so suddenly that Alice had not a moment to think about stopping herself before she found herself falling down a very deep well.
“Either the well was very deep, or she fell very slowly, for she had plenty of time as she went down to look about her and to wonder what was going to happen next . . .
“Down, down, down. Would the fall NEVER come to an end! . . .
“Down, down, down . . . when suddenly, thump! thump! down she came upon a heap of sticks and dry leaves, and the fall was over . . .
“Suddenly she came upon a little three-legged table, all made of solid glass; there was nothing on it except a tiny golden key, and Alice’s first thought was that it might belong to one of the doors of the hall; but, alas! either the locks were too large, or the key was too small, but at any rate it would not open any of them. However, on the second time round, she came upon a low curtain she had not noticed before, and behind it was a little door about fifteen inches high: she tried the little golden key in the lock, and to her great delight it fitted!” 66
Courtesy of Lenny’s Alice in Wonderland Site, http://www.alice-in-wonderland.net/
Questions to Ponder
1.Jonathan Young of the Center for Story and Symbol says that falling down the rabbit hole represents a journey into the unconscious.67 What elements of the story have a dreamlike or hallucinogenic feel to them? (At the end we discover that Alice has been dreaming.)
2.How is this story like the Grimms’ tale of “The Golden Key”?
3.Do you have any theory about why Alice sees a rabbit with a watch before she begins her journey? (Young68 would call this a threshold experience, like the fragmentary hypnogogic images we experience before we fall asleep.)
66For all of the excerpts and pictures from the Alice stories, I am grateful to Lenny’s Alice-in-Wonderland site.
67Jonathan Young, “The Psychology of Creativity” (workshop, sponsored by The Center for Story and Symbol, www.folkstory.com. Sacramento, CA, May 16, 2006).
68Young, “The Psychology of Creativity” workshop in Sacramento, May 16, 2006.
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A New Paradigm for Creativity?
The Issue with Paradigms
A paradigm, of course, is “a set of associations, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality for the community that shares them, especially in an intellectual discipline.”69 Business professors define successful writing as succinct: the one-page memo and the executive summary. English professors want everything spelled out in depth: their mantra is “be specific.”
What’s more, even professors in the same field disagree about paradigms. Sternberg observes, “In general, scientists who are not well trained in one another’s techniques are likely to be suspicious of other’s techniques and of the conclusions drawn from them. These scientists probably will continue to do research within their own paradigm, which keeps supporting their views and thereby reinforces their confidence that they are right and that those who adhere to a paradigm from some other field are misguided . . . The history of psychology may be viewed as a history of failed paradigms.”70
Our paradigms influence our view of reality. Jurors may hear the same evidence yet argue about what it means. One believes that police plant evidence; another believes that they are guardians of the public good. One has experience as a homemaker; another, as an electrician. All of them have different assumptions based on different backgrounds and experience. They view reality through different paradigms. Richard Ogle reminds us that such paradigms are used in “framing” reality but “can’t be constructed” “linearly, step by step.”71 They may be implicit assumptions rather than conscious thoughts.
Paradigms for Creativity
Our paradigms determine how we view creativity. Hence Amit Goswami says that creativity theories “are as diverse as the worldviews in which they are wrapped.”72 He identifies three major categories. In the “mechanistic” or “materialist-realist” views, the mind operates as a “Newtonian” “machine” to create logical innovations based on past models and experiences. These theories view creativity as “continuity in human behavior,” with “only one domain of reality in the worldview underlying these theories—matter moving in space-time.” Such “materialist-realist” theories would include problem-solving techniques and emphasize Preparation and Concentration. Barbara McClintock, for instance, testified that her “aha” moments consisted of lightning-fast integration of previous facts. (See Chapter 1.) The “materialist-realist” theory, then, views creativity as thinking based on practice and technique.
In contrast, says Goswami, “organismic theories” stress “becoming” and “development,” with a focus on “a creative unfolding of purposiveness of the universe and of the individual.”73 Vera John-Steiner traces, in Notebooks of the Mind, the way that early childhood interests develop “through multiple apprenticeships.”74 When Einstein was a child, he was given a compass. He testified later to the way in which this gift unfolded the “purposiveness” of his talent by inspiring him with the wonders of science.
The fact that the magnetic needle behaved as if influenced by some hidden force field, rather than through the more mechanical method involving touch or contact, produced a sense of wonder that motivated him throughout his life. “I can still remember—or at least I believe I can remember—that this experience made a deep and lasting impression on me,” he wrote on one of the many occasions he recounted the incident. “Something deeply hidden had to be behind things.”75
More than simply solving problems based on past experience, he was fired by what Sternberg calls the “decision to be creative.” His “development” unfolded as a result.
Finally, says Goswami, “In the idealist worldview, consciousness, not matter, is assumed to be the ground of being. There is transcendence in creativity because consciousness is transcendent.”76 In certain types of creativity, inspiration seems to come from beyond past experience; it is “discontinuous” with past knowledge and practice and seems a gift from the universe. The same idea may be coming to many different artists and thinkers, but its expression will be different, depending on the individual artist, the unique filter through which it emerges. There seems to be a Unified Field, the equivalent of a radio station, beaming
