In a world that is increasingly reliant on digital technology for communication, staring at a flat screen bathed in blue light day in, day out can feel creatively draining. In our ultra-connected world, is it possible to rise above the white noise with a single original idea or thought? And how can you continue to draw on your creativity to feel invigorated, fulfilled and in touch with the world around you?
In this afternoon workshop with neuroscientist and psychologist Anna Abraham, you will learn not only about how creativity works, but also how you can isolate your creativity and utilise it to enhance your personal and professional lives. Drawing on the latest brain science, Anna will take you through the importance of creativity, no matter your field or specialism, and will show you how to recognise the factors that impede creative thinking in everyday life.
You will come away with a new suite of techniques that you can use to help you see the world around you in a new way, as well as develop an awareness of the conditions that enable you to enter into your most creative state of mind.
This workshop focuses on the way that your brain works and its relationship to creativity; you don’t need to be fluent – or, indeed, a beginner in – a particular creative skill to benefit, but you do need to have a thirst for learning more about your own creativity and how you can draw on it to thrive.
Course content
- Understand the nature of creativity across domains of human endeavour
- Distinguish between the myths and truths of the creative mind
- Recognise the factors that impede creative thinking in everyday life
- Develop an awareness of the conditions that enhance your own creativity
- Explore a range of techniques that open up new ways of seeing and thinking
Please note that Anna will also be using this workshop as a forum in which to collect some anonymised performance and qualitative data from participants for the purpose of academic research and teaching.
Tutor profile
Anna Abraham is the E. Paul Torrance Professor for Creativity and Gifted Education, and the Director of the Torrance Center for Creativity and Talent Development at the College of Education in the University of Georgia (Athens, USA). She investigates the psychological and neural underpinnings of creativity and other aspects of the human imagination, including the reality-fiction distinction, mental time travel, self-referential thinking and mental state reasoning. Her educational and professional training has been within the disciplines of psychology and neuroscience in several academic institutions and a diverse range of departments around the world. She is the author of numerous publications including the book, The Neuroscience of Creativity (2018, Cambridge University Press), and the edited volume, The Cambridge Handbook of the Imagination (2020). For more information, visit her website.
You will be sent a link to the webinar 2hrs before the start time of 4pm (GMT). Please email masterclasses@theguardian.com if you have not received the access link within one hour of the scheduled start time.
This masterclass is available globally. If you are joining us from outside the United Kingdom, please use this time zone converter to check your local live streaming time.
4pm GMT | 5pm CET | 8am PST | 11am EST
All Guardian Masterclasses are fully accessible but please contact us at masterclasses@theguardian.com if you have any queries or concerns.
Full course and returns information on the Masterclasses website
