Csikszentmihalyi

Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi pronounced  CHEEK-sent-me-hi-ee  is a Hungarian psychology professor, who emigrated to the United States. He is noted for his work in the study of happiness and creativity. Csikszentmihalyi says the creative process normally takes five steps (Creativity, 1996, p.79):

1. Preparation - becoming immersed in problematic issues that are interesting and arouses curiosity.
2. Incubation - ideas churn around below the threshold of consciousness.
3. Insight - the "Aha!" moment when the puzzle starts to fall together.
4. Evaluation - deciding if the insight is valuable and worth pursuing.
5. Elaboration - translating the insight into its final work.

Spontaneity takes practice Csikszentmihalyi says that it typically takes someone 10 years of acquiring technical knowledge by immersing themselves in a discipline before they create anything significant.