Dilemmas of Creative Children

Hey doc,

What is the POINT of this article?

That the kid who is making a ruckus in the classroom is actually a budding genius! Just wait it out?! Let him bloom?

Put up with all his crap? Don`t whip his ass? Take lip from him?

Are we supposed to dance? And sing...

``Hail to the genius!!!``

Your articles are usually long on quotations and short on originality. This one is no exception. You extract long paragraphs from a few books here and there on a few geniuses, then you slap together a pargraph of intro in the beginning and some lame cockamammy of naseehat at the end and presto, chowk gets another article - ready to be shoved down the collective throat of simple folks like me - crying tears of protest notwithstanding!!!

And do you write your books the same way?

I better check on my Aspirin supply again - and make sure I have a large size bottle handy before I read one of these scary things again!

Dr. Sohail:

Thanks for another thought provoking article.

Highly creative children, like Einstein, will always have dilemmas. They are usually one of a kind in their class and hence lonely. Therefore, they communicate with themselves. It is usually the creative, but not extremely, children who need guidance and direction.

Karl Gauss was so far ahead of not only his class fellows but also his teacher that there were always unpleasant encounters. He would invariably correct whenever his teacher lost track of a mathematical problem. In school, he had developed the solution of a 4th order polynomial equation (Omar Khayyam had given the soultion of a cubic equation).

He used to say about his teacher:

He is a mathematician among poets and a poet among mathematician.

In school, Iqbal had composed the following verse:

Mein jiss kay saath hoo`n ussay hoti nahin shikast
Iqbal meray naam ki taseer dekhna

Mohammad Gill

I believe the children are our are future.Teach them well and let them lead the way. Show them all the beauty they possess inside. Give them a sense of pride to make it easier. Yup that ought to do it.

Re: # 4

Dear Nasah....thanks for your kind and generous words as usual. How do you express your

creative energies? sincerely sohail

Re: # 3
Dear Urstruly....I have no doubt in my mind that you are a creative person. You are being

modest. I am sure you express your energies in many non-traditional ways. What was your

dream as a teenager?

all the best...sohail

Tabeeut apni tanhaa ruh ravi kee
choRa laee mujhay hur carvan say

Sohail sahib -- as usual -- great enlightening piece. thank you.

I was quite naalaique when I was kid, and sadistically mischievious; I think I have potential to be great one day.

Re: # 1
Dear Kulharee....I fully agree with you that `creativity` can be expressed in many ways and

in many forms....from sports...to fine arts...to business....to politics. The point I am trying

to make is that creativity is non-traditional in thinking and lifestyle and becomes a

challenge for traditional families and communities and when traditional families and

communities are challenged they can feel threatened and try to oppress and suppress the

creative process which in unfortunate. Once we are aware of that dilemma we can find

some creative solutions to conflicts and make a win ...win situation for the creative person

as well as the community. sincerely sohail

Dr Sohail Sahib, it appears that your definition of creative is limited only to artists and scientists. What about politicians, social scientists, musicians, and so on? A book that recently came out “Sexus Ploiticus” by two French argues that great politicians tend to be great seducers. So yes, there are all kinds of definitions of creativity and there might be a few exceptions that couldn’t tolerate the confinements of traditional learning, but that in itself does not prove that the traditional learning environments has resulted in suppressing creativity. Does it? I would argue that the definition of ‘creative’ should be expanded to business, commerce, governance, and all other areas as well.