The reason telling someone to “think out of the box” is so stupid is because it really means “I hate all your ideas” or “I can’t think out of the box myself, so I need you to.” In any case, it’s lame to say. But I read research from the University of Toronto and Harvard that people who are the really creative people, the ones who can think out of the box, usually have some sort of mental illness in their family history. So now I can stop feeling like I’m a big braggart when I say that I’m very creative. It’s my payoff for a family full of mental problems. But also, I think there are degrees of creativity, and knowing where you fall is really important, because then you know more about what you need to feel fulfilled. We are all creative . The only thing we really have in this world is the ability to craft a life. One day your life will be over, and we are largely unsure what happens next, but during the time we’re alive, we get to choose what we do. We create a life.