How to Find Your Creative Calling (Using Science & Strategy)

Discover how to find your creative calling with science-backed strategies from Chase Jarvis. Learn why everyone is creative and how to build a daily practice.

Award-winning photographer and entrepreneur Chase Jarvis built a career shooting campaigns for Nike, Apple, and Red Bull. But his most provocative idea has nothing to do with cameras: everyone is creative, and most people have been talked out of believing it. His bestselling book Creative Calling lays out a framework for reclaiming that creative identity and using it to design a more fulfilling life.

This article breaks down Jarvis’s core insights, backs them with research, and gives you actionable steps to find and follow your own creative calling.

What Is a Creative Calling?

A creative calling is the inner pull toward meaningful creative expression—the intuitive sense that you’re meant to create something. Chase Jarvis defines it as the intersection of your unique talents, passions, and the impact you want to have on the world. A creative calling isn’t limited to traditional arts like painting or music; it can show up in entrepreneurship, problem-solving, cooking, or any domain where you bring original thinking to life.

The problem? Most people never pursue theirs. Not because they lack talent, but because somewhere along the way, they stopped believing they were creative at all.

Why You Stopped Believing You’re Creative

Chase Jarvis traces this problem to a specific pattern: labeling. From a young age, teachers, parents, and coaches sort children into categories—“the creative one,” “the athlete,” “the math kid.” These labels are well-intentioned, but they calcify into identity.

Jarvis lived this firsthand. In second grade, he made his first film with neighborhood friends—he even sold candy at the premiere. But he was also a gifted athlete, and his teacher recommended his parents steer him toward sports. He followed that path for years, earned a soccer scholarship, and was drafted by the Seattle Sounders B-team. He also made the Olympic development team.¹ But a devastating knee injury and a growing sense that the soccer world “didn’t really light me up” forced a reckoning.

After inheriting cameras from his grandfather, Jarvis rediscovered the creative passion that had been pushed aside for over a decade. That experience became the foundation of his philosophy: the labels we accept in childhood shape our adult identity far more than our actual abilities do.

The labels we accept in childhood shape our adult identity far more than our actual abilities do.

The Science Behind the Label Problem

This isn’t just Jarvis’s personal observation. Psychologist Carol Dweck’s research on mindset shows that fixed labels—“you’re creative” or “you’re not creative”—create self-fulfilling prophecies. When people adopt a fixed mindset about creativity, they avoid the stretch experiences that build creative skill. They interpret struggle as proof they “don’t have it” rather than as a normal part of the learning process.²

The fix isn’t positive affirmation. It’s a shift from identity labels to process praise. Instead of “I’m not a creative person,” try: “I haven’t built a creative practice yet.”

Action Step: Write down three labels you received as a child (“the responsible one,” “not artistic,” “the quiet one”). For each, ask: “Is this still true, or did I just stop questioning it?” This simple exercise can loosen the grip of decades-old assumptions.

Everyone Is Creative (and the Research Proves It)

Jarvis’s central claim—“Creativity is your birthright”—sounds like motivational fluff until you look at the neuroscience.

Research published in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience shows that spontaneous fluctuations in neuronal activity across the cerebral cortex enable a semi-random, unconscious search for novel solutions. This is a universal brain mechanism present in all humans, not a special gift reserved for artists.³

The American Psychological Association’s research review on creativity confirms that creative thinking involves the whole brain—debunking the “right-brain” myth—and operates through dynamic interactions between the default mode network (imagination and daydreaming) and the executive control network (focus and evaluation).⁴

Your brain is wired for creativity. The barriers are environmental and habitual, not biological.

The NASA Study That Changed Everything

In the 1960s, Dr. George Land and Dr. Beth Jarman developed a divergent thinking test for NASA to identify the most innovative engineers. Then they gave the same test to 1,600 children and followed them over a decade.⁵

The results were staggering:

Land’s explanation: schools teach children to generate ideas and judge them simultaneously. He compared it to “driving a car with one foot on the accelerator and one on the brake.” Children learn to censor ideas before they’re fully formed, and over time, they stop generating bold, original thoughts altogether.

Land’s conclusion: “What we are really doing is teaching children to not be creative.”⁶

98% of five-year-olds scored at genius level for creative thinking. By adulthood, only 2% did.

The takeaway isn’t depressing—it’s liberating. Non-creative behavior is learned, which means it can be unlearned.

Chase Jarvis’s Definition of Creativity (and Why It Matters)

Jarvis defines creativity this way: taking two or more things that didn’t previously go together and combining them in a new and useful way.

This definition is deliberately broad. Creativity isn’t reserved for galleries and concert halls. Choosing rosemary instead of basil for tonight’s dinner is creative. Restructuring a meeting agenda to solve a team conflict is creative. Deciding to walk a different route home and noticing something you’ve never seen is creative.

Research supports this expansive view. The Four C Model of Creativity, developed by psychologists James Kaufman and Ronald Beghetto, maps creativity across four levels:⁷

• Mini-C: Personal insights and interpretations (“I just realized why that approach wasn’t working”)
• Little-C: Everyday creativity (cooking, decorating, problem-solving at work)
• Pro-C: Professional-level creative expertise
• Big-C: Legendary, field-changing innovation

Most people fixate on Big-C creativity and conclude they don’t qualify. But Mini-C and Little-C creativity happen dozens of times a day. Recognizing them is the first step toward building a creative identity.

Action Step: For one week, keep a “Creative Choices Log.” At the end of each day, write down three decisions where you combined ideas, solved a problem in a new way, or chose something different from your default. You’ll be surprised how creative your ordinary life already is.

The IDEA Framework: 4 Steps to Find Your Creative Calling

In Creative Calling, Jarvis outlines a four-step framework called IDEA. Here’s how to apply each step:

Step 1: Imagine

Envision what you want to create without judgment or limitation. Jarvis calls this listening to your “creative calling”—the quiet inner signal pointing toward what matters to you.

The practical challenge: most people have spent so long ignoring their intuition that they can’t hear it anymore. Jarvis suggests starting with what you were drawn to as a child, before the labels took hold.

How to do it:

1. Set a timer for 10 minutes. Write freely about what you’d create if money, time, and other people’s opinions were irrelevant.
2. Notice which ideas give you energy (even nervous energy) versus which feel obligatory.
3. Look for patterns across multiple sessions. Your creative calling often hides in recurring themes.

Pro Tip: Jarvis emphasizes that your intuition—“that soft voice we’ve been taught to ignore”—is your most powerful creative asset. The goal isn’t to find the “right” answer. It’s to reconnect with the signal.

Step 2: Design

Build a system that supports your creative vision. Ambition without structure is just daydreaming.

This means scheduling dedicated “studio time” (even 15 minutes counts), removing friction from your creative process, and designing your environment to support the work.

How to do it:

1. Block 15-30 minutes of daily creative time on your calendar. Treat it like a meeting you can’t cancel.
2. Prepare your materials the night before (open the document, set out the sketchbook, queue the playlist).
3. Tell one person about your creative project. Social accountability increases follow-through.

Step 3: Execute

Take consistent action, especially when you don’t feel inspired. Jarvis puts it bluntly: “You’ve got to do the verb to become the noun.” You don’t wait to feel like a writer before you write. You write, and over time, you become a writer.

This is where most people stall. They wait for motivation, for the perfect idea, for permission. Jarvis’s counter: “Creators create. Action is identity. You become what you do.”

How to do it:

1. Use the Two-Minute Start: commit to just 2 minutes of creative work. Once you start, momentum usually carries you further.
2. Separate brainstorming from editing. Generate ideas first (divergent thinking), then evaluate them later (convergent thinking). This directly addresses Land’s “accelerator and brake” problem.
3. Track your streak. Research by Dr. Phillippa Lally at University College London found that it takes an average of 66 days for a new behavior to become automatic—and missing a single day didn’t derail progress.⁸ Consistency matters more than perfection.

You don’t wait to feel like a writer before you write. You write, and over time, you become a writer.

Step 4: Amplify

Share your work and find your creative community. Jarvis calls this finding your “tribe,” and research confirms it matters.

A study published in PMC found that perceived social support causes higher creativity—not just correlates with it. Participants who felt socially supported showed significantly higher divergent thinking scores and greater creative self-efficacy.⁹

How to do it:

1. Share one piece of creative work this week, even if it’s unfinished. Post a sketch, read a paragraph aloud to a friend, or share a recipe you improvised.
2. Join a creative group (online or local) where the norm is encouragement, not critique. Jarvis’s advice: “A-gamers work with A-gamers. The best way to level up your own game is to level up the team around you.”
3. Ask for specific feedback, not general approval. “What part resonated with you?” is more useful than “Do you like it?”

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Creativity Is a Habit, Not a Talent

One of Jarvis’s most important reframes: creativity is a practice, not a personality trait. You build it through repetition, not revelation.

The science backs this up powerfully. A study by Conner, DeYoung, and Silvia published in The Journal of Positive Psychology tracked 658 people over 13 days and found that engaging in everyday creative activities—cooking, writing, sketching, playing music—predicted higher well-being and enthusiasm the next day.¹⁰

Even more striking: this created an “upward spiral.” Creative activity on Day 1 boosted well-being on Day 2, which made people more likely to be creative on Day 2, which boosted Day 3, and so on. Small daily actions create outsized results over time.

The researchers found that this benefit wasn’t limited to people who scored high on openness to experience. Everyone who engaged in creative activity got the well-being boost—regardless of whether they considered themselves “creative.”

Action Step: Use the Creativity Compound Effect. Choose one small creative act you can do daily for the next two weeks: sketch for 5 minutes, write three sentences of fiction, cook one meal without a recipe, or rearrange something in your workspace. Set a phone reminder. After 14 days, notice how your relationship with creativity has shifted.

How Creative Agency Builds Over Time

Jarvis’s insight—that embracing creativity gives you a sense of agency over your life—is supported by Self-Determination Theory, one of the most well-supported frameworks in psychology. SDT identifies autonomy (the feeling of genuine control over your actions) as one of three basic psychological needs. When people feel autonomous, they demonstrate greater creative engagement and higher-quality work.¹¹

But here’s the nuance: this doesn’t happen overnight. You don’t cook one adventurous meal and suddenly feel in control of your entire life. Creative agency builds gradually through what researchers call creative self-efficacy—your belief in your own ability to produce creative outcomes.

Each small creative choice (trying a new recipe, solving a problem differently at work, writing a poem) strengthens that belief slightly. Over weeks and months, those micro-choices compound into a fundamentally different relationship with your own potential. Mini-C creativity evolves into Little-C, and for some, eventually into Pro-C.

The key: start noticing the creative choices you’re already making. Awareness precedes growth.

Each small creative choice strengthens your belief in your own ability—and over time, those micro-choices compound into a fundamentally different relationship with your potential.

Characteristics of Creative People

Research identifies several traits that distinguish highly creative individuals—and all of them can be developed:⁴

• Openness to experience: The single strongest personality predictor of creativity. Creative people actively seek novel ideas, perspectives, and sensory experiences.
• Tolerance for ambiguity: Comfort sitting with uncertainty rather than rushing to a “right” answer.
• Willingness to take risks: Not recklessness, but a habit of trying things that might not work.
• Cognitive flexibility: The ability to switch between different perspectives and approaches.
• Childlike curiosity: A genuine interest in how things work and why things are the way they are.
• Persistence through failure: A poll of 143 creativity researchers identified perseverance and resilience as the number one ingredient for creative achievement.²

None of these are fixed traits you either have or don’t. Every one of them is a behavior you can practice.

About Chase Jarvis

Chase Jarvis is an award-winning photographer, director, and entrepreneur. He has created campaigns for Nike, Apple, Microsoft, Google, and Red Bull. His documentary Portrait of a City received an Emmy nomination in 2014.¹² He co-founded CreativeLive in 2010, an online education platform that has served over ten million students learning photography, design, business, and other creative skills.¹³ His book Creative Calling (2019) became a Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, and Publishers Weekly bestseller, with endorsements from Brené Brown and Seth Godin.¹⁴ His latest book, Never Play It Safe, was published in 2024.

Creative Calling Takeaway

Chase Jarvis’s core message is backed by decades of research: creativity isn’t a trait reserved for artists and musicians. It’s a universal human capacity that most people have been conditioned to ignore. Here’s how to reclaim it:

1. Identify your labels. Write down the identity labels you received as a child and question whether they still serve you.
2. Redefine creativity broadly. Start noticing the Mini-C and Little-C creative choices you make every day—from problem-solving at work to improvising dinner.
3. Use the IDEA framework. Imagine what you’d create without constraints, Design a daily system to support it, Execute consistently (even for just 2 minutes), and Amplify by sharing your work and finding your creative community.
4. Build the habit. Choose one small daily creative act and commit to it for 66 days. Research shows the upward spiral of creativity and well-being kicks in quickly.
5. Separate brainstorming from judgment. When generating ideas, turn off your inner critic completely. Evaluate later. This single change addresses the primary reason adults score so much lower on creative thinking tests than children.