Thought for the Weekend: Five Ways to Improve Creativity
Why is creativity so important?
Well, our livelihood is based on it. Practically everything people earn a wage doing was a result of someone’s creativity. Look how computers have been able to filter into nearly every profession and field. 100 years ago no one knew what a computer was, now practically everyone has many. Cars, appliances, smart phones all have computers these days.
Everyday people create new better ways to do things. More efficient, more effective, or they offer new opportunities to make choices that may not have been possible before.
The creative enterprise allows us to have everything we want and more. Or less. The possibilities are endless and thus encouraging creativity offers all of us more possibilities and choices for the future.
Some interesting ways to boost creativity.
Sleep - The mind works much better when well rested. But that doesn’t mean the same thing to everybody. Most have heard that one should sleep 6-8 hours in a 24 hour period. However, many of the great thinkers didn’t sleep that way. Many were biphasic or even polyphasic sleepers. Waking for a period of time, then sleeping for 1-2 hours, then repeating the pattern. Although not widely practiced it may be that the majority of people would do better if they practiced biphasic or polyphasic sleep patterns.
Animals - Taking time to interact with a pet, the neighbor's pet or even a creature from the wild can be extremely beneficial. Not only to reducing stress and anxiety but also stimulating one’s creative nature.
Good Lovin - Expressing one’s love for another as well as receiving love and adoration from another is very beneficial to stimulating creative juices. Research has shown that when someone feels their idea will help or be used by others, more novel ideas are generated. Conversely, when subjects were told their ideas wouldn’t be used by others… they had less ideas.
Blow up the problem or the solution - Looking at the problem or solution from a different perspective is always useful. “Blowing it up” to examine the individual parts and pieces of the problem or solution can generate new insight into how it might be done better. There's a great essay called "Destruction and Creation" by a fighter pilot named John Boyd. I highly recommend it.
Quit - Sometimes the best thing to do is just let it go. Let your subconscious work on it and get back to it at a later time.
nice post. learned alot. Thanks for sharing :)