Wily Walnut’s Blog 2.0

I really enjoyed reading this interview with the now 75-year-old, Edward de Bono: http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/2009/01/04/interview.html

In it he calls for an Embassy or “Palace of Thinking”, a grand edifice building that would visually impress the importance and regard we choose to give to the thinking arts in the new millenia.  

This Palace of Thinking would be situated in his homeland of Malta, the tiny Mediterranean island which would be rebranded the Creative Think Tank of the world!

Check out some of Edward de Bono’s other provactive ideas in this article, namely:

1. That he goes to America, as a ‘gift’ from the EU, to teach Presidential elect Obama how to think creatively!

2. The invention of a new spending currency “the Bon”. He explains how that would work.

3. The development of a currency for buying and selling property with a managed exchange rate mechanism to stabilise property markets in times of bubble/bust.

4. What a fat female cross-eyed hunchback can expect if she ever crosses paths with Mr de BONO!

It’s very waffo and you can read it here: The Embassy of Thinking

I like Mitesh’s post on How To Choose The Best Idea After Brainstorming

His three little categories for sorting your ideas into make perfect sense.

Of course, once you’ve done your brainstorming, and made your own choice as to the best ideas, you need some feedback.

Trouble is… when you ask for criticism you get it. People automatically go into “what’s wrong?” mode and that can savage a perfectly good idea and perhaps stop you in your tracks.

Fortunately, Mitesh has a way round that, by getting the feedback group to apply the same categorization process to the ideas and see which ones triumph overall.

Loving the post about citta slow in Ludlow over at: Readers write — New lifestyle trends

Shows what a few beers and a playful attitude with a focus on strengths can do to unleash creative thinking.

See how one place inspires another place to adopt town and city planning with a focus on relaxation and quality of life — surely the way towns and cities should be designed — to enhance the experience of the peoples living and visiting there?

Stacie gets it. Check out her post over at: Doing Your Best or Just Doing?

Too much trying, feel like crying. Just get doing, ‘tivity’s a shoe-in.

Possibly worst rhyme you’ve ever heard.

Don’t care.

Not the point.

Have fun. Be creative. Chillax about the quality.

Let yourself be free… and you throw wide open the doorway to your deepest creative thinking.

Love, love, love this quote over at “On Creative Thinking …and Being”.

It encapsulates the struggle that we sometimes feel to reach for that free, beautiful, peak performance part of ourselves… when we are locked up in the tight, restrictive, controlling parts of our mind.

The call for the whirlwind to blast away our limitations.

Edward de Bono’s article Creative solutions: how creativity can help with decision making and analysis made for uncomfortable reading.

Why?

Because it exposed a few hidden home truths that most self-confessed ‘creative types’ hide even from themselves.

And what is that?

That we enjoy creative thinking while it is fun, but often bail out when it starts to feel like hard work.

But as Edward de Bono points out in this article, “the disciplined use of creative thinking often turns up ideas way beyond those that arise from the habit of creative thinking.”

Becoming a disciplined creative thinker is a whole different ball game.

Are you up to it?

I picked up on a Twitter thread and found Dean Hunt’s brilliant site and specifically this post: The Power Of Creative Thinking in which he shows how one little idea he came up with generated massive practical value for him.

You should look at Dean’s site just for a masterclass in original quirky thinking, unique presentation, and living creatively in your life, work and business.

Love the whole killer rabbit theme going on… simple little thing and yet it makes the whole experience memorable and fun.

I like this article over at BusinessWeek on How to Produce Big Ideas on Demand by G. Michael Maddock and Raphael Louis Vitón  of Maddock Douglas, a company that invents, brands, and markets products “for companies driven by innovation.”

Here are their tips:

1. Shower your way to creativity.

This is fairly old hat. You relax in the shower and that frees up your mind. But they add a note that there may be some scientific basis to it… that the water may stimulate synapses in the brain. There is also the diving reflex to consider. Splash cold water in your face and it triggers the diving reflex which in turn oxygenates your brain.

See The Brain Bubbles technique to permanently boost your IQ in just 3 weeks!

2. Sleep on it!

See: Sleep to succeed! Sleep and dream your way to brilliant ideas!

3. Engage in Mind-Mapping!

See: Mind Mapping: the visual creative thinking process

4. Schedule Your Day Dreaming

This is a good point. They say that many people are most creative in the morning, just at the point where they start checking and replying emails, wasting that time. I took a tip from internet marketer Michael Campbell about this, he does all his creative work first thing and leaves email till later in the day. It’s still a hard habit to break though.

5. Yuk it Up!

See: Enhance Your Intelligence With Jokes, Wit and Humor!

And: Gay Think - think pink your way to creativity, genius and wit!

Marc McGuiness is a great writer and I am really enjoying his regular posts at Lateral Action.

He knows how to stimulate a debate too.

His latest post is Spark Your Creativity Thinking Inside The Box.

I think he makes a good point that we are most easily creative when given a particular channel (box) to focus within.

In my comment, I make the point that the brain can only think in ‘boxes’. It needs points of reference to think consciously, and the target driven aspects of the brain respond best to specific aims, goals, or purposes.

I also defend those “self-styled creativity guru[s]” who tell us to “think outside the box” from the scathing attitude underlying his post. I think for the purposes of his post it deliberately overlooks the context in which the advise to think outside the box is generally given… which is after you have exhausted your sources of information and ideas within the box.

Check it out. There’s a good exercise to show you the value of thinking inside the box. And I want to see your comments there if not here too.

Impact Learning’s 6 Key Principles For Encouraging Creativity is an extract from the book, ‘101 Activities for Teaching Creativity and Problem Solving’.

I love the quote at the top of the post, by Cynthia Heimel. It defines the risk necessary in true creative thinking.

The 6 Key Principles are:

1. Separate idea generation from evaluation.
2. Test assumptions.
3. Avoid patterned thinking.
4. Create new perspectives.
5. Minimize negative thinking.
6. Take prudent risks.