Seeing things in the here and now: Exploring mindfulness and creativity with Viviana Capurso

In this article we continue our focus on the relationship between creativity and mindfulness, with an eye to learning and technology (a theme we began in Henriksen & Gruber, 2022, and one that will extend for a few columns) through a conversation with Dr. Vivana Capurso. Dr. Capurso is a scholar who studies the connections between mindfulness and creativity. She recalls having the goal, at a young age, of working in a creative industry. Immediately after graduating from university, with a degree in public relations, she found a job in the advertising industry. but the reality of life in advertising and the stresses of working there made her wonder, “Is this the real life of a creative copywriter in an advertising agency?” This ultimately led her to pursue the study of creativity as a scholar, leading to a doctorate in cognitive neuroscience from Sapienza, University of Rome. Dr. Capurso began meditating over a decade ago, and quickly realized that mindfulness practice could support creativity; thus, this became a primary focus in her research. In particular, she realized that meditation practices allowed one to develop a ‘beginner’s mind,’ something that connected deeply with creativity. Beginner’s mind, a term coined by meditation guru Shunryu Suzuki, refers to the development of the mind’s ability to see everything as if for the first time, purposefully leaving aside judgements and opinions and opening oneself to possibilities that might be ignored otherwise (Suzuki & Dixon, 2010). This beginner’s mind, Dr. Capurso realized, allows us to see the world anew, a process that could be described as ‘making the familiar strange’ (Stouffer & Russell, 2004)—a fundamental step in the creative process. Csikszentmihalyi makes a similar distinction between "recognition” and “perception”—where perception is akin to taking on a “beginners mind” and is the foundation of creativity. As Dr. Capurso began looking into mindfulness and creativity she found that very few academics were studying this connection, though her personal experiences validated her sense that such a connection existed. She therefore focused her doctoral research on examining this relationship, exploring questions such as: What is the link between creativity and mindfulness? What does it mean to be creative? How is creativity manifested in different ways? Her move between disciplines, starting from public relations and advertising/ copywriting, gave her a unique interdisciplinary perspective to inform her educational research. As we have noted in other columns, creativity is often a transdisciplinary way of seeing the world, and creative ideas are seeded through cross-pollination between different disciplines (Mishra et al., 2012), and Dr. Capurso’s career is an example of the value of such cross-pollination. In her Ph.D. program, studying the link between creativity, mindfulness, and well-being, she found herself among psychologists and educators who had different ways of thinking about creativity. As she shared, “ For my colleagues, * Danah Henriksen danah.henriksen@asu.edu