Now, I don't mean to say that being wrong is the same thing as being creative. What we do know is, if you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original. If you're not prepared to be wrong. And by the time they get to be adults, most kids have lost that capacity. They have become frightened of being wrong. And we run our companies like this, by the way, we stigmatize mistakes. And we're now running national education systems where mistakes are the worst thing you can make.

Being in your element is not only about aptitude, it's about passion: it is about loving what you do...tapping into your natural energy and your most authentic self.

Research indicates that, as long as we keep using our brains in an active way, we continue to build neural pathways as we get older. This gives us not only the ongoing potential for creative thought, but also an additional incentive for continuing to stretch ourselves.

Creativity is a process more often than it is an event.

Private imaginings may have no outcomes in the world at all. Creativity does. Being creative involves doing something.

In a world where lifelong employment in the same job is a thing of the past, creativity is not a luxury. It is essential for personal security and fulfillment.

The combination of creative energies and the need to perform at the highest level to keep up with peers leads to an otherwise unattainable commitment to excellence.