Know someone creative who you can't quite understand? David Ogilvy (in Confessions of an Advertising Man) cites research from a study done by Frank Barron about creative people.
Creative people are especially observant, and they value accurate observation (telling themselves the truth) more than other people do.
They often express part-truths, but this they do vividly; the part they express is the generally unrecognized; by displacement of accent and apparent disproportion in statement they seek to point to the usually unobserved.
They see things as other do, but also as others do not.
They are born with greater brain capacity; they have more ability to hold many ideas at once, and to compare more ideas with one another—hence to make a richer synthesis.
They are by constitution more vigorous, and have available to them an exceptional fund of psychic and physical energy.
Their universe is more complex, and in addition they usually lead more complex lives.
They have more contact than most people do with the life of the unconscious—with fantasy, reverie, the world of imagination.