Here's a graph I'm pretty sure is correct. Have you noticed how people get creative when things are bad? Try and observe it.

Look at music. The best songs are written on a broken heart, or by people with serious drug problems. Or both. I'm a big fan of Amy Winehouse. Her songs were about tough times with lovers and drugs – that made up for some of the best music made this century. Alanis Morissete is another example. Her album "Jagged Little Pill" was a huge hit in the 90's - I still know most of the lyrics by heart. You can tell she was having a lot of guy trouble in those days. Her music wasn't as successful after she found herself on a trip to India and became more centered, I would argue.

The best Brazilian music ever created, in my opinion, was composed during the military dictatorship in the 70's. It talked about freedom and fighting the system. There was never again such a magical span of time in Brazilian music.

Which brings me to Brazil vs Germany. The infamous World Cup semifinal that happened past Tuesday. Brazil lost 7-1, we took 5 goals in 25 minutes. That’s something no Brazilian will ever forget. In part because of the jokes and memes that flooded the internet – most of which were made by Brazilians.

Brazil? Nah my brother. I'm from Ghana...

Yeah, it was pretty shameful.

The jokes were coming up as the game progressed. The worse the score got, the funnier the jokes. Some of them were extremely insightful; others, a beautiful display of lateral thinking. For me, being Brazilian, the humor is bittersweet - but I have to confess the laughter kept the tears away.

Here are some of the most creative examples I found, by suffering Brazilians and otherwise:

Someone uploaded the match to a porn website

Memes on Mashable

Memes on the Huffington Post

The big question, though, is "can we be as creative in quiet times?" Do we, as humans, really need something bad happening to get the best creativity out of our heads? I tend to think so. I think the graph is correct. But if we look at it from another perspective, we can use this in our favor.

So the better question is "can we emulate bad situations to force our brain into a more creative space?" We can. I'll write more about this in future articles.

Have you ever seen creativity flourish amidst chaos? Do you know any examples? Tell us in the comments. Let’s discuss. Get your friends involved, share this article.

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