I have learned that my curiosity can lead to some interesting and often very rewarding places if I am wise enough to listen and follow it. As necessity is the mother of invention, I think that curiosity might be the mother of creativity. It is at least a very close relative.
Let me expound upon that thought with a specific example. We have about 50 stuffed, animated figures for the Christmas holiday. They were all lined up in 3 rows by the fireplace. Mysteriously, one of them, Santa Homer Simpson, made his way across the room to a small table. This table also happened to hold a plasma ball that my daughter received as a gift for her birthday. One day when I was coming down the stairs, I saw Homer facing the plasma ball and that is when I had a lightbulb (or was it a plasma bulb?) moment.