Rearing Monarchs #17:

Dominion and Creativity, part 1
Unification Thoughts, September 2022

Welcome back
In case you’re joining us for the first time, I’d invite you to read about the purpose and focus of this Rearing Monarchs series, of which this article is the 17^th.¹

Where we left off and where we’re going

Last time, we’d started looking into the development of the third major area of a child’s education: their capacity to achieve “dominion”, i.e., competence and even excellence in a field where their gift lies.²

We’d started by explaining three areas of training that provide the foundation for their development and ultimate accomplishment (see the previous article). This time, we will look specifically at the function of creativity in their achievement of dominion.³

But first, one observation

I've sometimes noticed ability and creativity in our young people for different things—for arts, music, entrepreneurship, psychology, sports, education, etc. However, it sometimes seems to me that they don’t have a clear understanding and vision of how to develop or apply their abilities to make the greatest contribution and impact.

If through caring counsel, reflection and earnest prayer (their own and their elders), they sense their destiny in time, they can choose some field and prepare to acquire the skills they’ll need to succeed in it. This study of skills and techniques corresponds to what UT calls “technical education”. To put it in the terms of Godism, this training can help them fulfill their capacity for dominion.

UT has some important practical guidance that could help us better guide our young ones, so that’s what I’d like to present in this and succeeding articles. The areas I’d like to touch on are: the original standard of creativity, education’s role, the starting point of creativity, the motivation and purpose of creativity, the creator's mindset and the creator's individuality. Here, we'll start with where creativity comes from, what education’s role is, and the starting point of creativity.

The Origin of Creativity

In our article a year ago, we’d explained the original creative process. Without repeating that entire explanation, the short version is that a clear and powerful purpose arose within God’s heart and so the universe was first conceived and then secondly, the universe began to be created. This second part of the creative process is known to have started with the Big Bang about 14 billion years ago. Here’s the figure from that article which summarizes the process:

Delving further into the process of conceiving an idea, UT explains that the purpose that arises in the heart drives mental creative activity. This activity is an interaction between the reasoning (subject) part of the mind and its object counterpart. Reasoning is enabled by intellect, emotion and will; the object part contains what reason works with: concepts, laws, and mathematical principles. The interaction produces first an idea, and also a corresponding plan for building out this idea. That process looks like this:

The design process is outlined in this small example:

“Once the Purpose for creating something—such as a bird—is formed by Heart… God thinks… ‘How can I realize the idea of a bird? What color should it be? What should the shape and structure of the feathers be like? How should the bones and muscles be constructed?’ Next, He makes a specific plan for creating the bird. Seeing the plan, He feels with His emotion, ‘It is not good,’ or ‘It is fine.’ If the plan is unsatisfactory, He corrects it. Then He decides, with His will, to realize the plan…”

• Explaining UT, p. 35

Thinking is the function of intellect; feeling is the function of emotion; decision is the function of will. They work together to conceive an idea and then a plan to realize it. Finally, with this plan in mind, materials are gathered and arranged until the idea is finally manifested. The completed process is represented like this:

Considering this creative process, it should become apparent why the three areas of education mentioned in the previous article are essential during a child’s growth. Intellectual education enriches a child’s creative imagination with wider ranges of possibility. UT puts it this way:

“(The 1st stage) refers to one’s ability to form a logos, or to construct a plan. In order to develop a logos, one must acquire a great deal of knowledge through intellectual education…. The more knowledge (information) one obtains, the richer and deeper one’s ideas become.”

• New Essentials of UT, p. 261–2

Technical education provides training in the practical skills they’d need to bring a fine idea to fruition:

“(The 2nd stage) refers to one’s ability … to substantiate ideas through the use of tools and materials… in other words, the development of skills… Here, technical education is required.”

• New Essentials of UT, p. 261–2

Physical education of course supports the health and well-being they’ll depend on throughout their life.

One other quick example that I have very direct experience of—along with some intense visceral and unforgettable memories—was the Good Go fishing boats that Father Moon designed and had built for tuna-fishing off the Grand Banks in Massachusetts. His overall purpose was to solve hunger in the world and one important part of this much greater plan was to create a superior boat for catching tuna and training youth; and so the Good Go fishing boats were conceived, created and refined. They remain in my memory as sea-going things of purpose and beauty.⁵

Education’s role in creativity

Creativity is an essential part of dominion, so let’s start by looking at the role that creativity plays in attaining it. UT explains:

“…the purpose of an education of dominion is to become well-versed in the various methods of developing one’s creativity. Creativity is inborn; everyone is naturally endowed with a creative potentiality. An education of dominion, however, is necessary in order to actually manifest it.”

• New Essentials of UT, p. 261

This is a very important position for a parent and grandparent to understand: that everyone possesses creative potential!⁶ It provides parents and grandparents with the extraordinary certainty that their own child has inborn creative potential and that—if they can only help the child identify it—they can pursue the most appropriate educational path.

A mind-altering understanding

For me, as a student of creative arts for nine years in high school and college, this next perspective of UT altered my understanding of the nature of creativity. Like my peers, I held the common notion that creativity was most essentially about self-expression. The techniques and skills we tried to master were meant to facilitate that. Decades later, based on personal observation, I suspect that idea still prevails among many of our young adults. But shortly after graduation, I found Godism and it offered this invaluable insight to me:

“In its original meaning, creativity must be based on love. This means that, in order to control the natural world, science must be conducted on the basis of values. To date, however, values have been disregarded in the development of the sciences.”

• Essentials of UT, p. 26

And another:

“Human creativity is what God gave to human beings in accordance with the law of resemblance. Originally, human beings should have inherited God’s creativity (DP , 43, 67, 167), and human creativity should have resembled God’s creativity completely.”

• New Essentials of UT, p. 34

Reflecting on the preceding diagrams of the creative process, please note that it all begins in the heart—because that’s where desire and purpose originate. It’s the heart that must drive original creativity. UT puts it this way:

“God’s creation was neither accidental nor spontaneous. It was accomplished based on an irrepressible, inevitable motive with a clear and purposeful intention. This may be called the theory of creation motivated by Heart or, simply, the Heart Motivation Theory.”

• New Essentials of UT, p. 33

If our young ones could learn to practice their creativity in this manner, we can project how they’d gradually nurture the habit of intentionally, generously approaching whatever they’d create. In response to their creative impulse, they’d carefully work out their ideas, thinking earnestly to imagine something beautiful and fine. And then they’d build with care, effort and sincerity, to produce things of real value. And it wouldn’t be just for self-expression, but for the enjoyment of others, just as it was in the Original creative process; this kind of expansive and generous heart would be expressed in all areas of human creativity and dominion.

Conclusion

To recap then, our children’s and grandchildren’s creativity is a divine gift. Humanity possesses it to such a degree that it distinguishes us from other created things and places them in our hands. It’s not to be abused nor taken lightly. It warrants deep reflection:

“Then, why did God want to give His creativity to human beings? It was in order to bless human beings as the lords of creation (DP , 78), and to give to them the qualification to enjoy dominion over all things (DP , 67, 78). …Original dominion means to utilize things creatively, with a heart of love, in various activities, including cultivation, manufacturing, production, reforming, construction, invention, safekeeping, transportation, storage, artistic activity, and so on. Religious and political activities are also included, since material things and economic concerns are indispensable in these activities as well. New creative ideas, as well as love, are requisites for human beings to deal with things. In other words, God’s creativity is required for the original dominion of things by human beings.”

• New Essentials of UT, p. 34–35

In the next articles, we will continue looking into this beautiful gift of divine creativity. Specifically, we’ll look into Godism’s remarkable insights on the original purpose behind creativity and how it can elevate our children’s and grandchildrens’ understanding and practice.

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