Searching for creativity quotes to inspire your next masterpiece? Fuel your imagination and spark innovation with these thought-provoking creativity quotes that push the boundaries of ordinary ideas.
Creativity is the magic of turning the most ordinary moments into something extraordinary.
Spotting possibilities where no one else can see them is as much creativity as painting a masterpiece or writing a book, novel, or poem.
Whether fixing a squeaky door with a hairpin, coming up with a brilliant solution out of nowhere, or even breathing new life into an old idea, creativity plays a role in every little part of life.
I mean to say here that creativity is not reserved for artists or writers; it belongs to anyone daring enough to think differently.
After all these years, you’d think I’d have mastered the art of summoning creativity on command. Spoiler alert: I haven’t.
Yes, some days, creativity flows like a river after a storm. Still, there are days when I go blank and keep staring at my WordPress editor as it owes me an explanation. No words, no ideas, just that blinking cursor mocking my very existence.
Over time, I’ve realized creativity is more like a muscle. Sometimes it needs stretching; other times, just a little inspiration to wake it up.
That’s where these quotes about creativity step in, helping me think out of the box and discover solutions I never saw coming, like tiny road signs on the winding highway of your imagination.
No matter if you’re riding the wave of a creative high or wrestling with a creative block that feels immovable, these nuggets of wisdom can give your imagination the boost it needs.
Let’s explore them together; you never know which might be the key to unlocking your next big idea.
Famous Creativity Quotes
Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things. And the reason they were able to do that was that they’ve had more experiences or they have thought more about their experiences than other people. Unfortunately, that’s too rare a commodity. A lot of people in our industry haven’t had very diverse experiences. So they don’t have enough dots to connect, and they end up with very linear solutions without a broad perspective on the problem. The broader one’s understanding of the human experience, the better design we will have. ~ Steve Jobs
The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt. ~ Sylvia Plath
Odd how the creative power at once brings the whole universe to order. ~ Virginia Woolf
Creativity is intelligence having fun. ~ Albert Einstein
She was never quite ready. But she was brave. And the universe listens to brave. ~ Rebecca Ray
You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have. ~ Maya Angelou
Creativity is seeing what others see and thinking what no one else ever thought. ~ Albert Einstein
Best Quotes About Creativity
Creativity is…seeing something that doesn’t exist already. You need to find out how you can bring it into being and that way be a playmate with God. ~ Michele Shea
Everybody is talented because everybody who is human has something to express. ~ Brenda Ueland
Creative activity is a type of learning process where the teacher and pupil are located in the same individual. ~ Arthur Koestler
Discovery consists of looking at the same thing as everyone else and thinking something different. ~ Albert Szent-Gyorgyi
The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. ~ Eleanor Roosevelt
Begin by learning to draw and paint like the old masters. After that, you can do as you like; everyone will respect you. ~ Salvador Dalí
It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation. ~ Herman Melville
In order to be open to creativity, one must have the capacity for constructive use of solitude. One must overcome the fear of being alone. ~ Rollo May
My contention is that creativity now is as important in education as literacy, and we should treat it with the same status. ~ Sir Ken Robinson
Overthinking the process will kill any career in the creative space. You just have to do, not think. ~ Casey Neistat
For us, creativity means thinking about the lives of our audience and how to connect with them. ~ Anna Wintour
The great enemy of creativity is fear. When we’re fearful, we freeze up – like a nine-year-old who won’t draw pictures, for fear everybody will laugh. Creativity has to do with a willingness to take risks. Think about how children play. They run around the playground, they trip, they fall, they get up and run some more. They believe everything will be all right. They feel capable; they let go. ~ Faith Ringgold
Punishing honest mistakes stifles creativity. I want people moving and shaking the earth and they’re going to make mistakes. ~ Ross Perot
It’s a bizarre but wonderful feeling, to arrive dead center of a target you didn’t even know you were aiming for. ~ Lois McMaster Bujold
Dance above the surface of the world. Let your thoughts lift you into creativity that is not hampered by opinion. ~ Red Haircrow
Your ego can become an obstacle to your work. If you start believing in your greatness, it is the death of your creativity. ~ Marina Abramovic
I think that perhaps if I had had to slow down the ideas so that I could capture them on paper I might have stifled some of them. ~ J.K. Rowling
We nurture our creativity when we release our inner child. Let it run and roam free. It will take you on a brighter journey. ~ Serina Hartwel
Let your creative and imaginative mind run freely; it will take you places you never dreamed of and provide breakthroughs that others once thought were impossible. ~ Idowu Koyenikan
You never have to change anything you got up in the middle of the night to write. ~ Saul Bellow
Those who do not want to imitate anything, produce nothing. ~ Salvador Dali
Resting is not a waste of time. It’s an investment in well-being. Relaxing is not a sign of laziness. It’s a source of energy. Breaks are not a distraction. They’re a chance to refocus attention. Play is not a frivolous activity. It’s a path to connection and creativity. ~ Adam Grant
Happiness lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort. ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt
Rest nurtures creativity, which nurtures activity. Activity nurtures rest, which sustains creativity. Each draws from and contributes to the other. ~ Kim John Payne
Creativity can solve almost any problem. The creative act, the defeat of habit by originality, overcomes everything. ~ George Lois
A creative life is an amplified life. It’s a bigger life, a happier life, an expanded life, and a hell of a lot more interesting life. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert
Creativity is inventing, experimenting, growing, taking risks, breaking rules, making mistakes, and having fun. ~ Mary Lou Cook
It’s no good being too easily swayed by people’s opinions. You have to believe in yourself. ~ Donatella Versace
The thing is to become a master and in your old age to acquire the courage to do what children did when they knew nothing. ~ Ernest Hemingway
I apply the term ‘creativity’ broadly… it’s problem solving. We are all faced with problems, and we have to address them and think of something new, and that’s where creativity comes in. ~ Edwin Catmull
Some of [my memoir] — perhaps too much — has been about how I learned to do it. Much of it has been about how you can do it better. The rest of it — and perhaps the best of it — is a permission slip: you can, you should, and if you’re brave enough to start, you will. Writing is magic, as much the water of life as any other creative art. The water is free. So drink. Drink and be filled up. ~ Stephen King
There is no such thing as a new idea. We simply take a lot of old ideas and put them into a sort of mental kaleidoscope. ~ Mark Twain
There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all. Without creativity, there would be no progress, and we would be forever repeating the same patterns. ~ Edward De Bono
Our dreams are the canvas, and our creativity is the paint that brings them to life. ~ Xiuhtezcatl Martinez
So people seek the irreproducible moment, the brief, fragile community of story told in one place. The ancient ritual…the living tongue that tells the word, the living ear that hears it, bind and bond us in the communion we long for in the silence of our inner solitude. ~ Ursula Le Guin
It’s easy to attack and destroy an act of creation. It’s a lot more difficult to perform one. ~ Chuck Palahniuk
Everyone is born a genius, but the process of living de-geniuses them. ~ Richard Buckminster Fuller
The visionary starts with a clean sheet of paper, and re-imagines the world. ~ Malcolm Gladwell
Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void, but out of chaos; the materials must, in the first place, be afforded: it can give form to dark, shapeless substances, but cannot bring into being the substance itself. ~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
The difficulty lies not so much in developing new ideas as in escaping from old ones. ~ John Maynard Keynes
You’re mad, bonkers, completely off your head. But I’ll tell you a secret. All the best people are. ~ Lewis Carroll
If a composer suffers from loss of sleep and his sleeplessness induces him to turn out masterpieces, what a profitable loss it is! ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work. ~ Gustave Flaubert
We become what we behold. We shape our tools, and thereafter our tools shape us. ~ Marshall McLuhan
Creativity itself doesn’t care at all about results – the only thing it craves is the process. Learn to love the process and let whatever happens next happen, without fussing too much about it. Work like a monk, or a mule, or some other representative metaphor for diligence. Love the work. Destiny will do what it wants with you, regardless. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert
Thank goodness I was never sent to school; it would have rubbed off some of the originality. ~ Beatrix Potter
Non-judgment quiets the internal dialogue, and this opens once again the doorway to creativity. ~ Deepak Chopra
I would rather be an artist than a leader. Ironically, a leader has to follow the rules. ~ Criss Jami
The modern artist is working with space and time and expressing his feelings rather than illustrating. ~ Jackson Pollock
Draw the art you want to see, start the business you want to run, play the music you want to hear, write the books you want to read, build the products you want to use – do the work you want to see done. ~ Austin Kleon
Almost always, the creative dedicated minority has made the world better. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
Creativity is merely a plus name for regular activity. Any activity becomes creative when the doer cares about doing it right, or better. ~ John Updike
True alchemy lies in this formula: ‘Your memory and your senses are but the nourishment of your creative impulse’. ~ Arthur Rimbaud
Creativity is the heartbeat of activism, and dreams are the fuel that drives our determination. ~ Jamie Margolin
Dreaming without action is merely a fantasy. Channel your creativity into real change. ~ Jamie Margolin
As the story grew, it put down roots into the past and threw out unexpected branches . ~ J.R.R. Tolkien
A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it. ~ Michelangelo
We need musicians and storytellers to bring healing to our culture, and we need that now, more than ever. ~ Chloé S. Valdary
A painting is not thought out and settled in advance. While it is being , it changes as one’s thoughts change. And when it’s finished, it goes on changing, according to the state of mind of whoever is looking at it. ~ Pablo Picasso
True happiness comes from the joy of deeds well done, the zest of creating things new. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery
There are some people who live in a dream world, and some who face reality and then there are those who turn one into the other. ~ Douglas Everett
Serious design, serious play, is something else. For one thing, it often happens spontaneously, intuitively, accidentally or incidentally. ~ Paula Scher
Listen to anyone with an original idea, no matter how absurd it may sound at first. If you put fences around people, you get sheep. Give people the room they need. ~ William McKnight
Creativity doesn’t wait for that perfect moment. It fashions its own perfect moments out of ordinary ones. ~ Bruce Garrabrandt
Creativity is the language we use to communicate the urgency of our dreams for a better future. ~ Audre Lorde
My future starts when I wake up every morning. Every day I find something creative to do with my life. ~ Miles Davis
Creativity comes from trust. Trust your instincts. And never hope more than you work. ~ Rita Mae Brown
True originality consists not in a new manner but in a new vision. ~ Edith Wharton
When learning is purposeful, creativity blossoms. When creativity blossoms, thinking emanates. When thinking emanates, knowledge is fully lit. When knowledge is lit, economy flourishes. ~ A.P.J. Abdul Kalam
Everyone who’s ever taken a shower has an idea. It’s the person who gets out of the shower, dries off and does something about it who makes a difference. ~ Nolan Bushnell
Creativity requires input, and that’s what research is. You’re gathering material with which to build. ~ Gene Luen Yang
The important thing for you is to be alert, to question, to find out, so that your own initiative may be awakened. ~ Bruce Lee
The creative strength is good enough and deep enough to bring itself to flower and to grow in spite of this sickness. ~ Joanne Greenberg
The role of the artist is exactly the same as the role of the lover. If I love you, I have to make you conscious of the things you don’t see. ~ James Baldwin
The road to creativity passes so close to the madhouse and often detours or ends there. ~ Ernest Becker
A picture might be worth a thousand words but a good sentence is worth a thousand windows. ~ Mati Klarwein
The precise role of the artist, then, is to illuminate that darkness, blaze roads through that vast forest, so that we will not, in all our doing, lose sight of its purpose, which is, after all, to make the world a more human dwelling place. ~ James Baldwin
An artist without ideas is a mendicant; barren, he goes begging among the hours. ~ Irving Stone
The world always seems brighter when you’ve just made something that wasn’t there before. ~ Neil Gaiman
Stress and worry, they solve nothing. What they do is block creativity. You are not even able to think about the solutions. Every problem has a solution. ~ Susan L. Taylor
Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not. ~ Pablo Picasso
Creativity is problem-solving. Creativity is progress. Creativity is a tool. Harness yours. ~ Alex Lieberman
Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the thinks you can think up if only you try! ~ Dr. Seuss
Creativity is that marvelous capacity to grasp mutually distinct realities and draw a spark from their juxtaposition. ~ Max Ernst
Create. Not for the money. Not for the fame. Not for the recognition. But for the pure joy of creating something and sharing it. ~ Ernest Barbaric
They’re only crayons. You didn’t fear them in Kindergarten, why fear them now? ~ Hugh MacLeod
I believe that the most important single thing, beyond discipline and creativity is daring to dare. ~ Maya Angelou
Creativity may be hard to nurture, but it’s easy to thwart. ~ Adam Grant
The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul. ~ Dieter F. Uchtdorf
Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way. ~ Edward de Bono
Creativity, as has been said, consists largely of rearranging what we know in order to find out what we do not know. Hence, to think creatively, we must be able to look afresh at what we normally take for granted. ~ George Kneller
You cannot teach creativity — how to become a good writer. But you can help a young writer discover within himself what kind of writer he would like to be. ~ Mario Vargas Llosa
Creativity is not just for artists. It’s for businesspeople looking for a new way to close a sale; it’s for engineers trying to solve a problem; it’s for parents who want their children to see the world in more than one way. ~ Twyla Tharp
Creativity is the brain’s invisible muscle — that when used and exercised routinely — becomes better and stronger. ~ Ashley Ormon
To me there’s no creativity without boundaries. If you’re gonna write a sonnet, it’s 14 lines, so it’s solving the problem within the container. ~ Lorne Michaels
People who live in fear of others stealing their ideas generally don’t have many good ideas. Creativity is abundant. Execution is scarce. What prevails is not the best idea but the best implementation. ~ Adam Grant
A culture of unaccountability is a culture without incentive, and a culture without incentive is the death of critical and creative thinking. ~ Michael R. LeGault
Every animal leaves traces of what it was; man alone leaves traces of what he created. ~ Jacob Bronowski
An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all. ~ Oscar Wilde
Creativity is a habit, and the best creativity is the result of good work habits. ~ Twyla Tharp
Creative ideas flourish best in a shop which preserves some spirit of fun. Nobody is in business for fun, but that does not mean there cannot be fun in business. ~ Leo Burnett
Creativity is more than just being different. Anybody can plan weird; that’s easy. What’s hard is to be as simple as Bach. Making the simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity. ~ Charles Mingus
The power of our dreams and the creativity we employ can break the chains of injustice and oppression. ~ Desmond Tutu
There are painters who transform the sun to a yellow spot, but there are others who with the help of their art and their intelligence, transform a yellow spot into sun. ~ Pablo Picasso
Quotes About Being Creative
You can be cautious or you can be creative, but there’s no such thing as a cautious creative. ~ George Lois
I dream in fire but work in clay. ~ Arthur Machen
To be creative means to be in love with life. You can be creative only if you love life enough that you want to enhance its beauty, you want to bring a little more music to it, a little more poetry to it, a little more dance to it. ~ Osho
Absurdity and anti-absurdity are the two poles of creative energy. ~ Karl Lagerfeld
There’s room for everybody on the planet to be creative and conscious if you are your own person. If you’re trying to be like somebody else, then there is isn’t. ~ Tori Amos
The progressive development of man is vitally dependent on invention. It is the most important product of his creative brain. ~ Nikola Tesla
There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of people you love. When you learn to tap this source, you will truly have defeated age. ~ Sophia Loren
The most creative people are motivated by the grandest of problems that are presented before them. ~ Neil deGrasse Tyson
One sure-fire way to stay creative; force yourself to learn something new. ~ Harvey Mackay
I very rarely think in words at all. A thought comes, and I may try to express in words afterwards. ~ Alber Einstein
I never paint dreams or nightmares. I paint my own reality. ~ Frida Kahlo
Our species is the only creative species, and it has only one creative instrument, the individual mind and spirit of man. Nothing was ever created by two men. There are no good collaborations, whether in music, in art, in poetry, in mathematics, in philosophy. Once the miracle of creation has taken place, the group can build and extend it, but the group never invents anything. The preciousness lies in the lonely mind of a man. ~ John Steinbeck
People who do a job that claims to be creative have to be alone to recharge their batteries. You can’t live 24 hours a day in the spotlight and remain creative. For people like me, solitude is a victory. ~ Karl Lagerfeld
Creative people are often found either disagreeable or intimidating by mediocrities. ~ Criss Jami
The creative person is willing to live with ambiguity. He doesn’t need problems solved immediately and can afford to wait for the right ideas. ~ Abe Tannenbaum
A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others. ~ Ayn Rand
The life of the creative man is led, directed and controlled by boredom. Avoiding boredom is one of our most important purposes. ~ Saul Steinberg
You can be creative in anything — in math, science, engineering, philosophy — as much as you can in music or in painting or in dance. ~ Sir Ken Robinson
The truly creative mind in any field is no more than this: A human creature born abnormally, inhumanly sensitive. To him… a touch is a blow, a sound is a noise, a misfortune is a tragedy, a joy is an ecstasy, a friend is a lover, a lover is a god, and failure is death. Add to this cruelly delicate organism the overpowering necessity to create, create, create — so that without the creating of music or poetry or books or buildings or something of meaning, his very breath is cut off from him. He must create, must pour out creation. By some strange, unknown, inward urgency he is not really alive unless he is creating. ~ Pearl S. Buck
Everyone is born creative; everyone is given a box of crayons in kindergarten. Then when you hit puberty they take the crayons away and replace them with dry, uninspiring books on algebra, history, etc. Being suddenly hit years later with the ‘creative bug’ is just a wee voice telling you, ‘I’d like my crayons back, please. ~ Hugh MacLeod
Short Quotes on Creativity
Creativity is an act of defiance. ~ Twyla Tharp
You’re only given a little spark of madness. You mustn’t lose it. ~ Robin Williams
Ideas control the world. ~ James A. Garfield
A poet should be so crafty with words that he is envied even for his pains. ~ Criss Jami
There is creative reading as well as creative writing. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
The chief enemy of creativity is ‘good’ sense. ~ Pablo Picasso
Sometimes the creativity is in the rest. ~ Joshua Kissi
Don’t be ‘a writer’. Be writing. ~ William Faulkner
Simplicity and complexity need each other. ~ John Maeda
Creating opportunities means looking where others are not. ~ Mark Cuban
Vision is the art of seeing the invisible. ~ Jonathan Swift
If you want something new, you have to stop doing something old. ~ Peter F. Drucker
You can’t schedule creativity, it just happens. ~ Brittany Cabriales
Creativity comes from a conflict of ideas. ~ Donatella Versace
An artist is not paid for his labor but for his vision. ~ James Whistler
An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail. ~ Edwin Land
Creativity flows when curiosity is stoked. ~ Neil Blumenthal
Arrogance kills creativity. ~ A.M. Riley
A business that makes nothing but money is a poor business. ~ Henry Ford
The dreamers are the saviors of the world. ~ James Allen
A hunch is creativity trying to tell you something. ~ Frank Capra
Creativity is knowing how to hide your sources. ~ C.E.M. Joad
Creativity is the power to connect the seemingly unconnected. ~ William Plomer
I am an artist you know … it is my right to be odd. ~ E.A. Bucchianeri
What keeps life fascinating is the constant creativity of the soul. ~ Deepak Chopra
Creativity is contagious, pass it on. ~ Albert Einstein
Creativity takes courage. ~ Henri Matisse
Artists are those who can evade the verbose. ~ Haruki Murakami
Good artists copy, great artists steal. ~ Pablo Picasso
All good work requires self-revelation. ~ Sidney Lumet
To have a great idea, have a lot of them. ~ Thomas A. Edison
Replace fear with curiosity. ~ Steven Spielberg
You have to be willing to spend time making things for no known reason. ~ Lynda Barry
Great things are done by a series of small things brought together. ~ Vincent Van Gogh
Creativity is the art of concealing your source. ~ Coco Chanel
To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong. ~ Joseph Chilton Pearce
Sometimes an artist’s first invention is herself. ~ Stephanie Vaughn
Creativity is piercing the mundane to find the marvelous. ~ Bill Moyers
I dwell in possibility. ~ Emily Dickinson
Creativity is the way I share my soul with the world. ~ Brené Brown,
Mystery is at the heart of creativity. That, and surprise. ~ Julia Cameron
If you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original. ~ Ken Robinson
All creative people want to do the unexpected. ~ Hedy Lamarr
What if the very reason you were created was to be creative? ~ Michelle Dennis Evans
Anxiety is the handmaiden of creativity. ~ T.S. Eliot
Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen. ~ Oprah Winfrey
The creative adult is the child who survived. ~ Ursula Le Guin
If you want creative workers, give them enough time to play. ~ John Cleese
Creativity is a continual surprise. ~ Ray Bradbury
Create with the heart; build with the mind. ~ Criss Jami
The criminal is the creative artist; the detective only the critic. ~ G.K. Chesterton
Creativity is as important as literacy. ~ Ken Robinson
What is now proved was once only imagined. ~ William Blake
I criticize by creation, not by finding fault. ~ Marcus Tullius Cicero
Creativity is a wild mind and a disciplined eye. ~ Dorothy Parker
there is no healthier drug than creativity. ~ Nayyirah Waheed
creativity keeps the world alive, yet, everyday we are asked to be ashamed of honoring it, wanting to live our lives as artists. i’ve carried the shame of being a ‘creative’ since i came to the planet; have been asked to be something different, more, less my whole life. thank spirit, my wisdom is deeper than my shame, and i listened to who i was. i want to say to all the creatives who have been taught to believe who you are is not enough for this world, taught that a life of art will amount to nothing, know that who we are, and what we do is life. when we create, we are creating the world. remember this, and commit. ~ Nayyirah Waheed
Vision is the true creative rhythm. ~ Robert Delaunay
Deadlines and things make you creative. ~ Jack White
I’ve been all over the world and I’ve never seen a statue of a critic. ~ Leonard Bernstein
The painter has the Universe in his mind and hands. ~ Leonardo da Vinci
Everything you can imagine is real. ~ Pablo Picasso
Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties. ~ Erich Fromm
Clear thinking at the wrong moment can stifle creativity. ~ Karl Lagerfeld
The creative process is a process of surrender, not control. ~ Bruce Lee
Inspiring Creative Quotes
You can’t wait for inspiration, you have to go after it with a club. ~ Jack London
Don’t wait for inspiration. It comes while working. ~ Henri Matisse
Inspirations never go in for long engagements; they demand immediate marriage to action. ~ Brendan Francis Brown
Inspiration does exist, but it must find you working. ~ Pablo Picasso
I spoke fire, laughed smoke, and madness spilled forth from my inspiration. ~ Arthur Holitscher
The most wonderful inspirations die with their subject, if he has no hand to paint them to the senses. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
Do not quench your inspiration and your imagination; do not become the slave of your model. ~ Vincent Van Gogh
The richness I achieve comes from nature, the source of my inspiration. ~ Claude Monet
Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist. ~ Pablo Picasso
If you ever find that you’re the most talented person in the room, you need to find another room. ~ Austin Kleon
I don’t care that they stole my idea. I care that they don’t have any of their own. ~ Nikola Tesla
If you get stuck, get away from your desk. Take a walk, take a bath, go to sleep, make a pie, draw, listen to music, meditate, exercise; whatever you do, don’t just stick there scowling at the problem. ~ Hilary Mantel
If there’s a book you really want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it. ~ Toni Morrison
We are all feeding from each other, all the time, every day. ~ Dave Eggers
Creativity is our most powerful tool to shape the world we want to live in. ~ Isra Hirsi
Find your authentic voice, become vulnerable, and then put yourself out there. ~ Meredith Brooks
The important thing is to not stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. ~ Alber Einstein
The muscles of writing are not so visible, but they are just as powerful: determination, attention, curiosity, a passionate heart. ~ Natalie Goldberg
We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled. The trick is, knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out. ~ Ray Bradbury
Be alone, that is the secret of invention; be alone, that is when ideas are born. ~ Nikola Tesla
Make an empty space in any corner of your mind, and creativity will instantly fill it. ~ Dee Hock
Trust that little voice in your head that says ‘Wouldn’t it be interesting if…’; And then do it. ~ Duane Michals
The challenge for leaders is to learn how to think differently – and even more powerfully, how to think differently together. ~ Nick Udall
No old road leads to new destinations! Change begins when one realizes that it is unwise to pour a new wine into an old wine skin. If you change your mind, you have to change your actions too! ~ Israelmore Ayivor
Don’t be satisfied with stories, how things have gone with others. Unfold your own myth. ~ Rumi
The world needs dreamers and the world needs doers. But above all, the world needs dreamers who do. ~ Sarah Ban Breathnach
Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes. ~ Carl Jung
One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche
That’s the great secret of creativity. You treat ideas like cats: you make them follow you. ~ Ray Bradbury
When you make music or write or create, it’s really your job to have mind-blowing, irresponsible, condomless sex with whatever idea it is you’re writing about at the time. ~ Lady Gaga
The monotony and solitude of a quiet life stimulate the creative mind. ~ Albert Einstein
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them. ~ Alber Einstein
Instead of worrying about what you cannot control, shift your energy to what you can create. ~ Roy T. Bennett
There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed. ~ Ernest Hemingway
Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It’s self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can’t try to do things. You simply must do things. ~ Ray Bradbury
Know where to find the information and how to use it. That’s the secret of success. ~ Albert Einstein
There is no time for cut-and-dried monotony. There is time for work, and time for love. That leaves no other time. ~ Coco Chanel
If your business plan depends on suddenly being “discovered” by some big shot, your plan will probably fail. Nobody suddenly discovers anything. Things are made slowly and in pain. ~ Hugh MacLeod
Get out of your mind and become crazy about your future in a creative way! ~ Michael Bassey Johnson
Our dreams and creativity can rewrite the narratives of our future. ~ Mari Copeny
Everyone has their own ways of expression. I believe we all have a lot to say, but finding ways to say it is more than half the battle. ~ Criss Jami
I like to listen. I have learned a great deal from listening carefully. Most people never listen. ~ Ernest Hemingway
We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down. ~ Kurt Vonnegut
The comfort zone is the great enemy to creativity; moving beyond it necessitates intuition, which in turn configures new perspectives and conquers fears. ~ Dan Stevens
When one does a thing, it appears good, otherwise one would not write it. Only later comes reflection, and one discards or accepts the thing. Time is the best censor, and patience is a most excellent teacher. ~ Frederic Chopin
Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can. ~ Arthur Ashe
I think that you’ve got to make something that pleases you and hope that other people feel the same way. ~ Thomas Keller
All things are created twice; first mentally; then physically. The key to creativity is to begin with the end in mind, with a vision and a blue print of the desired result. ~ Stephen R. Covey
Find your authentic voice, become vulnerable, and then put yourself out there. ~ Meredith Brooks
Curiosity about life in all of its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people. ~ Leo Burnett
Dreams are the starting point of every revolution, and creativity fuels its fire. ~ Gloria Steinem
You are never given a dream without also being given the power to make it true. ~ Richard Bach
If the literature we are reading does not wake us, why then do we read it? A literary work must be an ice-axe to break the sea frozen inside us. ~ Franz Kafka
Quotes About Art and Creativity
The object isn’t to make art, it’s to be in that wonderful state which makes art inevitable. ~ Robert Henri
Take your broken heart, make it into art. ~ Carrie Fisher
If art is the bridge between what you see in your mind and what the world sees, then skill is how you build that bridge. ~ Twyla Tharp
Spontaneity is a meticulously prepared art. ~ Oscar Wilde
Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep. ~ Scott Adams
What does one prefer? An art that struggles to change the social contract, but fails? Or one that seeks to please and amuse, and succeeds? ~ Robert Hughes
Art is where what we survive survives. ~ John Green
Life beats down and crushes the soul and art reminds you that you have one. ~ Stella Adler
To practice any art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow. So do it. ~ Kurt Vonnegut
Art is the elimination of the unnecessary. ~ Pablo Picasso
Art helps us envision a world in which all of our goals for society are right before us. Use your creativity to bolster and expand your attention. You’re in it for the long haul. ~ Imani Barbarin
You don’t make art out of good intentions. ~ Gustave Flaubert
For art to exist, for any sort of aesthetic activity or perception to exist, a certain physiological precondition is indispensable: intoxication. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche
We’ve got truth and lies and then there’s this little space, the edge, in the middle. That liminal space, that’s art. ~ Mac Barnett
Art is a group of highly sensitive people reporting back what reality is like for them. ~ Pete Holmes
You use a glass mirror to see your face. You use works of art to see your soul. ~ George Bernard Shaw
I am my own experiment. I am my own work of art. ~ Madonna
Art is essentially the affirmation, the blessing, and the deification of existence. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche
Every child is an artist, the problem is staying an artist when you grow up. ~ Pablo Picasso
Art isn’t optional for humans. ~ John Green
If you’re going to have the tortured soul of an artist, then you might as well create some art while you’re at it. ~ Leila Sales
The role of the artist is to make the revolution irresistible. ~ Toni Cade Bambara
NASA has this phrase that they like: ‘Failure is not an option.’ But failure has to be an option in art and in exploration, because it’s a leap of faith. And no important endeavor that required innovation was done without risk. You have to be willing to take those risks. So, that’s the thought I would leave you with, is that in whatever you’re doing, failure is an option, but fear is not. ~ James Cameron
Quotes on Creativity and Innovation
Mindless habitual behavior is the enemy of innovation. ~ Rosabeth Moss Kanter
If you look at history, innovation doesn’t come just from giving people incentives; it comes from creating environments where their ideas can connect. ~ Steven Johnson
Art begins in imitation and ends in innovation. ~ Mason Cooley
Vulnerability is the birthplace of innovation, creativity and change. ~ Brené Brown
Without tradition, art is a flock of sheep without a shepherd. Without innovation, it is a corpse. ~ Winston Churchill
You have all the reason to achieve your grandest dreams. Imagination plus innovation equals realisation. ~ Denis Waitly
If an organization values innovation, you can assume it’s safe to speak up with new ideas, leaders will listen, and your voice matters. ~ Adam Grant
There is no innovation and creativity without failure. ~ Brené Brown
Without change there is no innovation, creativity, or incentive for improvement. Those who initiate change will have a better opportunity to manage the change that is inevitable. ~ William Pollard
Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower. ~ Steve Jobs
Belief in your creative capacity lies at the heart of innovation. ~ Tom and David Kelley
I think frugality drives innovation, just like other constraints do. One of the only ways to get out of a tight box is to invent your way out. ~ Jeff Bezos
The heart and soul of the company is creativity and innovation. ~ Bob Iger
Imagination and Creativity Quotes
Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions. ~ Albert Einstein
Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine and at last you create what you will. ~ George Bernard Shaw
An idea is salvation by imagination. ~ Frank Lloyd Wright
Imagination rules the world. ~ Napoleon Bonaparte
Imagination creates reality. ~ Richard Wagner
The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination. ~ Albert Einstein
That’s what we storytellers do. We restore order with imagination. We instill hope again and again and again. ~ Walt Disney
Use your imagination to fill in the blanks. ~ Barbara Corcoran
Live out of your imagination, not your history. ~ Stephen Covey
The world of reality has its limits; the world of imagination is boundless. ~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine, and at last, you create what you will. ~ George Bernard Shaw
You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. ~ Mark Twain
Imperfection inspires invention, imagination, creativity. It stimulates. The more I feel imperfect, the more I feel alive. ~ Jhumpa Lahiri
Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world. ~ Albert Einstein
Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere. ~ Albert Einstein
There are no rules of architecture for a castle in the clouds. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton
Imagination is the source of all human achievement. ~ Sir Ken Robinson
This world is but a canvas to our imagination. ~ Henry David Thoreau
Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere. ~ Carl Sagan
Creativity begins to die when we fail to celebrate curiosity. We reward students for getting the right answer, but not for asking good questions. We promote managers for delivering results, but not for developing new ideas. Encouraging imagination is the mother of invention. ~ Adam Grant
That’s creativity in a nutshell. A messy tug-of-war with imagination to erase that feeling that nothing really matters anyway. ~ Zoe Whittall
The imagination is man’s power over nature. ~ Wallace Stevens
Doors are for people with no imagination. ~ Derek Landy
The power of imagination makes us infinite. ~ John Muir
Imagination is an opportunity to put your mind to work – for good. ~ Sam Horn
The imagination is a muscle. If it is not exercised, it atrophies. ~ Neil Gaiman
A writer should have the precision of a poet and the imagination of a scientist. ~ Vladimir Nabokov
You need imagination in order to imagine a future that doesn’t exist. ~ Azar Nafisi
He who has imagination without learning has wings but no feet. ~ Joseph Joubert
When you become the image of your own imagination, it’s the most powerful thing you could ever do. ~ RuPaul
True intelligence requires fabulous imagination. ~ Ian Mcewan
So, that’s my little collection of quotes that have helped me (and my stubborn WordPress editor). What about you? Did any of these resonate or spark something new? I’d love to hear your thoughts or even your favorite quote on creativity, if you have one! Let’s keep the conversation going in the comments.
Give Your Pinterest Board the Glow Up It Deserves: Pinning These Quotes for Creativity
