When I think of freedom, my first thought is the cliche "America land of the free, home of the brave". I don't care much for politics, so I started to think of other associations I could make to the word freedom. Immediately, I started thinking about creative freedom and what it means to be free creatively. When I started to dive into what I think it means to be creatively free, I also started to think about what it means to not have that creative freedom. Our society today is preoccupied with conformity. There is pressure to look a certain way, think a certain way, and act a certain way. It is truly rare to find someone who is free of this conformity, if there are any people free of it at all. Because of this pressure to conform, our creativity can sometimes be hindered. I found a really good quote that talks about breaking free of the chains of conformity. It says:
"The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion." --Albert Camus
After reading this quote, I began to wonder what it would be like if I really did live that way. It made me wonder why I conform to what society wants me to be. I found a video on youtube that humorously displays what we look like when we blindly conform.
The people in the video that are not in on the gag are being mocked for their refusal to question what is going on around them. After seeing this, I do not want to live in conformity any longer. In Michalko's Thinkertoys book he talks about asking the question "what if?" It is kind of ironic, because just recently my boyfriend and I had begun to start playing a "what if?" game at dinner. Most of the time the question is something like "What if someone paid you 5,000,000 to live in Mordor for a year. Would you do it?" It is always a dreadful place and a large sum of money. I always say no until he throws in something like "But what if you could cure cancer if you did it?" Then I feel obligated to say that I would do it, but only for that reason. It wasn't until reading the chapter about asking "what if?" questions in the Thinkertoys book, that I realized how much creativity and imagination are put into playing our little game. After thinking about this, I googled the word imagination. I found this picture which made me realize a few things.
First off, I love this picture. Secondly, it made me realize how much we lose our imaginations when we grow up. Kids come up with the most imaginative and crazy ideas because when you are that young you don't care what other people think. You are free to be whatever you want and are often encouraged to do so. Why does this have to change as we grow older? I think that it would be amazing if adults would start asking the question "what if?" and used their imaginations on a daily basis.
All of these thoughts tie into my view on creativity. After really thinking about it, I realized that I do not want to be confined to what society tells me to be. Often times when I am designing something I look at other people's work for inspiration. Sometimes I start to feel like my work is too different or not good enough. After thinking about creative freedom, I realize that the best thing about my work is that it is MINE. If I get hired somewhere or someone buys a logo from me it is because of my creativity. Not because I am like everyone else. This freedom to be myself is a privileged and it would be a shame to let it go to waste. So, from now on I am going to try to focus on cultivating my own creativity that is unique to my style, not society's. I found this last picture when googling the word freedom.
This picture is the epitome of what I think it is to be free. Not a care in the world about what society thinks. Free to be myself. Free to have my own creative thoughts. Free to design and create things in my own unique style. Creative freedom gives you the right use your imagination and follow your dreams not the chains of conformity. 
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