Topic 1: How to Improve your creativity

Creativity is considered a mind skill which can be improved with intentional effort. Here are a few ways to improve your creativity.

1. Be teachable. Research on creative potential shows people with higher levels of openness and lower levels of self-consciousness have more creativity. Being teachable is an attitude of being open to what is being taught and eliminating ego or self-conscious focus.

2. Improve your critical thinking. Some people don’t realize that creativity requires critical thinking and the ability to seek solutions to problems. Critical thinking is a discipline to acknowledge first impressions and assumptions, recognize clichés and ruts of habit, and to systematically explore possible solutions.

3. Work and rest your brain. Being creative requires energy. Creative thinking happens in your frontal cortex and is negatively impacted by depression or anxiety. TV and computer games also impair frontal cortex energy levels. Rest and allow your brain downtime from a stimulus. Give yourself time to consider the problem from different angles.

4. Curiosity vs Frustration. The difference between the creative and the unimaginative is curiosity. Next time you become frustrated on or off the court, stop and become a detective. Ask why. Work hard to probe and put energy toward possible alternative outcomes. Get curious rather than frustrated.