Thinking outside the box

The other day, I was having a conversation with a friend. I don't remember what it was about. However, at one point, I remember her saying "Wow - it sure was great to be a kid. I remember taking one whole day and drawing rainbows in all sorts of different color patterns, like pink-white-purple-sparkles stuck in glue-blue-red."

Now, that really stuck with me because it got me thinking. When I was a kid, my mom taught me how to draw rainbows. For anyone who is unclear about this, let me straighten it out for you: the traditional color scheme of a rainbow is red-orange-yellow-green-blue-purple. So, I would draw rainbows in exactly that way. NEVER ONCE did it occur to me to draw them with any other variations.

You see - I've always been this way. Even as a kid, I wanted to know and follow the rules. AS far as I was concerned there was never any grey area. Its black and white baby, either you do it the "right" way, or you're wrong.

Now, I was still a creative kid, but I was creative within the box of rules that I had to work with. I'd come up with a story about made up people. But, if there was a rainbow in that story, it would be the colors it was "supposed" to be.

The point? I just think its interesting to think about. I deeply apreciate my friends who can think outside the box. And while I may night get or even like a rainbow that completely made up of the color blue, I do apreciate the capacity some people to have to come up with it, as it will never be me.

I think that as people, we are designed to complement each other. A person with no rules will ultimately fail. But, the same can be said of a person with no creativity. I believe that we all have some of each in us, but the balance that's tipped in one way or the other can be compensated by the people around us who teach how to see the world the way that they do.

So, lets try to not be hard on each other when the 'rules' person is going off on some rant about how things aren't being done "right" or the 'creativity' person can't understand why you just won't turn on red when the sign clearly says "no turn on red". In the end, we'll all be better people.