Oiling Our Creative Bones by David Hasbury

I have been thinking about the role of graphics in MAPS, PATH, or any other gathering of people. Certainly the use of graphics has set these ways of being together apart from other ways. I don't know that it makes it any better than other ways, but I do know that it has always made it more interesting for me personally as a facilitator or a participant. Ultimately I feel a creative act is unfolding when graphics are included. My own experience of the world is one where creativity is most often either absent, or heavily disguised. We have been complicit in assigning creativity to artists and inventors.

Something happened to so many of us as we were growing up when we learned how to judge ourselves so quickly as "not being creative or artistic". The playfulness that artistic expression requires has been locked away in so many of us. It is hard not to be saddened by the thought of this death of creativity.

But artistic expression -- colouring, drawing, painting, sculpting are "expressions" of feeling and thought. The murder of the "creative" sense of self that so many of us have gone through, has not only killed our expression, in many cases it has also killed the way of thinking that fuels creativity.

This creates a particular dilemma for those of us who live in a world that was not designed to include us. Great amounts of creativity are required daily, even from moment to moment, to deal with this design problem. Families and individuals who have to confront the "disabled world" are forced to be creative. But creativity without the playful side makes dutiful art, and something is lost. I have watched so many families and individuals become weakened, even crumble, under the weight of "forced creativity". Exhaustion results when facing the daily grind of fitting the square peg in the round hole.

The playful possibilities of creativity have to be awakened if we are going to find the energy needed to sustain the "exclusive" design problem. Graphics as a tool can begin to oil that part of our brain that we have left to rust. The world of imagination is one that all of us have spent time in, mostly as children, but nonetheless we have previous experience, and we can unleash some of it to get us through the days that we face.

For most us there is an initial discomfort in participating in the "childish" activity of colouring and drawing. But not too far beyond that discomfort is a sense of awe and even a longing to feel that kind of creativity. It is liberating. As a facilitator we have the task and opportunity to unleash this creative energy and desire.

The facilitator's goal is not to draw or create a pretty picture of the meeting. The goal is to get more people in this gathering involved in the creative experience. The more that we can rekindle the creative experience in others, the stronger the gift we can leave behind. The deeper the experience of involvement, the stronger the memory will be, and the memory of the experience is one of the most powerful things that we can carry with us when we face the inevitable moment that we will be forced to be creative again.

There are so many layers, and so many things that need to be balanced. There is a place for "pretty" in graphics, but it needs to be balanced with the experience of ownership where participants in the process will leave saying "that is my image", "that says what I wanted to say", "that is me". And if we can actually get someone involved directly in drawing, colouring, positioning the words and images that we will leave behind, if we can do that and leave them with a sense of pride in their own creation, then we are really on the right track. If we can do this then we will definitely be doing something that most other planning processes don't have available to them.

I don't know if there is a way to measure the impact of the qualitative difference that the use of graphics contributes to the planning process, but I have a deep sense that there is an impact and it is profound. It can change the way that we think, and new ways of thinking are what we will need day after day as we face the "exclusion" mindset that permeates the world around us.

So when I am facilitating, as a process facilitator or as a graphic facilitator, I am always listening for opportunities for all of the participants to be involved in the "creativity" of the drawing. This has led me to find small ways for people to interact with the drawing; picking colours, thinking about symbols and shapes, drawing on the paper, touching the page, making decisions about placement of words and images on the page.

And it is not just the focus person that I seek to have involved. I want as many people as possible involved, with the provision that the focus person gets to respond to the idea before anything goes on the page. "What do you think about that?", "How does that sound to you?", "Is that o.k. with you?" are all questions that we can keep available to us to be sure that the focus person is not being overpowered. But I want others to be engaged as fully as possible, because that is what will sustain the long haul -- a small group of people who feel creatively engaged and hold some sense of ownership. People are more likely to stay involved if they have this.

I want people to feel that there is some aspect of this creative expression that they can feel they can do and feel good about. As a graphic person I will bring whatever is necessary to fill in the gaps, i.e. those parts that people don't feel they have the skill or ability to contribute and still feel good about it all. So I need to balance direct participation with an end product that people will feel good about. At the end, the picture that is left behind needs to serve as a memory of the creative experience that we all shared in. I want people to be carried back to moment when they look at the picture, to remember what they were thinking, how they were feeling, what it was like to be a part of this group.