Creative Choices: How Many Ways Are There to Cut a Strawberry?

Just put together some fruit and cereal for breakfast. Made some choices (creativity at work): got my usual bowl, added the usual Honey Bunches of Oats, some ground flaxseed, and frozen blueberries. Right before drowning everything in 1% milk, I spotted fresh strawberries in the fridge (an occasional treat in our house). I decided to add strawberries to my otherwise typical breakfast (actually a snack at any time for me). Pulled out the chopping board and a paring knife. Took a couple of strawberries out of their container and rinsed them. I knew I had to remove the strawberry leaves and core so I did that. Then I paused a few seconds to decide how I wanted to slice the strawberry. There were at least two possible ways I was contemplating – from top to bottom, or side to side. I decided I wanted to make o-rings today so chose to slice them top to bottom. I didn’t really think about slice thickness. So, for a few seconds, I employed creative (although not innovative) energy. Like regular physical exercise, it must be good and healthy to regularly work out with creative exercise. Fortunately, I was able to make a fairly quick decision as indecisiveness in a creative situation would be a bad thing.

In the SP YCISL workshop, I used dressing in the morning as an example of a creative exercise (more so perhaps than other dressing occasions because there really is usually a blank slate, new attitude and refreshed inspiration after waking up in the morning – at least normally, I would guess). Even where a uniform is involved and choices are limited, there may be at least one creative decision involved even if the decision is the same as the one chosen the day before.