Mixed media 'balloon girl' in my art journal

I have been attending the right-brain virtual business summit. Being immersed in the world of creative people is rather delightful, but I must admit the whole idea of categorising people as right or left brain, gives me pause.

And as much as I love joining this band of 'right-brainers', I can't help wondering whether I am something of an imposter among them - a right-brain wanna-be. Or is it the opposite, that these creatives are in fact my people and I was never going to be comfortable in a left-brain dominated field? I have spent such a large part of my life utilising logic and analysis quite successfully, so that can't have been a complete misfit, can it?

The answer came from the right brain business summit itself. Like most sensible advice, once I heard it out loud it seems fairly obvious. Melanie Duncan (one of the speakers) said that we should give ourselves permission to be both creative and analytical, and avoid pigeon-holing ourselves.

I think that is the problem with labels. We all love a classification test, whether it is Myers-Briggs personality tests, Cosmopolitan relationship tests or the test to determine which Big Bang Theory character you most resemble. They are fairly irresistible, particularly when you have actual pressing work to do. And of course, they can be helpful in identifying one's strengths and weaknesses, but I think they also run the risk of feeding some of our limiting beliefs. However scientific the tests are, I have a hard time believing that they will all be spot on, all of the time. I would very much like to think that I am a deeply complex being, incapable of being classified. (I think there is a personality type for that.)

In truth, the idea of having one dominant side of the brain is a myth that is now disproved. There is some evidence that better performance comes when both parts of the brain, logical and creative, work together. So far from feeling I have no right to be employing skills from the 'other side' of the brain, I should be embracing them.

If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading. Lao Tzu