I was reading Kai Nagata’s latest blog post and it gave me pause to think a bit. For those of you who are not aware Nagata was, until recently, a celebrated 24 year old journalist and Quebec City bureau chief for CTV. Nagata shocked his peers by quitting his job effectively closing the door on a promising career with CTV for reasons that are more complex than I can do justice here (check out his blog www.kainagata.com for more info on his decision). Suffice to say he felt he could do more with his life outside of journalism than within.

At any rate Nagata poses a question in his latest post that is worth pondering. He asks:

“How do so many smart, talented, well-meaning people, working together, create something so intellectually flaccid, even morally ambiguous?”

He is asking this of television journalism but it is likely a question most organizations anywhere doing anything could ask of themselves be they businesses, non-profits, churches or even families.

I believe one word can answer the question above – fear. Fear has a tendency to kill every creative impulse. It is ironic given that fear is an instinct designed to keep us alive by alerting us to threat and if we were mere animals we would do well to heed its voice every time. We are not, however, mere animals but human beings and there is a distinction whether we want to acknowledge it or not.

Fear prevents us from taking risks, it prevents us from potentially offending people and yes, it still prevents us from dying, more often artistically and creatively than physically but a death is a death.

Perhaps one of the things that makes us human is the need for us to overcome our fear and risk everything, even our lives, for the sake of what we are endeavoring to create or reveal as the case may be. Nagata should understand this because his career died when he overcame what was likely intense fear – fear of what friends and family would say, fear for the future, etc.

Fear as an animal instinct is a good thing, but fear of creativity, fear of truth – these are not good things and they are the reason that so many groups of people become less than the sum of their parts instead of greater.

To overcome this fear and achieve truth and real creativity a person must overcome their fear and be willing to die. You might think I mean this metaphorically and certainly I do to a great extent but we cannot exclude the possibility of real sacrifice being required for the sake of life, truth and creativity. One need only look to certain historical figures such as Christ, Bonhoeffer, Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and others to recognize the truth in this.

Most people are simply not willing to go that far, either metaphorically or literally. It requires a kind of revelation that few ever have. We (and I include myself in this) are content to satisfy Mazlo’s hierarchy of needs. Give me food, shelter and companionship of one form or another and I am content with my mediocre life.

That being said mediocrity has never changed the world for the better…nor does simply complaining about it’s state. It requires personal, sacrificial action. With such dedication even one person can change the world. It has happened before and will no doubt happen again.