Restore what was neglected
Creativity includes restoring what has fallen into ruin or disuse.
Black Storytellers Alliance / Nguzo Saba
Day Six • Sixth Principle
CREATIVITYKUUMBA
To always do as much as we can, in the way that we can, in order to leave our community more beneficial than we inherited it.
CREATIVITYRESTORATIONRENEWALGENERATIONS
Kuumba / 01
The principle
Create so the community becomes better.
Kuumba is a commitment to being creative within the context of the national community vocation of restoring our people to their traditional greatness and leaving our community more beneficial than we inherited it.
Kuumba has both a social and spiritual dimension. It is deeply rooted in the social and sacred teachings of African societies. “Created” does not simply imply or mean “made out of nothing,” because the principles of Kwanzaa are grounded in African continental roots.
Our creativity is a creative restoration and renewal in both the Ancient Egyptian (Kemetic) and African American Nile Valley sense of practice. It is a restoring of that which was in ruins or disuse while simultaneously seeking to make it more beautiful and beneficial than before.
Core thought
Leave what you inherit more beautiful and beneficial than it was before.
Make it more beneficial
Restoration is joined to improvement and renewed usefulness.
Build across generations
Creative work becomes a key component of generational responsibility.
Kuumba / 02
The deeper practice
Progressive perfection.
Kuumba connects creativity to the Kawaida concept of progressive perfection: our ability and obligation to strive always to leave what we inherit more beautiful and beneficial than it was before.
Receive a legacy
Legacy may include community, family business, church, culture, or another inheritance.
Enrich what exists
Build on and enrich the legacy that stood before you.
Pass forward more
Generational responsibility means leaving something more beautiful and beneficial for those who follow.
Kuumba / 03
Cultural foundation
Build for eternity.
Kuumba reminds us of the Ancient Egyptian (Kemetic) teaching presented here that if we wish to live for eternity, we must build for eternity by doing great works and serving our communities in real, sustainable, and meaningful ways socially and morally.
Create with lasting value
Some will build great works that endure beyond a lifetime.
Everyone can serve
All of us cannot and will not build great works, but we all can serve.
Works keep names alive
A people called forth by its works will not die, for their names will be raised because of it as a by-product of servanthood to the people.
Kuumba / 04
Living the principle
Creativity is service.
Kuumba makes creativity a communal responsibility: use what you have to improve what you inherited.
Bring neglected traditions, spaces, and practices back into meaningful use.
Make something beautiful, useful, and rooted in community.
Use creativity in socially and morally meaningful ways that benefit the people.