Are You a Romantic?

If someone asked you if you were a romantic, what would you say? Okay, now if someone asked if you were a Romantic, what would you answer?

I've never really thought of myself as a Romantic. And no, we're not talking about Cupid and hearts and Valentine's Day, although that's all fine and good it that's your sort of thing.

So a few months ago, I probably would have answered no to both of those questions. Or at least the second one, for sure. But I think I've rethought my position since then.

In case you don't remember from your high school history or English literature class, Romanticism was a movement that circulated during the 1800's in America and Western Europe. It affected nearly all areas of art, including literature, visual art, music, and dance. It was largely a reaction against the Scientific Revolution, rationalism, and rapid industrialization of the time.

The Romantics believed that creativity was more important than intelligence, spontaneity was more important than planning, emotion was more important than mind, and nature was more important than industrialization.

And these few things are what made me disagree with them.

I will be the first to admit: I am a very logical person. I like to think out how to solve problems in a logical way, I analyze (and sometimes over-analyze) everything, and I tend to plan things out before I do them. So to insist that something else is more important than the way my brain works sort of instantly turned me away from agreeing with the Romantics.

But I am also a very creative person. All of my hobbies are very expressive ones: music, writing, art, and sometimes I can be rather reflective and sensitive. I do tend to plan out my stories before I write and sketch out my drawings before I paint, but it's still creativity.

I've realized now that I don't entirely disagree with the Romantic movement. I just disagree that one set of ideas is necessarily more important than the (seemingly opposite) set.

I believe in the importance of creativity as well as intelligence, spontaneity as well as planning, emotion as well as mind, and nature as well as industrialization. People, and the world as a whole, needs a balance of both to really be successful.

"There is no conflict between warm emotions and an intelligent, well-trained mind."                 —Walter Raymond Spalding, Music: An Art and a Language