Quotes: Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer

"[C]reativity follows from positive emotion. The more positive a person's mood on a given day, the more creative thinking he did the next day –– and, to some extent, the day after that –– even taking into account his moods on those later days. This may be due to what psychologists call an incubation effect. Pleasant moods stimulate greater breadth in thinking –– greater cognitive variation –– which can linger and even build over a day or more. Such cognitive variation can lead to new insights at work. In other words, although new ideas might emerge soon after you experience a positive emotion, you might find them popping up much later."

–– Teresa Amabile (b. 1950), American academic and author; and Steven J. Kramer, American independent researcher, writer, and consultant

Source: Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer. The Progress Principle: Using Small Wins to Ignite Joy, Engagement, and Creativity at Work. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press, 2011; p. 52-53. 

via Commonplace Book 2013-2014, 2013, p. 27-28.

Quotes: Walter Bagehot

"No great work has ever been produced except after a long interval of still and musing meditation." 

–– Walter Bagehot (1826-1877), British journalist, essayist, political analyst, and economist  

via: Sketchbook 11, 2010, p. 35

Creativity quotes: James Waddell Alexander

"There are pauses amidst study, and even pauses of seeming idleness, in which a process goes on which may be likened to the digestion of food. In those seasons of repose, the powers are gathering their strength for new efforts; as land which lies fallow recovers itself for tillage." 

– James Waddell Alexander (1804-1859), American Presbyterian minister and professor