It’s never too late to be creative, according to Landscape Architecture Professor Bill Boon.

Many people think children and a few lucky artists are the only creative people, but Boon said people only think they aren’t creative.

“Attitude is the big difference,” he said. “All of life should be a learning experience.”

A creative person is anyone who takes risks and isn’t afraid to fail, he said. Someone who chooses to step away from the norm and explore uncharted waters will discover new solutions to everyday problems.

“Don’t be afraid to fail,” Boon said. “The world will forget your failures because of just one success,” he said. Sometimes one failure can be more of a learning experience than several successes. It is part of the creative process.

Boon said he failed as an army lieutenant, but it was one of his “most exciting and rewarding times, anyway.” He said he was also fired as an agronomist by a friend. Boon wasn’t in the right field, he said. If his friend hadn’t taken that step, Boon wouldn’t have found out what he really liked doing — teaching.

People just don’t realize how exciting education is, Boon said. This is the only time that minds are open to change and absorb all the information that is being thrown at them, he said.

His advice to teachers is to “make learning fun and exciting — because it is.” Bringing humor into the classroom will inspire, motivate and challenge students to see life as fun and exciting, he said.

Boon’s goal is to teach a class of 10,000 freshmen in Hilton Coliseum. He and other teachers would “perform” for the students and teach them how to develop good study habits, while the cheerleaders dance and the pep band plays in the background. Boon said he would like to arouse as much excitement from students in the classroom as fans have at a basketball game.

The best place to learn about anything — and everything — is in college, he said, because there are a variety of opportunities. Boon encouraged students to take different classes and get involved in various organizations. Doing anything that is unfamiliar and forces interaction with others will develop the creative process, he said.

The key to being creative is to “know as much as there is to know about everything,” Boon said.

One way to provoke creativity is through a class Boon teaches. In Boon’s Design Studies 129 class, Introduction to Creativity, he has challenged students to come to class wearing anything but clothes, sleep in a cardboard box by the Campanile and create a catapult that can launch a balloon at a target, Boon himself, standing 25 feet away.

One day, Boon came to class wearing nothing but rope. He even wore a piece around his head like a crown. When one of his students asked if he was supposed to be a rope, Boon said, “No. I’m a frayed knot.”

Simply adding humor to everyday life will expand creativity, Boon said. Those who laugh have made the connection, because they have a knowledge to base it on. He said those who don’t laugh don’t understand because they didn’t make the connection.

He also said students should, “rebel against the stuff you can look up in the encyclopedia … and keep your mind clear.”

Adults emit creative theta waves only once a day. But, Boon said, they can take advantage of this release in just the same ways children take advantage of it. Boon said people should keep a pad of paper and a pencil by their beds and write down anything that comes to mind just before they fall asleep — when the creative juices are flowing most.

Exercising creativity has its advantages in life, Boon said.

Humans use their entire nervous and muscle systems to think. People who expand these systems through creativity will live a healthier lifestyle and can avoid diseases such as Alzheimer’s and dementia as they get older.

Creative spirit does increase with age, he said. Boon is living proof — at the age of 64.