How do you live the creative life? I’ve gleaned tips from some of my favorite Creators. For five days I’m writing about these insightful suggestions. Yesterday I wrote about David Bohm’s Advice on Being Original.
If money were no object and someone offered to build an institution in your name, what would it be? A community theater for your town? Or a music conservatory? Where would it stand? On the edge of a forest or smack in the middle of town? How about architectural style? California mission or post-modern conceptual? Most of us will never get such an offer. But, Dr. Jonas Salk did. After developing the polio vaccine in the late 1950′s he got a Carte Blanche to build an institution worthy of his legacy. Salk founded The Salk Institute for Biologic Studies over-looking the Pacific Ocean. His dream: to bridge the divide between science and philosophy,which he considered artificial. For Salk, breakthroughs to help humanity came from a merging of fields, not from either/or thinking.
Salk saw this same artificial divide of either/or thinking in individual people. In his book Survival of the Wisest, he argues for an integration of mind as key to creativity. Check out his advice below:
- Keep your mind as agile as possible.
- Don’t be frightened by fixed ways of thinking or taboos.
- Fill yourself with all the knowledge you can.
- Develop your imagination.
- Keep what you know (your intellect) and what you imagine (your intuition) balanced. You need both functions.
- Sleep. Your conscious mind and unconscious integrates while you sleep– this integration is the key to creativity.
What do you think? Is integration of intellect and intuition crucial to creativity?
Filed under: advice and expectations, Biology, Integration, The Scientist Tagged: | Creativity, creativity and sleep, integration of intellect and intuition, intuition, jonas salk, salk institute, survival of the wisest
i especially liked #6. how interesting!
oh and to respond to the questions – i liked the idea of holding these in both hands. intelligence is more than knowledge and logic so i’d say yes.
I knew you’d like #6…my Achilles heel. So many times I write what I need to hear!
This came to our email. Great post.. It’s interesting that ancient Greek thinking which in many areas is so integrated into the way we think today tends to compartmentalize life which in some areas means that philosopy would be separated from science, spirituality and religion separated from science and as former president Bill Clinton portrayed, “What I do in my personal life is totally separate from my public life.”
While this is drifting a little away form Jonas Salk etc, so called “greek” thinking is contrary to some eastern schools of thought, where thinking is/was linked on a sliding scale.
Thus bridging the artificial divide is if I can say it, philosophically healthy. It is, I believe central to judo Christian thinking e.g the first part of Psalm 19 linking the spiritual with the physicial and so forth…
The trend in cutting edge basic science and social science is to cross-pollinate with other fields. This is a great thing! Also, as knowledge becomes more easily accessible to us all, the ability to bridge intellect with intuition will be best way to express originality.
Thanks for your comment!