nor have we sworn with an oath to defend our rights and the liberty of our country. Moroni raised a title of liberty and wrote upon it these words: ‘In memory of our God, our religion, and freedom, and our peace, our wives, and our children.’ Why didn't he write upon it: ‘Just live your religion; there's no need to concern yourselves about your freedom, your peace, your wives, or your children’? The reason he didn't do this was because all these things were a part of his religion, as they are of our religion today. Should we counsel people, ‘Just live your religion. There's no need to get involved in the fight for freedom’? No, we should not, because our stand for freedom is a most basic part of our religion; this stand helped get us to this earth, and our reaction to freedom in this life will have eternal consequences. Man has many duties, but he has no excuse that can compensate for his loss of liberty.”
- Ezra Taft Benson
I choose to lead a life centered on human liberty. Next to the atonement of Christ and his eternal plan for our salvation it is this agency, this free will, this liberty that I am most thankful for.
PRINCIPLES
I believe that true eternal principles are what are most powerful and most worthy of our time and effort.
The root principles that I try to see and implement in everything I do: Liberty, Love, Eternal Progression, Stewardship
Principles above politics, principles above party, principles above propaganda.
Choose good eternal principles in all situations ... "Do what is right, let the consequence follow"
Teach a Man How to Teach Himself How to Fish
The Saying Goes
“Give a man a fish; you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish; and you have fed him for a lifetime”—Author unknown
Here is how I view this statement.
The Problems:
- Let us be careful to confuse SHOW them how to fish with teach
- 1. You must teach them how to fish correctly. Showing them how to fish is not enough.
- 2. They must be in similar situations for their lifetime for what you have show them to work.
If both of these (#1,#2) are sufficient then you very well might have "fed him for a lifetime"
IMPROVED
... to clarify and expand let us try this approach
"Teach a man to teach himself how to fish and you have fed him for a lifetime, no matter what.
in addition: you might very well have fed all those he comes into contact, because someone who understands the foundations of a subject is much more capable of being a teacher as they at one point taught... themselves" - Scott Jarvie
Example
A man gives a workshop on fishing to another man.
He takes him to the river to show them what he does to be successful (lest someone mistakingly believe a successful fisher = a successful teacher(automatically) )
Put this hook on the line, put this bait on it, stand on this bank of the river, throw it this far out, come here at this time of the day on this day of the week. And just like me you will catch a fish... because if I do this exact set of things there is no reason why you doing those exact things wouldn't produce the same successful results.
For anyone that fishes we know that this would never work... why? Because things change.
So you the fishing Student can ask why he isn't having the same results and the teacher can show them how to adapt. But to continue with this process on and on is only moderately better than giving them the fish.
Teach them correct principles and let them act (or govern themselves as one wise man once said)
Teach them the concepts of why a fish is interested, why they act, teach them action reaction, teach them how all their tools impact the situations and they'll see how they vary...
THE KEYS
Objectives, Tools, Cause and effect and where to find more knowledge to continue their education.
(Also I say a working vocabulary of the field so they can communicate with others and later to teach others... communication requires language and language is vocabulary)
Soon the fisherman will no longer be coming to you to find the answers to the changes and the problems he comes up against... he will be able to figure them out himself.
And how will he figure it out.
Creative Solutions - Creativity is the ability to improve... to create... to make.
WARNING
One other caveat is that their foundations be sound, meaning their principles correct and knowledge in line with those principles. The core concepts given should be correct or they will not come up with valid results.
They might still starve if one of those principles is flawed.
GUIDANCE
While I believe a person can spend minimal time being taught to fish in a way as to be able to teach himself... I still believe it of great value that person hold firm to guidance. A source of knowledge.
APPLICATION
This is how I teach my photography classes and how i try to guide my students and/or interns.
This is the approach from the Gospel in this case there are other aspects to consider, like what our guidance is and how important a part it is... that there is all sorts of mis-information, incorrect principles. But still we aim to be able to know what is good from bad... by ourselves without having to have read it on a list, and to hold firm to the guidance for assuredness because of the ever changing situations we find ourselves in, in a very complex world.
This is might help us in the area of Education. What does it mean for our methods of learnings we use all around us? For our schools.
To our teachers. Do you give them the fish? Do you show them how to fish? Or do you teach them how to teach themselves?
A couple more things to consider
Don't get me wrong showing is a part of teaching... I just worry people think showing = teaching.
Teaching yearns for an instilling of correct principles. Anything less and it takes even more teaching to correct that issue.
the more a faulty foundation is built upon the more dangerous and inconsistent the results... and the more work to fix (does it take deconstruction -> reconstruction?)
We can agree on this -> "Teaching, No Greater Call"
Make things better
How sad if we couldn't take a "situation" and turn it into something far better. Any situation, good or bad.
As Einstein said: to approach a problem at a different level of thinking.
To allow ourselves to be creative, to allow ourselves to be inspired.
Then we can avoid problems simply because we always know we can make them better.
We can work with people and their problems when they conflict with our expectations, because we can find the better way.
With this we "Let Go" and simply find a better way.
The will of the lord does not stop with what has happened, but continues in how we react.
Our sadnesses should be few when we really recognize we are capable, and we are supported, to make any situation better.
