40 Creepy And Cool Things People Created With Their Own Hands

Whether or not you’re a fan of this creepy kind of artwork, you ought to admit that it takes a lot of creativity to come up with something like the pieces on this list. And as with most things in our heads, creativity works in fascinating and mysterious ways, which scientists have tried to delve deep into by using all sorts of methods.

One of these methods was an experiment carried out by an assistant professor of psychology and neuroscience at the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences and an artist, Paul Seli, PhD, as described in a piece for the American Psychological Association (APA). Dr. Seli would purposefully reach the brink of nodding off, about to fall asleep, when he would be awakened by Dormio, a sleep-tracking glove developed by scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. After coming back from the drowsy state, he would note down all the creative ideas that popped into his head during the semilucid moments.

With the help of hypnagogia—the transitional state between wakefulness and sleep—Dr. Seli created a series of paintings based on the ideas he had during his semilucid moments. He also created another series based on creative ideas that came to him during his waking hours.

He then asked his friends to rate both groups of paintings based on how creative they thought the pieces were (without telling them which were based on ideas from the dream-like state or the time he spent being awake). The judging panel deemed the hypnagogia-inspired paintings significantly more creative.

“In dream states, we seem to be able to link things together that we normally wouldn’t connect,” the artist and scientist behind the experiment noted. “It’s like there’s an artist in my brain that I get to know through hypnagogia.”

While creativity is often linked with artwork and crafts, it can be applied in many different areas, both professionally and leisurely. APA points out that on an individual level, creativity can lead to personal fulfillment or be used for therapeutic purposes. Moreover, people seem to take pleasure in creative thoughts, even if they don’t consider themselves exceptionally creative.

Sharing his two cents on the purpose and importance of creativity, Dr. Jonathan Schooler, a professor of psychological and brain sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara, noted that creativity is at the core of innovation. “We rely on innovation for advancing humanity, as well as for pleasure and entertainment,” APA cited him saying. “Creativity underlies so much of what humans value.”

Did you know that based on who it is appointed to and what context it is used in, psychologists who study creativity divide it into two categories?

A study of the creative brain from 2020 explains it this way: “When we think about creativity, the arts often come to mind. Most people would agree that writers, painters, and actors are all creative. This is what psychologists who study the subject refer to as Big-C creativity: publicly-recognizable, professional-level performance. But what about creativity on a smaller scale? This is what researchers refer to as little-c creativity, and it is something that we all possess and express in our daily lives, from inventing new recipes to performing a do-it-yourself project to thinking of clever jokes to entertain the kids.”

If you, too, mainly saw creativity as Big-C—as used by writers, painters, and other professional artists, you shouldn’t overlook the importance of the little-c, as so much of what we do on a daily basis is actually very creative! Even something as seemingly mundane as dressing yourself can be an expression of your creativity.

Having a creative mind is important not only when it comes to artwork—be it professional or not—or dressing yourself; it can also play a significant role at work. As a matter of fact, according to Forbes, as much as 70% of employers considered creative thinking to be the most in-demand skill in 2024. Who says that you can’t show off your creativity using Microsoft Excel?

Whether you use your creativity at work, in your kitchen, getting dressed, using Excel, or painting houses or canvases—it’s important that you keep training your creativity muscle. And, if you feel like you’re lacking inspiration, continue to Bored Panda’s art category next for more impressive pieces made with creative people’s hands.