right brain left brain

[miz_anneliese]

I am constantly questioning the things in my life. It's like I never grew out of the 2-year-old "Why?" phase. My boy can attest to the fact I live in a logical world the majority of the time, and I want reasons for why things happen. Witness today's episode of "Why" theatre, where I asked "Why do you like to cook", which is at least better and more intelligent than "Why did you stop in the doorway to apply your lip balm?"


I wonder if I've always been like this, so logic-based and less intuition/emotion/creativity-based. It certainly doesn't seem like it... when I was a kid I was very creative, always getting A's in english classes because my made-up stories were well done. But you know, I loved math more. I was never as good at it, but I enjoyed it more than answering essay questions.

And boy, that's held through life. I have a degree in engineering, but my highest grades and best compliments were from every class in which I had to write essays. Are good writing skills a measure of creativity and/or innovation? Are they different from logic, really? Hmm. I just posited my own "Why" question here, and I don't know the answer off the top of my head. Let's put some of my so-called logic to use ;)

I think writing anything besides technical papers or documentation entails having a higher creativity level than things like differential equations, e.g. Even in essay responses where you draw on knowledge you've already learned. To get the grades, to be recognized, to really demonstrate you understand, and are not merely regurgitating, you have to be able to string together words and form ideas and rephrase in new and different ways. Which takes more than logic skills.

Heh. But I still never enjoyed the essays. I loved the math classes. The trade-off was, I did extremely well in the philosophy courses, the history courses, even biology courses (which did require essays, though they were all science based). Nearly every professor I had in those classes complimented me. Case in point, and yes, I'm going to brag about this, because it's one of my fondest memories and it points out the fact that there are at least a few brain cells rattling around up here - my philosophy course. We had to analyze Roger Bacon and determine if his stance on universals had changed over a 5 to 10-year period. I went through all of his arguments, in detail, and posited that it did. My prof wholeheartedly disagreed with me, and this is a man that been teaching the course for quite some time, and also was the author of the book we were using :) I got an A on that paper.

Yeah. Creativity. I still got some of it somewhere. Where did it go? Or did I just "Why" it to death?

The other thing is, I'm still fascinated by psychology. The "Why" of people fascinates me. And hey - the best way to find out about someone is to ask.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I never believed in the right brain left brain theory. Creativity and analytical ability are so hand in hand it is rediculous. Most engineers are very creative, even the computer engineers. It seems to me that being good at one makes you better at the other. For me, there is nothing I want more than to write. I've focused my entire life towards that. At the same time, there is nothing so pure as math. With math, there is a right and a wrong answer (excluding the mysterious world of statistics). I think that purity drew me toward engineering. But if all I did was math, I think I'd become a robot. If all I did was write, I think I'd lose myself in some imaginary world. For you, you're creativity is still there. I see it in flashes of comments I read. Perhaps for you, you only need those flashes to balance you out.

[(Anonymous)]

Forgive the drunken spelling. You're is really your.
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