Five Faces of Genius is a course that allows us to explore our personal creativity and teaches us about different tools and skills that help unlock more creativity. It also gives you the tools necessary to answer the question of how creativity can help us and our community. In the second unit, we explored the Five Faces of Genius in depth and discovered our strengths and challenges with each Face. Our task was to condense what we have learned for the past few weeks about the Five Faces of Genius into chapters. We explained the Five Faces and related them to ourselves, we highlighted three geniuses and their Five Faces, and we applied our Five Faces to create two potential service projects. The purpose of this project was to learn about the Five Faces of Genius.
The Five Faces of Genius are: Seer, Observer, Alchemist, Fool, and Sage. A Seer is someone who see pictures in their mind’s eye and uses those images to lead to new ideas. A Seer navigates their imagination through visualization. Observers are sensitive to the world around them. An Observer notices the tiny details and realizes their creative significance. They make creative conclusions from their collection of facts. Observers don’t just collect and critique, they create. An Alchemist uses analogy as a way to generate to new ideas. Alchemists use different areas of interest and use what may seem dissimilar and develop a great idea from that dissimilarity. A Fool is someone who realizes that brilliant ideas lurk in the shadows of weakness. A Fool knows how to use absurdity and inverts weakness into strength. Sages use the past as a springboard for inspiration. Those who master the Sage know the wisdom of what has gone before and the power of simplicity.
According to the Five Faces survey, I seem to have very strong Observer and Seer characteristics. I disagree with the Seer assessment, because a Seer relies on the power of visualization to image creative ideas. I cannot visualize. Every time I close my eyes all I see is darkness. I can’t picture images of my family or friends in my head. And when faced with a challenge, I don’t strive to “image” a solution. I have not yet tapped the full wisdom the Sage has to offer, which was my weakest face with an 8%. I agree with the Sage assessment. I tend to complicate things and quite frankly all of the ideas are not simple ideas. They require lots of work, time and dedication. Overall, my Five Faces assessment was fairly accurate in assessing my genius traits.
I interviewed my friend AJ to determine which of the Five Faces she resembles. I think that AJ has very strong Sage characteristics. She is extremely motivated by her past. AJ finds good ideas from the past and keeps a mental record of the stories that intrigue and inspire her. I find that she is constantly asking herself what has worked in the past, and how can I rekindle it and bring it to the present with a refreshed vitality? She is an excellent storyteller, which is Sage trait. Also, I think AJ has very strong Seer characteristics. About two weeks ago, AJ came up with this idea of a doughnut museum. She instantly had a clear image of the exterior and interior design of the museum in her head. And that is exactly what a Seer does.
“History doesn’t have to be the history we learn in textbooks at school, but it can be our own past experiences”.
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| Selfie, AJ 2014 |
One person we studied in class was Walt Disney. "Walt Disney was an American business magnate, cartoonist, theme park designer, and filmmaker," (WIKIPEDIA). Disney co-founded The Walt Disney Company, and is regarded as a cultural icon. He is a perfect example of an Observer. It is said that Disney was inspired to create Disneyland in the park Republic of the Children located in Manuel B. Gonnet, La Plata after observing how unhappy and bored the children seemed (WIKIPEDIA). "Whenever I go on a ride, I'm always thinking of what's wrong with the thing and how it can be improved". He is also a Seer. He is a visual person considering he is a cartoonist. He envisioned the cartoon before drawing it.
"Whenever I go on a ride, I'm always thinking of what's wrong with the thing and how it can be improved".
Dame Jane Morris Goodall, also known as Jane Goodall is an English primatologist, ethologist, and anthropologist. Goodall is considered to be the world's most foremost expert on chimpanzees. I think Goodall is an Observer. She is best known for a 55-year study of social and family interactions of wild chimpanzees in Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania in which she observed chimpanzees. She is also a Fool. She began studying the Kasakela chimpanzee community in Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania in 1960, but Goodall did not have collegiate training directing her. She was able to invert that "weakness" into a strength. Without collegiate training directing her research, Goodall observed things that strict scientific doctrines may have overlooked. She observed that each chimpanzee has unique and individual personalities, which was an unconventional idea at the time.
“I was brought up to understand Darwin's theory of evolution. I spent hours and hours in the Natural History Museum in London looking at the descriptions of how different kinds of animals had evolved, looking at the sequence of fossil bones looking gradually more and more and more and more like the modern fossil”.
The Five Faces of Genius will be very helpful when designing my service project. I plan on using the Seer traits by visualizing the outcome of my project. I will also be using the Observer traits, by paying close attention to details to ensure my projects' success. As I am formulating/coming up with ideas, the Sage and Fool traits will be very helpful. I hope to come up with both simple and absurd ideas. By combining both of those faces and different elements/topics, I will be using the Alchemist face.
I combined two of my passions (Alchemist), which are CTA/trains and homelessness to create a service project. Seeing the occasional homeless person sleeping in a train car has become a common thing for any habitual CTA commuter. The CTA has tried to addressed the problem by apologizing to riders and by adding more patrollers. However, encouraging homeless people to seek shelter elsewhere is not solving the problem. It only removes them from sight. For my service project, I would like to create a train service that is homeless people friendly. This is kind of an adaptation of the Holiday Train, imagine having a special train offering shelter to the homeless. The train would route to the places with the highest homelessness percentages in the Chicagoland Area. Another service project idea I had was to have an art exhibition promoting stereotype discussions. I plan on inverting my age, which is a weakness into a strength. I want to excite people about the change a “young person or child” can do in the world (Fool).
Work Cited:
- Jane Goodall. (2014). The Biography.com website. Retrieved 11:33, Dec 14, 2014.
- "Jane Goodall, Primatologist Information (Emeritus), Facts, News, Photos -- National Geographic." National Geographic. N.p., 2000-2002. Web. 15 Dec. 2014.
- Jane Goodall. (2014, December 13). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 05:58, December 15, 2014.
- Walt Disney. (2014, December 2). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 04:32, December 18, 2014.
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