The Skool of Creativity (SoC) has opened its doors to everyone. So whenever you see the lightbulb and the sock, you know there’ creativity afoot!
You can find the very first SoC lesson right here on Phinkit:
Things Aren’t Always as They Seem.
In fact, Creative Encounters helped to found Phinkit. It’s a creativity based social business site and you’ll find much more from me (Simon Jack) on there. Just click the logo beneath to be taken there.
I’ve just released a free creative thinking course to the world. Yeeeha!
>>Creative Thinking Essentials<<
Oh so you don’t quite share my excitement?
Well perhaps if I explain why you need creativity?
There’s so much information out there, with so many supposed experts and ‘gurus’ pedalling their own brand of success secrets. Yikes- what a recipe for a headache! Then there’s the danger of going round and round in circles, chasing new advice and the ‘next big thing’. Fine to keep abreast, but too much reliance will ultimately cause you to lose focus and stall.
But once you’ve really got to grips with creativity, you won’t need anything else! You will become your own business guru and begin to make wonderfully creative decisions that drive real progress. Why trust an unknown when you know you can do it your way!?
Excited now??!
This free course is the baby sister of the full course ‘Discover Your Creative Genius‘. But it still packs a punch, with 3 short and sharp modules that are going to change the way you think forever. Here’s a run-down:
1. Kick the Habit
Break routine to invigorate your creativity. Simply question why you’re doing something that same old way. It’s either that or staying stuck in a rut of alternative ignorance.
2. Method in the Madness
Even the silliest ideas have great potential. Give yourself freedom to blurt out even your most absurd ideas then rationalise them by extracting useful concepts.
3. I Did it My Way
If it ain’t broke, you can still fix it! Don’t just accept solutions because they are the only ones available. Design your own! Uncover your frustrations and reinvent ideas that truly meet your needs.
Now get out there, and surprise yourself with what you can achieve!
What’s the most productive and fun way to come up with the best ideas from a brainstorming session?
Ideas Poker of course!
Ideas Poker works on the basis that truly great ideas form when the best bits of individual ideas are combined. Essentially, you can harness the entire group’s intelligence rather than rely on solo efforts to come up with the goods.
Here’s how to play…
1. In a group, brainstorm ideas for a particular challenge, with each idea written down on a separate index card. You then collect all ideas in a pack and each player is dealt 2 cards. Then similar to the way you’d play Texas Hold Em, you play 3 rounds, each time with a card from the pack being dealt into the middle.
2. During each round, players have to try and find ways of connecting the ideas or elements of ideas to form a new idea. So as the 3 rounds progress, there become more options for new connections.
3. Once the 3 rounds are over, you can score the game based on the ‘hands’ people have managed to invent. Each player will describe which idea cards they have used to connect their new idea together.
The scoring system is based the following poker hands. This rewards the players’ ability to make multiple new connections.
Note: Make sure you capture all ideas. Even though you may not get a winning hand through the number of connections, you may still come up with some great ideas in the process.
If you play Ideas Poker, let me know how you get on for heaven’s sake! 
Why not check out more great creativity games now!?
How great would it be to think like a genius?
Hmm, but just ponder that for a second…
I already have enough to do without having to solve advanced maths problems, recite obscure historical facts and I have absolutely no intention of appearing on Mastermind any time soon. Not to mention my strong desire to avoid being branded as a mighty smart-arse and all of a sudden having to hang out with nerds.
I don’t know about you, but that’s definitely not for me!
But what if you could tap into a part of you that makes you think more effectively and also have more fun? That’s your creative genius. That’s what makes you see beyond the obvious, wow people with your on the spot insights and surprise yourself with your brilliant ideas.
Yes please, I’ll have some of that!
Sounds tough? Nonsense! I reckon you can discover it quite easily… with no more than a positive attitude and a little bit of guidance.
So here are 10 principles behind discovering your creative genius:
1- Kick the Habit
Break routine to invigorate your creativity. Simply question why you’re doing something that same old way. It’s either that or staying stuck in a rut of alternative ignorance.
2- Kill Your Internal Censor
Your internal censor is keeping you on the straight and narrow. Great. The trouble is it can be health and safety for the brain gone mad! So subdue your censor, be a little risque and free your creative voice.
3- You’ve Been Reframed
Seek new meaning in your challenges. Quite simply, the more ways you find of expressing something, the more options you will have to start creating with.
4- Method in the Madness
Even the silliest ideas have great potential. Give yourself freedom to blurt out even your most absurd ideas then rationalise them by extracting useful concepts.
5- I Did it My Way
If it ain’t broke, you can still fix it! Don’t just accept solutions because they are the only ones available. Design your own! Uncover your frustrations and reinvent ideas that truly meet your needs.
6- Preconception is Mental Contraception
If assumptions always stayed the same, where would change and progress come from?! Destroy rigid thinking structures by busting your assumptions and fertilise your mind ready to re-create from within.
7- One Plus One Gives One
Why do all the hard work to create from scratch when there are ready-formed ideas that you can splice together to create even greater value?! Look to combine ideas from different fields for unexpected and exciting new creations.
8- Use the Force
Sometimes breaking out of your existing frame of reference can be a beast. To avoid mulling over the same old thoughts, go abstract and use offbeat metaphors and random stimulation to spur new thought paths.
9- Fun and Mental is Fundamental
If it’s funny, it’s likely to be the start of something beautifully creative. Learn a few comedy techniques to create provocative arrangements then just see where this leads your thinking.
10- A Win-Whinge Situation
Idea evaluation is your chance to show your thinking superiority right? Wrong!! Critical thinking can kill creativity, so make sure the two are done separately. Also learn to let your subconscious be your guide- whilst you chill out, your subconscious is beavering away at a winning solution. How sweet is that deal?!
Ok, interesting, but not quite doing it for you in the genius stakes? Well come on, it’s not that easy. Fortunately I have put together a brilliant online course (ahem, shameless self promotion) to take you through these 10 steps and really get to grips with the various techniques.
Find out more and enroll here: Discover Your Creative Genius.
In fact, I’m so confident it’s going to make a superb creative thinker of you, I’ve even put a money back guarantee on it!
If you want to just dip your toes in, you can enroll in Creative Thinking Essentials absolutely free!
What’s more, I’ll be on hand if your creative genius is shy and needs a little initial hand-holding. Even if your creative genius is bold and wants to do a bit of showboating, I’ll be there waiting with the ego massage oil!
Yikes, the Creative Encounters blog has been a bit quiet lately. Hmm perhaps just overwintering, ready to be reborn in the spring.
Woah deep.
But it’s back. And with many exciting things going on. There’s loads of juicy content waiting in the wings.
The Caption Competition has sprung back into life and is better than ever now there’s a real prize!
There’s also now the online course: Discover Your Creative Genius, which promises to give anyone the ability to come up with better ideas. Big claim but I’m confident!
Plus I’m involved in an exciting new ‘social media’ project- Phinkit. Finally, a site to put personality into my online business interactions without being judged on my ‘professionalism’ or the number of people I have collected!
Gotta rush now.. lots to do, but see you again very soon!
Simon
What's the word on the street?!
Today we’re changing the scales to make a regular situation seem funny and harnessing new insights for creative ideas on the Funny Business challenge of ‘making training more memorable’.
A classic example of changing the scales comes from the sitcom Red Dwarf in the episode ‘Backwards’. Rimmer is administering a Starbug driving test for Kryten and he begins with the theory…
Rimmer: You’re travelling at half the speed of light. What is the stopping distance?
Kryton: 4 years, 3 months.
Rimmer: And the thinking time?
Kryton: A fortnight.
Here the classic stopping distances question in car driving examinations has been blown way out of proportion for hilarious effect.
Let’s have a go…
How about a 1 week intensive course on importance of time management? This time might be better spent by providing easily digestible short skills sessions on a regular basis. This will ensure skills are constantly reaffirmed and improved.
Imagine hiring a conference centre complete with dazzling visual presentations on huge screens and celebrity guest speakers- but only for the purposes of training a tiny group. It would be completely over the top. But bringing it back to reality, people will forget if no effort is put in to providing them with an experience. So make people feel like superstars and worth the effort, no matter how many in attendance.
There’s more Funny Business just around the corner…
Overstatement is a form of exaggeration, only more specifically related to an individual’s response.
This is how overstatement works:
- Take a situation, ideally one that’s loaded with a bit of tension.
- Find the logical response. What would you normally expect to happen?
- Do the opposite. Make the response unexpected and irrational.
- Exaggerate to make the response wildly inappropriate.
Here are a few examples of wildly inappropriate responses:
- Pulled over for speeding. Apologise by offering the policeman a beer.
- Having marital problems. Hire a stunt double to sub in for heated arguments with the misses.
- Providing pole vaulting classes for prison inmates.
So let’s apply this technique to our Funny Business challenge of ‘making training more memorable’ and see what creative solutions can be extracted…
- Instead of feedback forms, participants could hold up Olympic-judge-style scorecards or maybe each participant has a Britain’s Got Talent style buzzer and when 3 crosses light up the trainer has to change the act to be more entertaining. Take this further and the trainer could be wired up to an electric shock system and they get a small jolt if they are not inspiring. Combining these ideas could lead to the following creative solution…. People are given colour coded place cards that they can flip over when they are confused. The trainer would immediately gain feedback and be able to instruct the group and particular individuals with greater effect. This would provide a means of giving ongoing feedback rather than just at the end when nothing can be done about it.
- Why manually split the group into teams for break-out sessions when you could instate team captains to pick ‘players’ in turn? Reminiscent of football practice at school, inevitably, those with the weakest skills will be picked last (oh the painful memories). However, turning this into a creative solution, you could run an exercise where you assign certain people a persona with a prominent character flaw and captains have to pick their teams to best effect from the selection of ‘skills’ on offer e.g. ‘know it all’, ‘nitpicker’, ‘bully’, ‘apathetic’, ‘overbearing’, ‘follower’. This would demonstrate how different personas can affect group dynamics and how to overcome their ill effects. It would be a great exercise for soft skills training e.g. facilitation, management and leadership styles.
So that’s overstatement. There will be more Funny Business very soon…
Who remembers the Ministry of Silly Walks? If you’re not familiar with this Monty Python classic, you must watch!
Ordinarily the ministry of silly walks would be a totally absurd government department (not wanting to open up a can of worms by using government and absurd in the same sentence!). But in this sequence, no matter how much legs jangle, protrude and contort, everyone maintains a straight face and a serious business discussion ensues. It’s a great example of an understated reaction to a silly, silly situation.
The blueprint is fairly simple:
- Take a common situation and exaggerate it to a level of absurdity.
- Identify what the logical response would be in that situation.
- Make the actual reaction as close to the opposite of logical as possible.
- Find a way of turning this reaction into a positive solution.
So let’s try it with our Funny Business challenge of ‘making training more memorable’…
Example 1= Imagine people bored and staring out of a window, only to look directly into another boring training session! A possible positive solution is to run training courses in parallel and arrange for people to swap between different sessions during the day to keep energy and enthusiasm up.
Example 2= Adolescent boys not paying any attention whatsoever even though a very sexy, scantily clad woman is taking the class. I guess even the best courses can be made dull if the content isn’t engaging beneath the surface and the speaker doesn’t have the right sort of pizzazz.
Example 3= A fire breaks out during a health and safety training course! And the trainer’s response: “Please all read your health and safety guide chapter 8 then we’ll learn about the correct emergency response for this situation”. The lesson here is not to be overly pedantic. People crave autonomy and freedom of expression, so enable them with skills and the ability and trust them to use with their intuition when the time is right. Otherwise skills will become very impersonal, be forgotten or at best, be approached with mere compliance.
Next up is understatement’s partner in crime… overstatement.
Today there’s some satirical funny business. With satire, the weapon is irony; pretend to accept reasoning in order to expose the absurdity. And to up the comic ante, you can really exaggerate the defunct aspects.
Here’s the blueprint:
- Find an aspect of your challenge that you disagree with or think is obsolete. There may even be a handy negative stereotype to work with.
- Reframe that negative aspect so that it becomes the main focus of an absurd solution.
- Exaggerate and raise the humour stakes!
- Extract key concepts in order to rework this provocative springboard into a practical creative solution.
Let’s apply satire to our funny business challenge of ‘making training more memorable’.
Example 1: Training is ineffective at remedying stubborn behaviours.
So provide training skills in all the undesirable management skills that we all know so well e.g. blame, mistrust, jargon, ego, snideness. You can just imagine the agenda!
The truth here is sometimes people will continue their ingrained behaviours unless the need to change is pointed out. Therefore, training might not only teach necessary skills but the attitudes required in order to ensure they are successfully implemented.
Example 2: Training is an inconvenience.
You’ve organised training on the most fascinating subject that is guaranteed to change people’s lives. But no-one is there as you haven’t provided lunch! Maybe the answer is to get a consensus on when and where people would like training instead of only giving one option. This might open up the possibility of having broader and more inspiring training out of business hours if enough people want to commit.
Example 3: Training sends people to sleep!
But at your training event you’re sorted as you’ve provided free pillows and sleeping masks for each participant! Teaching practical skills is always going to have an element of mundane. The answer is to ensure you inject regular life into the session- a bit of levity every 6-10 minutes works wonders for maintaining invigoration levels.
Next in the Funny Business series it’s the turn of understatement…
Continuing with the Funny Business, we’re looking at how comedy can lead to creativity at work. Previously we’ve explored reversal and role reversal and now it’s the turn of exaggeration.
Exaggeration takes the familiar then dashes our expectations by serving up a larger-than-life perspective. A classic and very visual example is the caricature. A caricature makes us laugh as we immediately recognise the person even though their particular features have been wildly accentuated. Essentially we want to make a caricature of our business problems- exaggerate certain features to blow perspectives way out of proportion.
Here’s the blueprint:
1. Identify the main concepts you’re looking to improve in your business challenge.
2. Take these concepts to the extreme. What’s the most dramatic way you could achieve the results?
3. Link your exaggerated situation back to reality by finding a practical connection.
We’ll apply this blueprint to our ongoing Funny Business challenge of ‘making training more memorable’. Making memorable is the concept, so let’s exaggerate…
Example 1= Training is conducted by an Army Drill Sergeant.
The Sergeant would be licking the ‘troops’ into shape ready for action in real conditions. Perhaps the training would be gearing up for war games at the end. The practicality here is that a training course could culminate in two teams pitted against each other, with spoils for the victors who are most able to apply their newfound skills.
Example 2= The training course is run by a stuntman/fire juggler/Cirque du Soleil.
Training would be a memorable spectacle, although any real business lessons might be overshadowed. However, what if you rewarded people that have opted into all the essential training by allowing them to sign up to a course of their choice (anything from time management to circus skills)? This would broaden horizons as well as make people happier and more fulfilled. Most importantly, they might approach usual business training with more enthusiasm with the anticipation of rewards.
Example 3= Repeat the same training over and over until it sticks.
Everyday would be like Groundhog Day. The only way to break the monotonous cycle would be to physically intervene and change the consequences. Just as in the film, each day Bill Murray is trying a new way to win over Andy McDowall, your goal is to work out the precise sequence of activities to achieve a harmonious response amongst your participants. So do a mental Groundhog Day of your previous training sessions and really search yourself to find those endearing aspects and those that are liable to get lost in the depths of time.
Next up in the Funny Business series is satire…
Previously in the Funny Business series, we looked at how reversing a situation can not only be amusing but ignite new creative perceptions and solutions to challenges.
Here we’re going in with a slightly different slant and looking at how role reversal can lead to new and creative ideas.
Role reversal is a long-standing comedy technique. If you’ve ever seen the films Trading Places, Freaky Friday, Vice Versa or Big, you’ll already know all about it. These films are all great examples of films of roles being switched, followed by the unfolding of ludicrous situations.
So let’s apply role reversal to our running Funny Business challenge of ‘making training more memorable’.
Here’s your blueprint:
1. Identify the subjects involved in the situation- their qualities, typical behaviours and attitudes.
2. Make the switch. Take an aspect you’ve identified and replace it with something right at the other end of the scale.
3. Elaborate on the incongruities of the new situation to make the situation come to comic life.
4. Find the elements of truth in the new situation and apply this to create new logic.
Example 1 = the pupil becomes the teacher.
Just imagine school kids taking a class of head-teachers. Maybe they are teaching a seminar on practical jokes, pranks and homework excuses. The truth here is the head-teachers are closely identifying with what really drives the kids. And the creative lesson is to figuratively ‘get down with the kids’; identify with the needs and desires of the people you’re working with and don’t alienate them by sticking too closely to the rule book!
Example 2 = the participants are alert but the trainer is bored.
With a small leap of imagination, you could up the ante on boredom and invent a scenario where participants craftily place sleeping pills in the trainer’s coffee to run the session their way. The truth and creative lesson here is that the most effective information doesn’t always come from official sources and personal experiment and feedback are just as necessary.
Example 3 = the audience is struck by nerves instead of the presenter.
That age-old classic advice, ‘imagine them in their underwear’ might be given to the audience to help them relax around the super scary trainer. The truth is an audience can sometimes be apprehensive over training- just watch heads go down when the question ‘who will volunteer to be in the role play’ are uttered! If people are intimidated, there’s a slim chance lessons will be remembered. So maybe a trainer should turn up in their metaphorical underwear and really focus on ensuring people are relaxed and can contribute openly.
Have a go yourself and apply this technique to your own challenges.
Next up in the Funny Business series is by far and away the most exciting post to ever be written online… that’s right, the technique of exaggeration!
Turning something on its head to see the reverse viewpoint is the 1st humour technique in the Funny Business series. With reversal, humour comes from a surprise twist, diverting our thoughts away from the expected logic.
Here’s a silly little joke that demonstrates this example: What’s the stupidest animal in the jungle? The polar bear!
The humorous twist in a situation can then be harnessed and used to explore a challenge with a new perception.
Here’s the blueprint to follow:
1. Find the opposite. This can be as simple as throwing the word ‘not’ in there. You might also reverse the typical order and assumptions. The way the challenge is reversed is not important; it just needs to defy the implied expectation.
2. Raise the humour stakes. The reversed logic may stimulate associated thoughts and ideas that can make the situation even more laughable.
3. Extract the themes and concepts. Find the essence of the reversal by breaking it down into clearly defined concepts that can be further explored.
4. Find the truth. The challenge is to find a way in which the extracted themes and concepts can be applied with renewed logic in order to arrive at a creative solution.
We’ll apply the reversal blueprint to the following business related challenge, which is something close to my heart: ’Making training more memorable’
Example 1= Being made to forget the training… perhaps by a hypnotist.
This could be made funny if the training was conducted under hypnosis and certain trigger words subsequently caused hilarious actions, such chicken noises and all the usual hypnotist tricks, in tense business negotiations! The truth here is that methods from the science of mental conditioning could be used to implant trigger words that bring vivid memories of the training experiences flooding back.
Example 2= Make it so participants are not able to listen to/hear the training.
This might lead to the absurd idea of a company employing a mime to deliver a typical business skills training session. The truth here is that the visual message would have to be very powerful in order to make it meaningful. Perhaps training could employ much more visual ways of communicating in order to make lessons stick? This would be particularly useful for a subject that is traditionally somewhat less than enthralling.
Example 3= Provide training at the end of a project instead of the beginning.
This might be made funny if a manager is on a huge power trip and wants to make themselves look better and cover their back with a smarmy, “I told you so” or “this is what I would have done” attitude. The truth here is that work can be rife with conflict and blame. This could lead to the idea of providing training that’s rings true as is based on real life scenarios. Training would not only deal with the required skills but how to overcome potential social pitfalls with the right attitudes and team spirit.
Next up in the Funny Business series is a slightly different take on reversal… the role reversal!
Creativity and humour are very close relatives. In fact, if they lived next door to each other they’d probably be having boundary disputes!
Humour is often the key to delivering a jolt that knocks habitual thinking off course and onto a new journey of discovery. If you can learn how to harness humour and turn it into practical creativity, you will possess a powerful skill.
So over the coming weeks, there’s going to be some repeated Funny Business at Creative Encounters! We’ll explore how different humour techniques can be applied to a business situation in order to provide a provocative springboard that leads to creative ideas. We’ll be opening up very different perspectives by making the situation seem odd, by challenging common logic and by just being plain silly.
At the end of the Funny Business series, I will make a summary article available to download. This will also include extra advice on how lightening up a work culture can achieve great results not just for creativity but also productivity and overall business success.
So prepare yourself, tell your friends and let’s all get ready for some Funny Business!
Here’s a fun little exercise to get your brain working in a different way…
Inspired by the website www.animalsontheunderground.com the object is to join up stations and underground routes to create animal shapes. This is a very playful activity but certainly gets the brain whirring away looking for new patterns. And we’re not just limited to London; there are all sorts of interesting subway maps out there! Have a go and see what animals you can create!
This is also a great activity to warm up your brain before problem solving or even for inspiration to put put more gusto into your usual work activities.
So you’ve tried over and over to develop your ideas in your head. You may have even try to mentally visualise what your solution looks like. But if we go through the same processes in our head, we can sometimes become a victim of routined thinking and end up getting stuck!
This is where transcending the mind and making ideas tangible in front of your very eyes can help. Putting pen to paper and drawing your solutions enables ideas and concepts to leap into life and take on new meaning. You have to dig a little deeper in order to find new ways of expressing your thoughts through images. This can act as a great springboard to new possibilities as you literally begin to ‘see’ the solution.
Better yet, build your idea! Grab a load of building blocks, modelling clay, kitchen implements or whatever comes to hand and build ’til your heart’s content. Building encourages the process of exploring through metaphor. This means we are able to articulate thoughts that are difficult to express much more easily by attaching meaning to the visual interactions we create.
Building ideas is the essence behind the game Mental Blocks on the Creativity Games page. The idea building concept has also been adopted by Lego to produce Lego Serious Play (http://www.seriousplay.com) whereby Lego is used to build and explore business concepts. The science of visual expression is also explored in the book Creative Explorations by David Gauntlett- well worth a read if you fancy delving in much further.
Necessity is the mother of invention. But do you really want to have all your ideas when you’re up against it?! We are equally able to produce great ideas when we are in a relaxed and happy state of mind. We can achieve this through being playful and maybe even recapturing some of our youthful exuberance. So if necessity is the mother of invention, play is most definitely the daddy!
If you’re in a group environment, why not play some creativity games to get you in the spirit? Here are some of my favourites that can work wonders for arousing creativity during workshops… Creativity Games
The more information we have to draw upon, the more we are able to access new possibilities. If we stay stuck in a narrow minded world, when the time comes to solve challenges and explore new opportunities, our frame of reference is prohibitively restricting. It’s tough coming up new solutions using the same old information isn’t it?!
Creative people look for inspiration in all sorts of places. They are not looking for immediate answers but instead broadening their information base for.. well you never know when! So keep your mind open, observe new things, react to them, try and see the funny things, the interesting aspects, the anomalies and so on. Make a habit of applying new found information to your existing challenges and see where your thoughts take you.
For example:
How might you apply the principles of genetics to developing a new food product?
- Genetic traits are passed down from mother and father. You could search for family recipes, honed over generations. A family recipe competition would be a good way to coax them out.
- Mutations occur and are selected for. Genetically modified food aside! You could have a range of base dishes that can be transformed by the addition of various sauces that you choose based on your mood.
- Men and women have different chromosomes. You could market products based on male and female designs e.g. his and hers chocolates.
- Simple amino acids combine to form complex sets of genetic instructions. You could produce a DNA guide to food- a matrix of what goes well with what so people can more easily experiment with greater meal variety in their own kitchens.
- Genes are split and recombined. We now get fusion food which combine the best bits of certain dishes. I’ve even seen roast beef combined with onion ice cream! Maybe you could make a selection of new dishes that are created from combining common leftovers- bubble and squeak being a classic example. This will inform and encourage people how to reuse leftovers in inspirational ways to avoid wasting food and to save money.
Looking at the opposite is a great way for reversing your perspective and provoking new solutions. There are many examples where a reverse viewpoint has led to a new solution:
- Internet shopping comes to you instead of you going to the shop.
- Bashing the bottom of a ketchup bottle will only send the sauce to the bottom through reactive force. But bash the top and the sauce will come flooding out.
- Some farmers are now ploughing fields at night as this stops weeds germinating in the sunlight.
- The birth control pill came about through experiments to prevent the birth of pests with hormones instead of resorting to pesticides. Not that I’m saying kids are pests :S
- Even if you tell a child they can’t do something- they will find a way!
Anything with an action can be reversed. You can look at the exact opposite, reverse the order, reverse the subject and even reverse the assumptions behind the statement.
Reversal is all about provoking your imagination to see where it leads your thinking.
Let’s try it! The action is stopping children from watching too much tv.
- The direct opposite: Can we make children watch too much tv? Is your routine at home not giving them any other entertainment options? Are the kids bored and resorting to tv? Can making them watch tv be a good thing? What if you allowed them all-they-can-watch educational programmes or interactive learning DVDs?
- Reversing the sentence order:
- Watching children stopping tv. Maybe kids could run their own club where their goal is to bring together people in local communities to get involved in exciting activities instead of watching tv? Maybe stopping tv could mean kids finding other ways to put on their own entertainment- perhaps a play (why wait or nativity!) or more opportunities to visit the theatre.
- Stopping tv from watching children. Maybe viewing figures should be capped? Kids would book into watch the shows they really want to see, making them conscious of how they spend their remaining time more productively. Maybe a cap and trade scheme could work where kids can earn a right to watch more if they perform better at school. This could work locally as a kind of parental control setting which is managed by the parents with allocated time that can be added to through good results.
- Reversed assumptions: We assume kids want to watch tv. How might we ensure they don’t want to watch? Perhaps they have to perform chores for the equivalent time spent watching tv? Maybe they have a quota of non tv things to do before being allowed to watch tv? What if they could only watch tv at the same time as exercising?!
- Reverse the subject:
- Stopping adults watching too much tv. Perhaps the parents are a bad example and the kids are just following suit?
- Stopping children from too much reading. This is probably not an issue but if the flip side of this is reversed, we can look at what is stopping reading. Maybe a positive reading time vs tv time ratio could be rewarded. Perhaps a barrier to reading is not knowing what books to read. Maybe a kids’ book club could be formed? Perhaps kids could be more engaged with books by reading stories relating to their favourite tv and films. They may even discover the book is better than the film!
What challenges can you reverse to find new solutions?
Sometimes, you just don’t feel creative. Everything seems to be more of a struggle than usual. Today is working out as one of those days for me.
My advice is not to fight it. Just accept that’s part of being human and look forward to tomorrow when you’ll have a fresh start!
To try and put a more upbeat spin on things, here’s a silly joke:
A man goes into the doctor’s with a steering wheel attached to his groin area. The doctor asks “how on earth did you manage to get a steering wheel stuck to your groin?” The man replies, “I have no idea but it’s driving me nuts!”
Yes it’s a classic. If you find a way of doing something that works, why bother going to the effort to change it? However, ways soon become outdated and there’s a slim chance of discovering new & better ways if you stay in your state of adequate bliss.
Here are a couple of examples of things that ain’t broke in our culture:
- In late 1800s, Otto von Bismark the German ‘Iron Chancellor’, introduced the pension. Citizens paid into a fund until they were 65, at which point they could claim their money back. However, Otto was a crafty one seeing as few people actually lived to over 65 in those days! Today there’s a great deal of hoo ha in many government’s as they try and claw back some of their deficits by raising the pensionable age and compensate for the impact of medicines and lifestyle changes
- Do you use a DVORAK keyboard? What’s one of them?! Once upon a time, instead of spelling QWERTY, the first row of keyboard letters would have instead spelled DVORAK. This is supposedly a more efficient typing configuration. So what happened? In the early days of typewriters, jamming was a problem because they couldn’t cope with keys being repeatedly being struck at speed. The clever solution was to slow the typists down by moving some of the more common letters to areas that are struck with the less dominant fingers. However, once the technology improved, jamming no longer became an issue and yet we still use the QWERTY configuration today.
Is it time to revisit some of the methods that you take for granted?
I’m sure we’re all very familiar with brainstorming. Get a bunch of people in a room and spurt out ideas until you find a new solution right?
But brainstorming seems to have become a throw away term in business and at worst becomes just another lackluster process for the meeting agenda. Unfortunately this means idea generation often gets conducted in far less than optimal conditions for creativity.
But never fear, you can inject creative life back into brainstorming by following these guidelines:
- Use a neutral facilitator- not the boss as they’re likely to create bias or worse, fear!
- Impose fun but embarrassing forfeits for anyone that judges ideas or gives negative feedback. Idea evaluation and selection should always be done separately.
- Work in short bursts to create a sense of urgency and keep ideas flowing.
- Build in plenty of snack breaks to and allow people to relax and engage their subconscious minds.
- Make sure everyone gets involved not just the supposed experts or those that believe they are the most creative.
- Go for quantity over quality. You’re much more likely to get good ideas by going for lots of ideas.
- Encourage silly ideas. In fact reward silly ideas to keep the fun spirit alive. They can often lead thinking down new and exciting avenues.
- Write absolutely everything down. All ideas at this stage are valuable raw inspiration material.
- Provide pictures, magazines and a variety of unusual objects to provide visual and tactile stimulation. Participants will also be more creative if they are encouraged to be playful.
- Allow people to freely separate and rejoin the group to work solo on ideas. Results of individual thinking are often a great catalyst to propel the group further into the realms of new possibility.
Perhaps most importantly, the spirit of brainstorming is to use others’ ideas as a springboard. By picking out useful themes, concepts, points of interest and positive aspects, your colleagues’ ideas are all you need for the ultimate inspiration.
Today’s creativity tip is a little more philosophical than usual. Over the weekend I was working at an art fair on a stand with a quite inspirational sculptor. We got into some fairly in depth discussions about the meaning of creativity, self-realisation and the way in which we choose to live our lives.
Have you ever wondered how the dreams, ambitions and desires you once had seem diminish as we plunge ourselves deeper into the ‘real world’? Do you have a passion or goal in life that has become a victim of major procrastination? Has life got in the way of actually living?
If you only wonder what could be and not what currently is you may be sorely cheating yourself. Even if you believe you can eventually fulfill your dreams, tomorrow will come and pass in a flash and you’ll soon be left wondering what went wrong. So live for the moment and whatever it is you want to do, do it now.
Sure, it sounds easy enough but so many of us put off our goals and desires as we wait for that moment of inspiration when the universe stops conspiring against us and at last we are able to create in perfect harmony. Trust me, it’s just not going to happen that way. Instead write down your goal and state it in the here and now and not the distant future. Make it real for yourself. What do you really want to achieve? How will this make you happy and more fulfilled? Then get on and do it. Don’t think about it, just go for it. It doesn’t matter how bad your attempts are, you can always improve. Don’t be crippled by the fear of not living up to your or others’ expectations; any result is positive when it’s something you truly want to do and remember, no-one has to know if you don’t want them to. The important thing is to let go and break away from the convenient constraints and excuses you’ve built for yourself over time.
If you’ve ever wanted to sing, dance, draw, paint, write or wrangle cattle then go ahead. And guess what? Once you start, it becomes part of you. The amount of money and success you get from an activity doesn’t define who you are or what you do. What defines who you are is what you do from moment to moment. Write and you are a writer. Dance and you are a dancer. Wrangle and you.. well you get the picture. Don’t wait for someone else to officially tell you who or what you are. The moment is entirely yours so grab it!
My inspirational sculptor friend is Ian Edwards. Thought he was worth a mention. He’s work’s pretty incredible too and you can check it out here… http://www.ianedwardsstudios.co.uk/
You wouldn’t skip a body warm up before a sports match, so why skip a mind warm up before thinking? A creative thinking warm up will loosen up your mind and get those synapses firing. It sounds simple but try it. It really will help improve the flexibility of your thought when working on your challenges.
Here’s an exercise to try for a warm up:
Find connections between a shark and a corkscrew.
Try and find at least 5 before looking at mine (and please do post yours in the comments beneath).
- Both have implements designed to ‘bite’ and hold on tightly to their target.
- Both evolved to be faster and more efficient
- Their actions both result in emptying the ‘claret’ of their target.
- Each has a business end and an end that controls the motion.
- Both move in circular motions when homing in on their target.
- Once they begin, a consumption frenzy often ensues.
- They are both designed for very singular purposes- killing and opening wine- although please don’t get the two mixed up or your next dinner party could be a disaster.
- Whichever one you twist you’re gonna get screwed!
This is actually one of my warm up exercise in our animal workshops. Check them out here… http://www.creativeencounters.co.uk/Animal_Workshops.html
You can use this method yourself to create your own warm up routine. Create one pile of items from one category and another pile from a different one e.g. household objects and animals. Pick one from each pile at random then make your connections. If you regulary do this before you work on your problems you may be surprised how flexible your mind becomes.
The essence of creativity is doing something differently in a way that brings you joy.
Pure creative activities should bring you joy by their very nature… unless like me you try to smash your guitar in a violent rage when you can’t hit all the chords. But what about adding creativity to other less inspirational activities… hmm like work perhaps!? Here are 3 suggestions:
1) Try creative exercises that are fun. Be intentionally provocative- break the rules, exaggerate, reverse perspectives, put things in very different contexts. It’s no coincidence that these techniques are also the backbone of comedy. They are also very useful to help you break away from default thinking and bring inspiration to the otherwise mundane.
2) Change how you engage with the task. Create a fun environment that allows you to lift your mood. Do whatever works for you, whether it’s singing, dancing, doodling or even random acts of kindness to those around you.
3) If you can’t find a way to make what you’re doing enjoyable, give yourself a reward to look forward to. Even the simplest of rewards can positively alter your attitude and approach toward the task.
Just remember, we’re at our creative best when relaxed and in a playful mood. So take notice of your mood and if it’s not helping you create, change it.
I was recently asked why children are so creative. After all, we’re still the same people we used to be. Why does our natural creativity disappear?
Well as kids, we don’t have any real pressures in life. There is no perceived need to be logical, sensible and always right (a skill that seems to develop particularly well in women as they grow up!). Simply put, children are open to all sorts of possibilities without fear of any consequences.
Adults live in fear of those consequences. Heaven forbid subjecting yourself to being put down or made to feel foolish. As adults we can’t bear that social suicide (sociacide?? Is that a new word?!). Better stay on the safe side hey?
But we are still capable of our childish thoughts if we give ourselves permission to let go and explore. We can still imagine a washing up bottle as a rocket ship, a paper plate as the steering wheel of a racing car and a cardboard box as a beautiful fairy princess castle (hmm, maybe one I should have kept to myself!)
Next time you need to break out of a rut, just imagine what a child would do. From now on, if someone accuses you of ‘acting childish’ thank them heartily then reward yourself with milk and cookies.
