November 19, 2024 • 37 mins
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In this episode we talk with Dr. Rex Jung about the differences in creativity and intelligence and how you can work your brain to be more creative!
Discover how engaging in creative activities might be the key to alleviating stress and enhancing personal growth. We explore the stages of creative cognition, demonstrating how a playful mind state can lead to innovation and a sense of flow. We'll discuss the empowering impact of creativity on mental health, relationships, and personal development. From spontaneous moments of inspiration while jogging to the communal joys of dance, these experiences not only enrich our lives but also foster deeper connections and a truer understanding of ourselves.
Today's Guest: Dr. Rex Jung
Rex Jung is an adjunct professor of psychology at the University of New Mexico, a research scientist at the Mind Research Network, and a practicing clinical neuropsychologist in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He studies both brain disease and what the brain does well—a field of research known as "positive neuroscience."
His research is designed to relate behavioral measures, including intelligence, personality, and creativity, to brain function and structure in healthy, neurological, and psychiatric subjects. He has published research articles across a wide range of disciplines, including traumatic brain injury, lupus, schizophrenia, intelligence, and creativity.
Rex was the President (2019-2021) of the International Society for Intelligence Research (ISIR).
Visit Dr. Jung's website here: https://www.rexjung.com/
Your Host: Kimberly Beam Holmes, Expert in Self-Improvement and Relationships
Kimberly Beam Holmes has applied her master's degree in psychology for over ten years, acting as the CEO of Marriage Helper & CEO and Creator of PIES University, being a wife and mother herself, and researching how attraction affects relationships. Her videos, podcasts, and following reach over 500,000 people a month who are making changes and becoming the best they can be.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Did you know that creativity and intelligence may
be more alike than you thinkthat they are?
They are both ways of problemsolving, believe it or not, and
in today's episode I'm going tobe speaking with Dr Rex Young.
Dr Young is an adjunctprofessor of psychology at the
University of New Mexico and heis a research scientist at the
(00:23):
Mind Research Network, and he isa practicing clinical
neuropsychologist in theAlbuquerque area of New Mexico
as well.
He has studied brain diseaseand what the brain does well in
a field of research known aspositive neuroscience.
He has done a lot withbehavioral measures, including
intelligence, personality andcreativity, and he's also
(00:45):
studied brain function andstructure in healthy
neurological and psychiatricsubjects.
So he has published articlesacross a wide range of topics,
including traumatic brain injury, lupus, schizophrenia,
intelligence and creativity.
I can't wait to dive into thisconversation about how you can
(01:06):
be more creative and what is thedifference in creativity and
intelligence.
In today's episode, let's divein.
I'm excited today to be joinedby Dr Rex Young and have this
conversation about creativityand intelligence and maybe get
into some other neurosciencythings.
Welcome to the show, dr Young.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
Thanks, Kimberly.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
How did you get into the work that you have been
doing with neuroscience and allof the different parts of the
brain that you've been studying?
Speaker 2 (01:39):
It's kind of a long story Maybe it would take the
whole podcast, but myundergraduate's in finance
actually.
So I was in the business worldand was volunteering for Special
Olympics and became veryinterested when I was working
with people with intellectualdisabilities autism and
(02:00):
intellectual disabilities andthe like cerebral palsy and
became very fascinated in thebrain in all of its capacities
and working.
So I wanted to do work closerto brain issues and stumbled
across neuropsychology.
I guess, long story short, andentered graduate school in my
(02:23):
late 20s and retrained to be aneuropsychology.
I guess, long story short, andentered graduate school in my
late 20s and retrained to be aneuropsychologist and
neuroscientist.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
That's fantastic.
What did you do yourdissertation on?
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Biochemical Correlates of Intelligence in
the Normal Human Brain is thetitle of my dissertation.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Wow, and do you remember what your findings were
?
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Yeah, I mean.
So in the mid nineties wedidn't have very sophisticated
neuroimaging techniques.
We were using MRI.
We're using a technique youcould get pictures of your brain
, but they were very staticpictures Like you see in the old
medical shows where they putthe picture up on the white
screen and you can kind of seestatic images.
(03:07):
We were using a technique calledspectroscopy which allows you
to look at brain biochemistry.
So we were seeing that certainchemicals of the brain that we
could measure that weresensitive to neurons and
neuronal health were lower inpatients with brain injuries,
(03:28):
specifically traumatic braininjury, and they were correlated
with neuropsychologicalperformance, memory, attention,
language functioning.
So I wanted to see if thosesame chemicals would be
correlated with normal cognitivefunctioning in college students
.
Our sample that we haveconvenient sample, and in fact
(03:53):
they were Intellectualfunctioning was positively
correlated with these markers ofneuronal fidelity, neuronal
health, even in normalpopulations.
So it was kind of a fascinatingstart to my career to see how
you could match normal brainstructure, function and
(04:15):
biochemistry to different braincapacities like intelligence,
creativity, personality, likeintelligence creativity
personality?
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, you've done a lot of worksince then, especially in the
line of intelligence andcreativity, as you were just
saying.
What is the difference betweenintelligence and creativity?
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Well.
So if you talk to three or fouror five different scientists,
they'll give you three or fouror five different answers, but I
have tried to simplify it asseeing these as two sides of the
same coin.
They're fundamentallyproblem-solving abilities, and
(04:57):
intelligence is problem-solvingin the world around us that is
more common, that is adaptive,that allows us to survive in the
world, in problems that we facein our everyday life.
Creativity is reasoning orproblem solving capacity that
allows us to address problemsthat are less common, that we
(05:21):
have to think to use a cliche,outside of the box, that we have
to come up with a new solutionto a problem.
So, as far as definitions areconcerned, I've defined
intelligence as rapid andaccurate problem solving and
creativity as novel and usefulproblem solving, which are
(05:42):
subtle differences but important, as I said, sides to the same
coin in terms of adaptiveproblem solving in both human
participants and probablynon-human species as well.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
So when?
Well, let me ask this nextquestion first.
So if you're highly creative,does that mean you're also
highly intelligent, or highlyintelligent?
You say they're kind of bothsides to the same coin and I've
never felt like I'm a creativeperson.
I say that, but I guess it alsodepends on how you define
(06:22):
creativity.
Like, I'm not going to be theone to go and paint a beautiful
picture of something period,much less if I'm looking at it
like looking at a mountainscapeor something like that.
But I do think that I can solveproblems in creative ways.
So tell us more about that.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Yeah, and creativity comes in many flavors.
And so, again, the cliche ofhaving to be creative by playing
a musical instrument orpainting or something like that
is not necessarily true.
That's a very niche way ofsolving a problem, I guess.
But we have a creativeachievement questionnaire which
(07:01):
goes through scientificcreativity, musical creativity,
poetry, written culinary artsand humor.
So there are different ways inwhich we can express our
creativity.
That perhaps gets at that otherside of the coin that you are
able to express yourself.
Being creative creative in yourrelationships, being creative in
(07:25):
that type of problem solving, Ithink, is something, a capacity
that we all have to more orless of a degree.
And to get back to your firstquestion, intelligence and
creativity are correlated witheach other, but it's not a
one-to-one or a hundred percentcorrelation.
The correlation betweenmeasures of creativity that we
have, measures of divergentthinking, for example, are only
(07:47):
about 30% correlated betweendivergent thinking and
intelligence, as we measure itbetween intelligence and
creativity.
So you can have someone thatperforms very well on a standard
measure of intelligence whodoesn't perform well at all on a
(08:09):
standard measure of creativity,for example.
So we're still trying tounderstand the exact
relationship, but everyone hassome level of intelligence that
is manifested in their abilityto solve rapid and accurate
problems in the world, andeveryone has some capacity to be
creative, to solve novel anduseful problems out in the world
(08:31):
.
It's a matter of degree andit's also a matter of selection
and types of problems that arepresented to that person and
need to be solved on aday-to-day basis.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Can you give some examples of what creativity
would look like in a novel anduseful problem solving
definition versus whatintelligence looks like from a
rapid and accurate problemsolving definition?
Speaker 2 (08:59):
Well, I mean, if you think about evolutionary
psychology, they talk about usliving on the savanna, and the
classic example of that is youknow, you hear a rumble or a
growl and you have to decidevery rapidly if that's your
stomach or if that's a lion, andwhether to climb the tree or to
escape a lion or to find anapple escape a lion or to find
(09:29):
an apple.
So that rapid and accurateproblem solving is quite
adaptive and could lead verywell to your survival, either in
the short term, if it's a lion,or the long term if it has
something to do with foragingfor food.
So that's kind of theday-to-day adaptability of
intelligence.
Creativity is more novel typeof problem solving figure out
(10:10):
how to escape from and you'recaught in a ravine and you have
to invent a ladder to get out ofthis ravine, for example, or
you'll be swept away by thisflood that you haven't seen in
your valley heretofore.
So these types of problemsolving can be very adaptive,
but some are more day-to-day andsome are more novel and
incredibly useful.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
Yeah.
So what is the role of geneticsin creativity and in
intelligence?
And I guess this can go back tothe classic nature versus
nurture.
Are we born with a certain setof this, or can we become more
creative and more intelligent intime?
Speaker 2 (10:49):
It's always it's it's it's never an either or
dichotomy, it's always both.
I mean we, we, we have uh, our,our set of genetic
predispositions that uh give usstrengths in certain areas and
weaknesses, if you will, inothers.
Um, that uh, uh accounts as abaseline for about 50% of the
(11:13):
variance in any ability, is agood starting point in any
complex ability.
Environment accounts for therest, and intelligence and
creativity, that kind of 50-50split between nature and nurture
, is a good starting point andthat's held up pretty well for
intelligence and probably willhold up for a complex construct
(11:35):
like creativity.
And again, these things aren'tset in stone.
Genes only work through theirinteraction with the environment
, so they can be turned on oroff by interacting with the
environment.
So that genetic determinismwe're finding out is much more
complex by virtue of itsinteraction with certain
(11:56):
environments.
And you can see that with twins,identical twins.
I have twin granddaughters,identical twin granddaughters,
very different from each other.
Their genes are exactly thesame, but their personalities,
they're what?
Six years old now, and theirpersonalities are really
starting to diverge by virtue ofsubtle differences in their
(12:17):
environment that they encounteron a day-to-day basis, and
physically and emotionally andmentally, they are quite
different from one another.
They look very similar.
Their genes have set that pathfor them, but there's quite a
bit of subtle differences thatyou can see through those genes.
(12:39):
Interaction with theenvironment.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
So if I wanted to become more creative or if I
wanted to become moreintelligent, what are some
things that I could do to workon both of those?
I don't know if you would.
Would you call them skills?
What do you call them could?
Speaker 2 (12:55):
do to work on both of those?
I don't know if you would.
Would you call them skills?
What do you call them?
Intelligence is a trait andcreativity is probably a trait,
but it has some what we callstate representation as well.
You can, I think, manipulate ormoderate creativity more
readily than intelligence.
(13:15):
Intelligence appears to be muchmore fixed in humans At a very
early age.
You can measure intelligence,you know, by the age of six and
it will correlate very highlywith measures of intelligence at
the age of 16 and 60.
And and so on.
It's it's very not set in stone, but it's very narrow variance,
(13:40):
if you will, of that ability tosolve problems in a rapid and
accurate way.
Creativity I think there is muchmore of a chance, and I became
interested in creativity becausethere appears to be much more
chance to modulate that throughinteraction with the environment
.
One way to do that is to reallypick something, choose
(14:02):
something that you might have askill at, and really start to
put in the work to acquire theraw materials necessary to
create with necessary uh, to uhcreate with uh.
If you, if you really feel likeI mean, this wouldn't work for
you, uh, but if you really feellike you.
You have the skill to be apainter, you know, really start
practicing at that.
(14:22):
Or a guitarist or something.
Musician uh, really startpracticing at that and getting
the work in necessary to acquirethe raw materials and skills to
produce something novel withinthat, within that particular
domain.
So that would be a way toactually leverage your creative
ability is by really focusing onone particular capacity and
(14:45):
really preparing yourself forthat creative endeavor.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
So is it really the behaviors that we typically
think of as creative that cangive people a starting place
here?
So, you know, painting, anytype of art, the music, theater,
things like that or are theresome that you have found that
maybe people don't think of ascreative, but actually they are
creative things that peoplecould do?
Speaker 2 (15:13):
but actually they are creative things that people
could do Well.
Yeah, I mean, science is really.
I'm biased as a scientist, butit's one of the areas in which
you know you can be highlycreative, both for good and for
bad.
I mean, the people are somewhatworried about nuclear warfare
now, given the news and and thenuclear bomb is.
(15:35):
Nuclear power is quitewonderful and abundant and
renewable Nuclear bombs arequite scary and potentially
horrific.
So that creative power ofscience that was unleashed in
the 50s and well, in the 40s and50s in this state, in this very
(15:59):
state at Los Alamos, issomething that I think about.
A lot in scientific creativityand the creativity of engineers
and people that build bridgesand buildings and things like
that I think is quite overlookedin comparison to the arts
writing and movies and paintingand dance and things of that
(16:26):
nature.
So I think, looking forcreativity, the harder you look
for the expression of noveltyand utility, the more likely you
are to find it.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
How about creativity and mental health?
Is there any kind of impactthat focusing on some of these
creative traits and even thestate of creativity, so focusing
more on just having more timeto be creative in these outlets
in the daily life does that havean impact on mental health?
Speaker 2 (17:03):
So there's a cliche that you have to be, you know,
half crazy to to be highlycreative.
And there's any number ofexamples of of highly creative
people, from Van Gogh who cutoff his ear, who was the woman
who walked into the ocean,virginia Woolf who walked into
(17:26):
the ocean with stones in herpockets, I believe.
I mean Hemingway who committedsuicide, a lot of different
creative types who were mentallyill.
But for each of those examplesof high levels of creativity you
have, you know, da Vinci's andMozart's and well, mozart's not
(17:50):
a good example Vivaldi's who donot have a whiff of mental
illness.
So there's no particular link,and a lot of work has been done
in this area.
There's no particular linkbetween madness and creativity.
(18:11):
That's a cliche, but there isan interesting neurological
correlate between that loosenedassociations and the ability to
produce novelty.
And I think you have a higherexpression of, for example, high
creativity and bipolar diseasedisorder, and some work has gone
(18:37):
into that area where you havesome frontal lobe disorders and
diseases that are associatedwith increased novelty
production.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Hmm, Interesting.
So I was actually asking thequestion with the opposite
thought in mind of does beingcreative actually help mental
health?
Like can it help alleviateanxiety or depression.
I mean, I think the other wayis a good way to view it too.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
Well, we confront that cliche, a lot between
mental illness and creativity,so I thought you were going in
that direction.
Speaker 1 (19:13):
No, it's good.
Yeah, I think it's a reallygood point.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
The expression of creativity can be very
satisfying, very rewarding, verygratifying and good for your
mental health.
Certainly so being able to findwhat you can create
successfully and to berecognized by others as creative
(19:36):
, because creativity always is athing that is judged by people
on the outside looking in asbeing either creative or not
Right.
It has to be accepted by othersas useful in the end so that
that can be very satisfying andvery good for mental health in
(19:58):
the long run.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
You talk about there being four stages to creative
cognition.
Can you tell us what that meansand what those four stages are?
Speaker 2 (20:09):
Well, it's not me.
Various people have talkedabout these four stages of
creativity and they're helpfulto think about different aspects
that we might want to study,and we've touched upon some of
them already.
Poincaré, a famousmathematician from France,
(20:30):
talked about his own creativeprocess first, and then Graham
Wallace wrote about these fourstages later.
They consist of preparation,incubation, illumination and
validation, I believe.
But we talked about preparation.
You have to have the rawmaterials necessary to create
(20:52):
with.
So putting those materials inyour brain, putting in the
10,000 hours or 10 years orwhatever it takes to really
excel at a particular task, isimportant in preparing your mind
to do that work.
Incubation is mulling overvarious iterations of an idea so
(21:15):
you can, in your mind's eye,see different scenarios or time
travel, or look at aconversation and see where it
might go in different directionsand try things out in your
mind's eye before reallycommitting to it in the world.
And that incubation period isincredibly important to just let
(21:36):
things stew in your head for awhile and see what new ideas
spring to life, that noveltymight emerge.
Illumination is kind of acliche, but that aha moment that
is described by some people,where that great new idea
(21:57):
emerges out of the murk of yourbrain and you decide that you've
got it and you can pushsomething forward.
And then verification orvalidation is seeing if it will
work, If you can push that ideaout in the world, if people
accept it, if it is new anduseful and people will like it.
So those are the four mainstages of creativity, and
(22:20):
neuroscientists, psychologists,educators are working in all of
these different domains invarious aspects.
Some are looking at all fourstages, some are looking at just
one stage and making a careerof that.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
I've heard other people say this is true for them
and I know it's true for me,and I want to ask you about it.
When I'm thinking about aproblem that needs to be solved,
it's typically not when I amwriting the head in my laptop,
like working on it, that thesolution or a really great idea
(23:02):
comes to me.
It's typically when I'm doingsomething completely different,
when I'm in the shower, or whenI wake up in the middle of the
night or when I'm out on a run.
Is this consistent among peopleand if so, why is it that it's
when we're not focused on itthat solutions typically come to
us?
Speaker 2 (23:42):
of broad attentional dispersal, that we tend to
tickle neurons that otherwisewouldn't be tickled and have
those connections made.
And it tends to happen, like yousay, when people are on runs or
in the shower or sleeping oremerging from sleep.
Emerging from sleep, but thesekind of defocused attention type
of states that these kind ofrandom connections tend to be
made in the brain that emerge.
(24:02):
That can't be made when you'rereally focused on a task whether
you're reading or working on acomputer or something like that,
you really the pathways in yourbrain to solve that task or to
pay attention to that task arereally engaged and can't meander
off into the brambles.
(24:23):
So it's, I think, important forpeople to set aside time.
Whatever works for them,running works for you.
I always joke that mowing thelawn is kind of my time to let
my mind wander.
I have a large lawn to mow andum, it really is a time you're
doing something repetitive,going back and forth, and um, I
(24:46):
can just kind of let my mindwander while I'm doing something
physical and um, someinteresting ideas can emerge out
of that.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Yeah, that's really fascinating.
So what is the benefit in?
You know, we're thinking about,or we're talking about
intelligence, we're talkingabout creativity, but what about
downtime?
What about rest?
What about unplugging fromdistractions laptops, phones?
How does that benefit not justcreativity and intelligence, but
(25:19):
humans?
Speaker 2 (25:21):
I think it's enormously important.
When I talk to educators, Itell them, I mean, this is my
opinion.
I don't have any research toback this up, but, anecdotally,
I think the most important classis recess in some regards,
because you really need thattime.
You've got all the ideas, thepreparation has been put in
(25:44):
place and you need to go playand you need to take those ideas
and have some unstructured timeto let them run into each other
, literally and figuratively, ina manner that might produce
some novelty.
And when we are engaged withour iPhones or engaged with our
(26:04):
computers, it's usually inservice of knowledge acquisition
or looking at Facebook orTwitter, you know, seeking out
some sort of information about arelationship or information
about some news thing.
And it it it is very, again,focused attention and focused
(26:25):
pattern of of brain activitythat doesn't leave room for that
defocused and playful brainstate that appears to be is so
important for creativity toemerge.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
Is there any kind of ideal time, like rest?
You know, one day a week.
A lot of you know religious andfaith-based people.
The Sabbath is the idea or rest, you know from 5pm on by not
thinking about work.
What are your thoughts?
Speaker 2 (27:00):
What I tell people.
I mean.
So you know, I tried to write abook on creativity and they
really want you to write achapter on things people can do.
And you're asking me thatchapter on things people can do
and what I, what I tell people,and I failed in writing that
book because I really couldn'tget to that point.
It's like there's no one sizefits all.
I mean, you like to run to doyour thing, I like to mow the
(27:21):
lawn, some people will take ashower or a bath, and it's kind
of really discovering that placeor that thing that really works
for you.
And there is a thing that worksfor you but getting into that
space, whether it's Shabbat orSabbath, that you can take a
(27:41):
full day and really relax,whether it is that moment after
you wake up in the morning butbefore you get out of bed, you
know half an hour that you'rejust lying there and kind of
thinking about your dreams andand kind of thinking about,
perhaps, what you're going to doin your day, whether it's, you
know, taking that run or goingto the gym, and getting into
(28:02):
that mental space.
That is some call flow.
I think discovering that foryourself is very important in
cultivating your creativity, andI don't think it's one size
fits all.
Speaker 1 (28:20):
Well, that may be the answer to the next question I
was going to ask, which is whatare good activities to jumpstart
your own creativity, knowingyou love to tell people exactly
the right things that work, andprescribing to them.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
What to do harkens back to an earlier, an earlier
answer, but that preparationpart is really is super
important.
I mean, you know I'm gettingcloser to retirement you can see
the gray in my beard that'shastening me to retirement and
you know, while I love seeing mypatients, you know picking up a
(28:58):
hobby is really important.
I haven't developed hobbieswhile I've been working so hard.
But you know what?
What do I want to do?
Do I want to do woodworking?
Do I want to you know pick uphorse riding?
Do I want to do something elseI need to do?
(29:19):
I want to play a musicalinstrument.
I mean getting started withsomething that I can start
practicing now, because it'sgoing to take a while for me to
become adept at.
I've enjoyed being creative inmy scientific career and to just
kind of end that and have nocreative outlet or fewer
creative outlets there's neverno creative outlet, creative
(29:43):
outlets, there's never nocreative outlet.
But having fewer creativeoutlets, I think will make my
retirement emptier than itotherwise would have been.
So I think I need to be able totransfer that creative outlet
to something new.
So I think finding that andpreparing for that is the most
important thing.
I already know how to incubatequite well, but preparing for
(30:07):
the next stage of my creativelife, I think, is important and
that would be the best advice Icould give anyone who wants to
be more creative is what do youwant to do, what do you want to
be good at, what do you want tocreate in what space?
And start, get started, andstart, get started.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
I love that you brought that up.
I was going to ask you is ityou know?
Are people ever too old to tryto be creative in something new?
Do you ever kind of grow out ofit?
Or do you know, by a certaintime in life?
And based on what you've said,it's no, you can always try to
do something new and creative.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Yeah, and my mom was a really good example.
She took up quilting in hersixties and became a master
quilter beautiful award-winningquilts they're hanging in my
house and in my office and andjust a beautiful artistic outlet
that she didn't know she haduntil she picked that up in her
(31:03):
when she was older than me, andso really inspirational to see
her prepare for and cultivatethis creative outlet in her mid
to late 60s and be able to sharethat with the world into her
70s and 80s with the world intoher 70s and 80s.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
That's really awesome .
So I have a final question foryou, and I don't even know I'm
going to ask it.
I hope you have an answer to it.
This was not one that you wereprepped with.
Of all the research you havedone on creativity, what have
(31:45):
you found to be the most?
Speaker 2 (31:46):
fascinating thing that you've learned about it
Intelligence and creativity.
The most fascinating thing wasthat I've learned is that
intelligence and creativityreally work.
Different parts of the humanbrain that novelty generator is
really different.
It's on the interior part, themedial or mesial parts of the
brain that are internallydirected, and it really fits
(32:09):
with that kind of noveltythinking inward thinking,
problem solving, mentalsimulation world and then the
intelligence parts tend to be onthe outside parts of the brain
where you're directing yourattention and cognitive
resources outward.
But the most surprising andgratifying things were that we
(32:30):
could create different theoriesabout different parts of the
brain that are engaged withcreativity and intelligence, and
it was just fascinating thatthey weren't the same parts of
the brain but they appeared tobe discrete or different parts
of the brain.
So there's so much more tolearn about how they interact
(32:51):
with each other.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
So here are my key takeaways from today's episode
with Dr Young.
Problem solving can be done intwo ways.
There's creativity, which isnovel and useful problem solving
, and then there's intelligence,which is rapid and accurate
problem solving.
I find it so fascinating thatboth of these things, creativity
(33:15):
and intelligence, have the sameend goal they are there for us
to use to solve problems.
It's just how we pull from themand how we use them that can
help us solve the problems.
So what does this mean for you?
What does this mean when itcomes to being your best self
physically, intellectually,emotionally and spiritually?
There is a need for us to bemore creative, and some of the
(33:39):
things that we talked abouttoday was to pick something that
you may have a skill at and putin the work to do more of it.
So I mentioned I'm not going tobe the person to put a blank
canvas in front of me with abunch of oil paint and paint a
mountain scheme.
No part of that sounds excitingto me.
The closest I'm going to get tothat is going to one of those
(34:00):
events that you go to with yourgirlfriends and you drink some
wine and events that you go towith your girlfriends and you
drink some wine and they teachyou how to paint some things.
Right, that sounds like fun andthat's a great way to get
started in it.
But the things that do interestme, and that I even did a lot
when I was in high school, wasmore of theater, more drama,
singing, all of those differenttypes of things, even teaching
(34:21):
myself to play the piano notlike an amazing pianist, but
just learning to play somechords and playing one of my
favorite songs that is on theradio or whatever.
Those are things that I used todo when I was in high school
and in college and would justget lost in the time.
I would definitely get in thatflow state and it was such a
(34:41):
kind of pressure valve releasefor the stress that was in my
life and I loved it and I'vegotten away from that.
So even in this conversationwith Dr Young, I'm thinking,
okay, maybe I should go and buya keyboard, bring it into my
office and let that be somethingthat I do at nighttime, in the
evenings, to just focus on doingsomething that is really more
(35:03):
of a creative outlet for me, andjust for me.
It's not going to be somethingthat I do on the podcast or make
a YouTube video about, but it'ssomething I enjoy doing.
What is that for you?
It could be building something,it could be crocheting, it
could be quilting, like he wastalking about there's no end of
(35:24):
options.
Gardening, it could be painting.
There's so many different typesof things that you can do to be
creative Interior design.
I could keep going on, but Ithink you get the idea.
But find one of those thingsand maybe use the questions that
he asked to help guide you.
What is it that you want to do?
What is an aspect you wouldlike to have added to your life?
(35:47):
What is the kind of space thatyou want to be creative in?
And I think all of us kind ofknow we have an idea in our gut
of something that we want to do,something we liked doing from
our past or something that wewould like to at least try.
And those are great places tostart.
Maybe it's even starting bygoing dancing getting some
(36:08):
friends, getting your husband,getting your wife trying a dance
class, going to swing dancinglessons.
We used to have those here inNashville, up at a place called
Centennial Park.
There would be swing dancing inthe park on Saturday nights,
and that was such a fun thing todo Place to go with friends.
Rob and I went a couple oftimes when we dated and to just
get creative.
And I heard elsewhere years agothat it's another great
(36:32):
opportunity for bonding in yourrelationship.
When you and your significantother go and do new things
together, when you have newexperiences together, it
actually helps create intimacyand it actually helps to bond
both of you closer together,which can deepen commitment.
So this hits on all kinds oflevels.
(36:54):
It can help get you focused onsome different things.
Physically, of course.
Intellectually, it's helpingyou to grow your skillset, your
hobbies, your mind.
Emotionally, this can help toreally help your relationships,
especially if you do this withother people.
Those are some key takeawaysfrom today's episode.
Until next week, stay strong.
Did you know that creativity and intelligence may
be more alike than you thinkthat they are?
They are both ways of problemsolving, believe it or not, and
in today's episode I'm going tobe speaking with Dr Rex Young.
Dr Young is an adjunctprofessor of psychology at the
University of New Mexico and heis a research scientist at the
(00:23):
Mind Research Network, and he isa practicing clinical
neuropsychologist in theAlbuquerque area of New Mexico
as well.
He has studied brain diseaseand what the brain does well in
a field of research known aspositive neuroscience.
He has done a lot withbehavioral measures, including
intelligence, personality andcreativity, and he's also
(00:45):
studied brain function andstructure in healthy
neurological and psychiatricsubjects.
So he has published articlesacross a wide range of topics,
including traumatic brain injury, lupus, schizophrenia,
intelligence and creativity.
I can't wait to dive into thisconversation about how you can
(01:06):
be more creative and what is thedifference in creativity and
intelligence.
In today's episode, let's divein.
I'm excited today to be joinedby Dr Rex Young and have this
conversation about creativityand intelligence and maybe get
into some other neurosciencythings.
Welcome to the show, dr Young.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
Thanks, Kimberly.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
How did you get into the work that you have been
doing with neuroscience and allof the different parts of the
brain that you've been studying?
Speaker 2 (01:39):
It's kind of a long story Maybe it would take the
whole podcast, but myundergraduate's in finance
actually.
So I was in the business worldand was volunteering for Special
Olympics and became veryinterested when I was working
with people with intellectualdisabilities autism and
(02:00):
intellectual disabilities andthe like cerebral palsy and
became very fascinated in thebrain in all of its capacities
and working.
So I wanted to do work closerto brain issues and stumbled
across neuropsychology.
I guess, long story short, andentered graduate school in my
(02:23):
late 20s and retrained to be aneuropsychology.
I guess, long story short, andentered graduate school in my
late 20s and retrained to be aneuropsychologist and
neuroscientist.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
That's fantastic.
What did you do yourdissertation on?
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Biochemical Correlates of Intelligence in
the Normal Human Brain is thetitle of my dissertation.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
Wow, and do you remember what your findings were
?
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Yeah, I mean.
So in the mid nineties wedidn't have very sophisticated
neuroimaging techniques.
We were using MRI.
We're using a technique youcould get pictures of your brain
, but they were very staticpictures Like you see in the old
medical shows where they putthe picture up on the white
screen and you can kind of seestatic images.
(03:07):
We were using a technique calledspectroscopy which allows you
to look at brain biochemistry.
So we were seeing that certainchemicals of the brain that we
could measure that weresensitive to neurons and
neuronal health were lower inpatients with brain injuries,
(03:28):
specifically traumatic braininjury, and they were correlated
with neuropsychologicalperformance, memory, attention,
language functioning.
So I wanted to see if thosesame chemicals would be
correlated with normal cognitivefunctioning in college students
.
Our sample that we haveconvenient sample, and in fact
(03:53):
they were Intellectualfunctioning was positively
correlated with these markers ofneuronal fidelity, neuronal
health, even in normalpopulations.
So it was kind of a fascinatingstart to my career to see how
you could match normal brainstructure, function and
(04:15):
biochemistry to different braincapacities like intelligence,
creativity, personality, likeintelligence creativity
personality?
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, you've done a lot of worksince then, especially in the
line of intelligence andcreativity, as you were just
saying.
What is the difference betweenintelligence and creativity?
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Well.
So if you talk to three or fouror five different scientists,
they'll give you three or fouror five different answers, but I
have tried to simplify it asseeing these as two sides of the
same coin.
They're fundamentallyproblem-solving abilities, and
(04:57):
intelligence is problem-solvingin the world around us that is
more common, that is adaptive,that allows us to survive in the
world, in problems that we facein our everyday life.
Creativity is reasoning orproblem solving capacity that
allows us to address problemsthat are less common, that we
(05:21):
have to think to use a cliche,outside of the box, that we have
to come up with a new solutionto a problem.
So, as far as definitions areconcerned, I've defined
intelligence as rapid andaccurate problem solving and
creativity as novel and usefulproblem solving, which are
(05:42):
subtle differences but important, as I said, sides to the same
coin in terms of adaptiveproblem solving in both human
participants and probablynon-human species as well.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
So when?
Well, let me ask this nextquestion first.
So if you're highly creative,does that mean you're also
highly intelligent, or highlyintelligent?
You say they're kind of bothsides to the same coin and I've
never felt like I'm a creativeperson.
I say that, but I guess it alsodepends on how you define
(06:22):
creativity.
Like, I'm not going to be theone to go and paint a beautiful
picture of something period,much less if I'm looking at it
like looking at a mountainscapeor something like that.
But I do think that I can solveproblems in creative ways.
So tell us more about that.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Yeah, and creativity comes in many flavors.
And so, again, the cliche ofhaving to be creative by playing
a musical instrument orpainting or something like that
is not necessarily true.
That's a very niche way ofsolving a problem, I guess.
But we have a creativeachievement questionnaire which
(07:01):
goes through scientificcreativity, musical creativity,
poetry, written culinary artsand humor.
So there are different ways inwhich we can express our
creativity.
That perhaps gets at that otherside of the coin that you are
able to express yourself.
Being creative creative in yourrelationships, being creative in
(07:25):
that type of problem solving, Ithink, is something, a capacity
that we all have to more orless of a degree.
And to get back to your firstquestion, intelligence and
creativity are correlated witheach other, but it's not a
one-to-one or a hundred percentcorrelation.
The correlation betweenmeasures of creativity that we
have, measures of divergentthinking, for example, are only
(07:47):
about 30% correlated betweendivergent thinking and
intelligence, as we measure itbetween intelligence and
creativity.
So you can have someone thatperforms very well on a standard
measure of intelligence whodoesn't perform well at all on a
(08:09):
standard measure of creativity,for example.
So we're still trying tounderstand the exact
relationship, but everyone hassome level of intelligence that
is manifested in their abilityto solve rapid and accurate
problems in the world, andeveryone has some capacity to be
creative, to solve novel anduseful problems out in the world
(08:31):
.
It's a matter of degree andit's also a matter of selection
and types of problems that arepresented to that person and
need to be solved on aday-to-day basis.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Can you give some examples of what creativity
would look like in a novel anduseful problem solving
definition versus whatintelligence looks like from a
rapid and accurate problemsolving definition?
Speaker 2 (08:59):
Well, I mean, if you think about evolutionary
psychology, they talk about usliving on the savanna, and the
classic example of that is youknow, you hear a rumble or a
growl and you have to decidevery rapidly if that's your
stomach or if that's a lion, andwhether to climb the tree or to
escape a lion or to find anapple escape a lion or to find
(09:29):
an apple.
So that rapid and accurateproblem solving is quite
adaptive and could lead verywell to your survival, either in
the short term, if it's a lion,or the long term if it has
something to do with foragingfor food.
So that's kind of theday-to-day adaptability of
intelligence.
Creativity is more novel typeof problem solving figure out
(10:10):
how to escape from and you'recaught in a ravine and you have
to invent a ladder to get out ofthis ravine, for example, or
you'll be swept away by thisflood that you haven't seen in
your valley heretofore.
So these types of problemsolving can be very adaptive,
but some are more day-to-day andsome are more novel and
incredibly useful.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
Yeah.
So what is the role of geneticsin creativity and in
intelligence?
And I guess this can go back tothe classic nature versus
nurture.
Are we born with a certain setof this, or can we become more
creative and more intelligent intime?
Speaker 2 (10:49):
It's always it's it's it's never an either or
dichotomy, it's always both.
I mean we, we, we have uh, our,our set of genetic
predispositions that uh give usstrengths in certain areas and
weaknesses, if you will, inothers.
Um, that uh, uh accounts as abaseline for about 50% of the
(11:13):
variance in any ability, is agood starting point in any
complex ability.
Environment accounts for therest, and intelligence and
creativity, that kind of 50-50split between nature and nurture
, is a good starting point andthat's held up pretty well for
intelligence and probably willhold up for a complex construct
(11:35):
like creativity.
And again, these things aren'tset in stone.
Genes only work through theirinteraction with the environment
, so they can be turned on oroff by interacting with the
environment.
So that genetic determinismwe're finding out is much more
complex by virtue of itsinteraction with certain
(11:56):
environments.
And you can see that with twins,identical twins.
I have twin granddaughters,identical twin granddaughters,
very different from each other.
Their genes are exactly thesame, but their personalities,
they're what?
Six years old now, and theirpersonalities are really
starting to diverge by virtue ofsubtle differences in their
(12:17):
environment that they encounteron a day-to-day basis, and
physically and emotionally andmentally, they are quite
different from one another.
They look very similar.
Their genes have set that pathfor them, but there's quite a
bit of subtle differences thatyou can see through those genes.
(12:39):
Interaction with theenvironment.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
So if I wanted to become more creative or if I
wanted to become moreintelligent, what are some
things that I could do to workon both of those?
I don't know if you would.
Would you call them skills?
What do you call them could?
Speaker 2 (12:55):
do to work on both of those?
I don't know if you would.
Would you call them skills?
What do you call them?
Intelligence is a trait andcreativity is probably a trait,
but it has some what we callstate representation as well.
You can, I think, manipulate ormoderate creativity more
readily than intelligence.
(13:15):
Intelligence appears to be muchmore fixed in humans At a very
early age.
You can measure intelligence,you know, by the age of six and
it will correlate very highlywith measures of intelligence at
the age of 16 and 60.
And and so on.
It's it's very not set in stone, but it's very narrow variance,
(13:40):
if you will, of that ability tosolve problems in a rapid and
accurate way.
Creativity I think there is muchmore of a chance, and I became
interested in creativity becausethere appears to be much more
chance to modulate that throughinteraction with the environment
.
One way to do that is to reallypick something, choose
(14:02):
something that you might have askill at, and really start to
put in the work to acquire theraw materials necessary to
create with necessary uh, to uhcreate with uh.
If you, if you really feel likeI mean, this wouldn't work for
you, uh, but if you really feellike you.
You have the skill to be apainter, you know, really start
practicing at that.
(14:22):
Or a guitarist or something.
Musician uh, really startpracticing at that and getting
the work in necessary to acquirethe raw materials and skills to
produce something novel withinthat, within that particular
domain.
So that would be a way toactually leverage your creative
ability is by really focusing onone particular capacity and
(14:45):
really preparing yourself forthat creative endeavor.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
So is it really the behaviors that we typically
think of as creative that cangive people a starting place
here?
So, you know, painting, anytype of art, the music, theater,
things like that or are theresome that you have found that
maybe people don't think of ascreative, but actually they are
creative things that peoplecould do?
Speaker 2 (15:13):
but actually they are creative things that people
could do Well.
Yeah, I mean, science is really.
I'm biased as a scientist, butit's one of the areas in which
you know you can be highlycreative, both for good and for
bad.
I mean, the people are somewhatworried about nuclear warfare
now, given the news and and thenuclear bomb is.
(15:35):
Nuclear power is quitewonderful and abundant and
renewable Nuclear bombs arequite scary and potentially
horrific.
So that creative power ofscience that was unleashed in
the 50s and well, in the 40s and50s in this state, in this very
(15:59):
state at Los Alamos, issomething that I think about.
A lot in scientific creativityand the creativity of engineers
and people that build bridgesand buildings and things like
that I think is quite overlookedin comparison to the arts
writing and movies and paintingand dance and things of that
(16:26):
nature.
So I think, looking forcreativity, the harder you look
for the expression of noveltyand utility, the more likely you
are to find it.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
How about creativity and mental health?
Is there any kind of impactthat focusing on some of these
creative traits and even thestate of creativity, so focusing
more on just having more timeto be creative in these outlets
in the daily life does that havean impact on mental health?
Speaker 2 (17:03):
So there's a cliche that you have to be, you know,
half crazy to to be highlycreative.
And there's any number ofexamples of of highly creative
people, from Van Gogh who cutoff his ear, who was the woman
who walked into the ocean,virginia Woolf who walked into
(17:26):
the ocean with stones in herpockets, I believe.
I mean Hemingway who committedsuicide, a lot of different
creative types who were mentallyill.
But for each of those examplesof high levels of creativity you
have, you know, da Vinci's andMozart's and well, mozart's not
(17:50):
a good example Vivaldi's who donot have a whiff of mental
illness.
So there's no particular link,and a lot of work has been done
in this area.
There's no particular linkbetween madness and creativity.
(18:11):
That's a cliche, but there isan interesting neurological
correlate between that loosenedassociations and the ability to
produce novelty.
And I think you have a higherexpression of, for example, high
creativity and bipolar diseasedisorder, and some work has gone
(18:37):
into that area where you havesome frontal lobe disorders and
diseases that are associatedwith increased novelty
production.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Hmm, Interesting.
So I was actually asking thequestion with the opposite
thought in mind of does beingcreative actually help mental
health?
Like can it help alleviateanxiety or depression.
I mean, I think the other wayis a good way to view it too.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
Well, we confront that cliche, a lot between
mental illness and creativity,so I thought you were going in
that direction.
Speaker 1 (19:13):
No, it's good.
Yeah, I think it's a reallygood point.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
The expression of creativity can be very
satisfying, very rewarding, verygratifying and good for your
mental health.
Certainly so being able to findwhat you can create
successfully and to berecognized by others as creative
(19:36):
, because creativity always is athing that is judged by people
on the outside looking in asbeing either creative or not
Right.
It has to be accepted by othersas useful in the end so that
that can be very satisfying andvery good for mental health in
(19:58):
the long run.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
You talk about there being four stages to creative
cognition.
Can you tell us what that meansand what those four stages are?
Speaker 2 (20:09):
Well, it's not me.
Various people have talkedabout these four stages of
creativity and they're helpfulto think about different aspects
that we might want to study,and we've touched upon some of
them already.
Poincaré, a famousmathematician from France,
(20:30):
talked about his own creativeprocess first, and then Graham
Wallace wrote about these fourstages later.
They consist of preparation,incubation, illumination and
validation, I believe.
But we talked about preparation.
You have to have the rawmaterials necessary to create
(20:52):
with.
So putting those materials inyour brain, putting in the
10,000 hours or 10 years orwhatever it takes to really
excel at a particular task, isimportant in preparing your mind
to do that work.
Incubation is mulling overvarious iterations of an idea so
(21:15):
you can, in your mind's eye,see different scenarios or time
travel, or look at aconversation and see where it
might go in different directionsand try things out in your
mind's eye before reallycommitting to it in the world.
And that incubation period isincredibly important to just let
(21:36):
things stew in your head for awhile and see what new ideas
spring to life, that noveltymight emerge.
Illumination is kind of acliche, but that aha moment that
is described by some people,where that great new idea
(21:57):
emerges out of the murk of yourbrain and you decide that you've
got it and you can pushsomething forward.
And then verification orvalidation is seeing if it will
work, If you can push that ideaout in the world, if people
accept it, if it is new anduseful and people will like it.
So those are the four mainstages of creativity, and
(22:20):
neuroscientists, psychologists,educators are working in all of
these different domains invarious aspects.
Some are looking at all fourstages, some are looking at just
one stage and making a careerof that.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
I've heard other people say this is true for them
and I know it's true for me,and I want to ask you about it.
When I'm thinking about aproblem that needs to be solved,
it's typically not when I amwriting the head in my laptop,
like working on it, that thesolution or a really great idea
(23:02):
comes to me.
It's typically when I'm doingsomething completely different,
when I'm in the shower, or whenI wake up in the middle of the
night or when I'm out on a run.
Is this consistent among peopleand if so, why is it that it's
when we're not focused on itthat solutions typically come to
us?
Speaker 2 (23:42):
of broad attentional dispersal, that we tend to
tickle neurons that otherwisewouldn't be tickled and have
those connections made.
And it tends to happen, like yousay, when people are on runs or
in the shower or sleeping oremerging from sleep.
Emerging from sleep, but thesekind of defocused attention type
of states that these kind ofrandom connections tend to be
made in the brain that emerge.
(24:02):
That can't be made when you'rereally focused on a task whether
you're reading or working on acomputer or something like that,
you really the pathways in yourbrain to solve that task or to
pay attention to that task arereally engaged and can't meander
off into the brambles.
(24:23):
So it's, I think, important forpeople to set aside time.
Whatever works for them,running works for you.
I always joke that mowing thelawn is kind of my time to let
my mind wander.
I have a large lawn to mow andum, it really is a time you're
doing something repetitive,going back and forth, and um, I
(24:46):
can just kind of let my mindwander while I'm doing something
physical and um, someinteresting ideas can emerge out
of that.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Yeah, that's really fascinating.
So what is the benefit in?
You know, we're thinking about,or we're talking about
intelligence, we're talkingabout creativity, but what about
downtime?
What about rest?
What about unplugging fromdistractions laptops, phones?
How does that benefit not justcreativity and intelligence, but
(25:19):
humans?
Speaker 2 (25:21):
I think it's enormously important.
When I talk to educators, Itell them, I mean, this is my
opinion.
I don't have any research toback this up, but, anecdotally,
I think the most important classis recess in some regards,
because you really need thattime.
You've got all the ideas, thepreparation has been put in
(25:44):
place and you need to go playand you need to take those ideas
and have some unstructured timeto let them run into each other
, literally and figuratively, ina manner that might produce
some novelty.
And when we are engaged withour iPhones or engaged with our
(26:04):
computers, it's usually inservice of knowledge acquisition
or looking at Facebook orTwitter, you know, seeking out
some sort of information about arelationship or information
about some news thing.
And it it it is very, again,focused attention and focused
(26:25):
pattern of of brain activitythat doesn't leave room for that
defocused and playful brainstate that appears to be is so
important for creativity toemerge.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
Is there any kind of ideal time, like rest?
You know, one day a week.
A lot of you know religious andfaith-based people.
The Sabbath is the idea or rest, you know from 5pm on by not
thinking about work.
What are your thoughts?
Speaker 2 (27:00):
What I tell people.
I mean.
So you know, I tried to write abook on creativity and they
really want you to write achapter on things people can do.
And you're asking me thatchapter on things people can do
and what I, what I tell people,and I failed in writing that
book because I really couldn'tget to that point.
It's like there's no one sizefits all.
I mean, you like to run to doyour thing, I like to mow the
(27:21):
lawn, some people will take ashower or a bath, and it's kind
of really discovering that placeor that thing that really works
for you.
And there is a thing that worksfor you but getting into that
space, whether it's Shabbat orSabbath, that you can take a
(27:41):
full day and really relax,whether it is that moment after
you wake up in the morning butbefore you get out of bed, you
know half an hour that you'rejust lying there and kind of
thinking about your dreams andand kind of thinking about,
perhaps, what you're going to doin your day, whether it's, you
know, taking that run or goingto the gym, and getting into
(28:02):
that mental space.
That is some call flow.
I think discovering that foryourself is very important in
cultivating your creativity, andI don't think it's one size
fits all.
Speaker 1 (28:20):
Well, that may be the answer to the next question I
was going to ask, which is whatare good activities to jumpstart
your own creativity, knowingyou love to tell people exactly
the right things that work, andprescribing to them.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
What to do harkens back to an earlier, an earlier
answer, but that preparationpart is really is super
important.
I mean, you know I'm gettingcloser to retirement you can see
the gray in my beard that'shastening me to retirement and
you know, while I love seeing mypatients, you know picking up a
(28:58):
hobby is really important.
I haven't developed hobbieswhile I've been working so hard.
But you know what?
What do I want to do?
Do I want to do woodworking?
Do I want to you know pick uphorse riding?
Do I want to do something elseI need to do?
(29:19):
I want to play a musicalinstrument.
I mean getting started withsomething that I can start
practicing now, because it'sgoing to take a while for me to
become adept at.
I've enjoyed being creative inmy scientific career and to just
kind of end that and have nocreative outlet or fewer
creative outlets there's neverno creative outlet, creative
(29:43):
outlets, there's never nocreative outlet.
But having fewer creativeoutlets, I think will make my
retirement emptier than itotherwise would have been.
So I think I need to be able totransfer that creative outlet
to something new.
So I think finding that andpreparing for that is the most
important thing.
I already know how to incubatequite well, but preparing for
(30:07):
the next stage of my creativelife, I think, is important and
that would be the best advice Icould give anyone who wants to
be more creative is what do youwant to do, what do you want to
be good at, what do you want tocreate in what space?
And start, get started, andstart, get started.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
I love that you brought that up.
I was going to ask you is ityou know?
Are people ever too old to tryto be creative in something new?
Do you ever kind of grow out ofit?
Or do you know, by a certaintime in life?
And based on what you've said,it's no, you can always try to
do something new and creative.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Yeah, and my mom was a really good example.
She took up quilting in hersixties and became a master
quilter beautiful award-winningquilts they're hanging in my
house and in my office and andjust a beautiful artistic outlet
that she didn't know she haduntil she picked that up in her
(31:03):
when she was older than me, andso really inspirational to see
her prepare for and cultivatethis creative outlet in her mid
to late 60s and be able to sharethat with the world into her
70s and 80s with the world intoher 70s and 80s.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
That's really awesome .
So I have a final question foryou, and I don't even know I'm
going to ask it.
I hope you have an answer to it.
This was not one that you wereprepped with.
Of all the research you havedone on creativity, what have
(31:45):
you found to be the most?
Speaker 2 (31:46):
fascinating thing that you've learned about it
Intelligence and creativity.
The most fascinating thing wasthat I've learned is that
intelligence and creativityreally work.
Different parts of the humanbrain that novelty generator is
really different.
It's on the interior part, themedial or mesial parts of the
brain that are internallydirected, and it really fits
(32:09):
with that kind of noveltythinking inward thinking,
problem solving, mentalsimulation world and then the
intelligence parts tend to be onthe outside parts of the brain
where you're directing yourattention and cognitive
resources outward.
But the most surprising andgratifying things were that we
(32:30):
could create different theoriesabout different parts of the
brain that are engaged withcreativity and intelligence, and
it was just fascinating thatthey weren't the same parts of
the brain but they appeared tobe discrete or different parts
of the brain.
So there's so much more tolearn about how they interact
(32:51):
with each other.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
So here are my key takeaways from today's episode
with Dr Young.
Problem solving can be done intwo ways.
There's creativity, which isnovel and useful problem solving
, and then there's intelligence,which is rapid and accurate
problem solving.
I find it so fascinating thatboth of these things, creativity
(33:15):
and intelligence, have the sameend goal they are there for us
to use to solve problems.
It's just how we pull from themand how we use them that can
help us solve the problems.
So what does this mean for you?
What does this mean when itcomes to being your best self
physically, intellectually,emotionally and spiritually?
There is a need for us to bemore creative, and some of the
(33:39):
things that we talked abouttoday was to pick something that
you may have a skill at and putin the work to do more of it.
So I mentioned I'm not going tobe the person to put a blank
canvas in front of me with abunch of oil paint and paint a
mountain scheme.
No part of that sounds excitingto me.
The closest I'm going to get tothat is going to one of those
(34:00):
events that you go to with yourgirlfriends and you drink some
wine and events that you go towith your girlfriends and you
drink some wine and they teachyou how to paint some things.
Right, that sounds like fun andthat's a great way to get
started in it.
But the things that do interestme, and that I even did a lot
when I was in high school, wasmore of theater, more drama,
singing, all of those differenttypes of things, even teaching
(34:21):
myself to play the piano notlike an amazing pianist, but
just learning to play somechords and playing one of my
favorite songs that is on theradio or whatever.
Those are things that I used todo when I was in high school
and in college and would justget lost in the time.
I would definitely get in thatflow state and it was such a
(34:41):
kind of pressure valve releasefor the stress that was in my
life and I loved it and I'vegotten away from that.
So even in this conversationwith Dr Young, I'm thinking,
okay, maybe I should go and buya keyboard, bring it into my
office and let that be somethingthat I do at nighttime, in the
evenings, to just focus on doingsomething that is really more
(35:03):
of a creative outlet for me, andjust for me.
It's not going to be somethingthat I do on the podcast or make
a YouTube video about, but it'ssomething I enjoy doing.
What is that for you?
It could be building something,it could be crocheting, it
could be quilting, like he wastalking about there's no end of
(35:24):
options.
Gardening, it could be painting.
There's so many different typesof things that you can do to be
creative Interior design.
I could keep going on, but Ithink you get the idea.
But find one of those thingsand maybe use the questions that
he asked to help guide you.
What is it that you want to do?
What is an aspect you wouldlike to have added to your life?
(35:47):
What is the kind of space thatyou want to be creative in?
And I think all of us kind ofknow we have an idea in our gut
of something that we want to do,something we liked doing from
our past or something that wewould like to at least try.
And those are great places tostart.
Maybe it's even starting bygoing dancing getting some
(36:08):
friends, getting your husband,getting your wife trying a dance
class, going to swing dancinglessons.
We used to have those here inNashville, up at a place called
Centennial Park.
There would be swing dancing inthe park on Saturday nights,
and that was such a fun thing todo Place to go with friends.
Rob and I went a couple oftimes when we dated and to just
get creative.
And I heard elsewhere years agothat it's another great
(36:32):
opportunity for bonding in yourrelationship.
When you and your significantother go and do new things
together, when you have newexperiences together, it
actually helps create intimacyand it actually helps to bond
both of you closer together,which can deepen commitment.
So this hits on all kinds oflevels.
(36:54):
It can help get you focused onsome different things.
Physically, of course.
Intellectually, it's helpingyou to grow your skillset, your
hobbies, your mind.
Emotionally, this can help toreally help your relationships,
especially if you do this withother people.
Those are some key takeawaysfrom today's episode.
Until next week, stay strong.
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