Key to Creativity--a good nights sleep

Finding your passion is also about using your creativity. Many of us, do not believe we are creative, but all of us have some hint of creativity. You have probably had experiences of creativity yourself.  Perhaps while talking to a friend, going for a walk or reading a  magazine article, you find yourself suddenly inspired with an idea  that solves a problem totally unrelated to the conversation, scenery  or article That is creativity.

Most of us thing that creativity is about when we generate creative ideas as potential solutions to a problem in an  active way. Active creativity occurs in brainstorming sessions where  we are actively generating ideas; while mind mapping; when we are  sitting at our desks trying to figure out how to make a business presentation more compelling to a client; and in any other situation  where we are actively trying to solve a problem.

In fact, one could argue that all creativity is the result of  previous efforts at active creativity. The author who dreams up an  idea for a novel may not have actively been looking for a new novel  idea. But, since her profession is writing, you can be sure she  frequently does actively seek new ideas.

Likewise, the scientist who, through sudden inspiration, invents a  new chemical or technology or theory, will almost certainly have been  actively looking for such solutions in the past. Indeed, passive  creativity seems to be one approach our mind takes towards solving  problems

Research carried out by the University of Luebeck in Germany found  that sleep seems to be an essential ingredient for creativity, which confirmed what many people have long  suspected: sleeping on a problem can help you solve it more  creatively.

Although the exact process is not clear, it seems that the  biochemical process of the brain restructures memories before storing  them during the night. This restructuring most likely allows our  minds to see problems in new ways and so bring new solutions to them.

Inspiration alone will not give you ideas. You  need to break down your problems into creative challenges and  actively try to solve them. But, if the solution does not come through the usual idea generation channels, one of the best  creativity tools you have available is to put the problem to the side of your mind, so to speak, and give your mind a chance to add new  input and surprise you with passively creative ideas. A good night's  sleep along the way will only help

Happy Birthday to my son

Happy Birthday to you and as you read this think about life and the joy you have in the inspiration of your music.

You probably know the myth of innovation as a sudden flash of insight that comes from nowhere. We read about that "aha" moment, or that light bulb turning on in the mind of some inventor or innovator, and this is true to an extent. Einstein really did get flashes of insight while shaving in the morning. However, he was of course working on the particular problems he had insight into, and he didn't suddenly have ideas for new kitchen gadgets or movie plots.

Einsteins innovations, in other words, no matter how "sudden" the original ideas were, came from past and present mental work. It is like a singer who works at his craft for ten years and then becomes an "overnight success." Innovative people only have "sudden" new ideas because they have habitually worked and thought in certain ways for some time. If you want to become an innovative thinker, then, why not start cultivating those mental habits?

Mental Habits
Lead To Innovation Problems can be opportunities. "Problem" may have a negative connotations, such as being a hassle or stressful, but any problem can lead to an innovation that improves our lives. Not knowing the time lead to clocks small enough to put on our wrists. Nasty diseases lead to sanitary sewer systems. Start looking for opportunity in every problem. Even a mundane problem like not having enough storage space could lead to a new innovation. You may just build a plywood floor in the attic, but you could invent a new type of outdoor storage unit.

Innovation begins with understanding the key elements. Metal, wood or glass are not key elements of a door to an innovator. A way to get in, a way to keep others out - these are key elements. Begin with these, and soon you're imagining new ways to make a door. You could design a door that is opened by your voice (nice when your hands are full), or one that shuts and locks itself when anyone else approaches. Think of the key elements in things.

Attitude helps innovation. The creative problem-solving technique of concept-combination involves combining two ideas to see what new idea or product results. The crucial point is that you assume there will be a useful new idea. Starting with that assumption, your mind will work overtime to produce something. A shoe and a CD have nothing to do with each other, but it took just a minute to imagine a CD player with headphones that only plays the music correctly if a jogger maintains his ideal pace. When you assume there is something there you'll often find something.

Playfulness helps innovation. A playful mind is a creative mind, and while high IQ doesn't correlate with creativity, put it together with playfulness, and you have an Einstein. Remember, he imagined himself riding on a beam of light in order to arrive at his theory of relativity. Why not start playing with ideas and things, in your mind and in your surroundings. Innovation should be fun.

Hurdles are for

Jumping over.
The hurdles to innovation are similar. Our own personal middle managers are culprits keen to sidetrack creative ideas before they even have a chance to become innovations. There are numerous reasons for this. As we manage our day to day activities our internal  manager may fear that if we follow-up on a brilliant idea we will move into new areas and out of our comfort zone. She/he may not want to deal with the change implicit in implementing the idea. He/She may fear the loss of her own power through as another part of  our brain takes charge of implementing a potentially innovative idea.

This is not to say that all our internal managers are innovation hurdles. Rather that in many of us our internal managers are perceived as hurdles. On the other hand, when we are open to new ideas our internal managers are  conducive to the innovation process, it is a huge benefit to us. But when they are hurdles, that becomes a problem.

Problems Are Challenges
But wait! As we have learned before the innovation process typically starts with a problem. It simply needs to be turned into a challenge so that people can work on solving the problem with creative ideas!

The first step in the creative problem solving process, which is the basis of the front end of any viable innovation process, is to understand better the problem.

The second step in the process, and this is the most important step, is to use the information from step one in order to ask why questions, for example: “why is our internal managers suppressing ideas?” 

The answer might be: “because we have no motivation to push good ideas forward.” That's a good answer. But it's not good enough. Indeed, the best practice is to ask “why?” five times. By doing so, you may discover that you are not rewarding yourself  for new ideas; you believe you are overly pressured to perform routine tasks; and that you believe you may lose face if you back a failing idea. In short, you are not rewarded in any way for pushing ideas forward, even if those ideas are winners, but you believe that you risk consequences if an idea we champion does not work.

In such an environment, any potentially innovative idea starts with a tremendous handicap. Moreover, one can hardly our internal manager for discouraging ideas.

Evaluation Criteria 

The next step in the innovation process is to define the criteria by which you will evaluate ideas. This can be done before or after the idea generation process, but it is usually more smarter to do it beforehand. In this situation, criteria will probably include: viability of implementing the idea, ease of implementing the idea, expected effectiveness of the idea; avoidance of conflict from middle managers, minimal disruption (In some cases, you may actually want to encourage disruption in a new process. But, for all the sexiness of “disruptive innovation” the truth is, most of us do not like their lives to be disrupted)

With this information, it becomes relatively easy to formulate one or more innovation challenges that can be used to generate ideas. For example: “in what ways might we motivate [or 'reward'] ourselves to champion new ideas?"or “in what ways might we encourage our internal managers to start more innovative projects?”

At this stage, you go through the usual idea generation process and get lots of ideas. This done, you can combine ideas and evaluate them using the criteria you have identified. Now, does that not sound like a lot more fun than moaning about middle managers being hurdles to innovation?

Best of all, this process can be used to identify and define other hurdles to innovation as well as generate ideas to solve them. Indeed, the biggest hurdle to innovation is probably allowing hurdles to become insurmountable. But you would never catch a leader thinking that way!

last thoughts on innovation for a while

It's a talent that everyone has, yet they think they don't. The power of innovation. If you've ever marvelled at somebody's creative prowess, guess what, you can create and innovate too. It just takes time. Everyone is born creative. The box of crayons in kindergarten were not limited to those who possessed potential; because the truth is, everybody has potential.

You know how long it took to learn to ride a bike or drive or to never commit the same mistake again? It's the same with innovation. It takes a bit of practice and a lot of time before this mind function comes easily when called.
Don't listen to what other people say. Follow the beat of your own drum. Allowing for the input of other people will only bring cacophony to the music you are trying to make. If you have an original idea, don't waste your time and effort trying to make people understand. They won't. And the help you will probably get comes in the form of negative feedback. If all those geniuses listened to their peers, we would probably still be living in the middle ages.

Spend time on it. I cannot stress that enough, although, please do not mistake this tip to tell you to quit your day job entirely. Do not. This involves some tricky time management but with a little discipline you'll be able to squeeze both in.

Exercise. Take a walk. Run a mile or two. Send all those endorphins coursing through your veins. Exercising certainly clears and relaxes your mind and allows for anything to pop up.

Record your dreams. Aren't some of them just the craziest things that your conscious mind would never have thought of? If you've had these dreams before, and I'm sure have, this only shows you the untapped innovative power you have lying within. So jot down those notes. Those dreams may just create an innovative spark in you.

Find your own style. You can always tell a Van Gogh from a Matisse. You'll know Hemingway wrote something by the choice of words on the paper. So it is the same with you. People will appreciate your innovation more because it is uniquely yours and that no one else would have thought of what you were thinking. That will let people see how valuable an asset you are.

Don't hide behind nifty gadgets or tools. You don't need the most expensive set of paints to produce a masterpiece. The same way with writing. You don't need some expensive fountain pen and really smooth paper for a bestseller. In fact, J.K. Rowling wrote the first book of the Harry Potter Series on bits of tissue. So what if you've got an expensive SLR camera if you're a crappy photographer? Who cares if you've got a blinging laptop if you can't write at all? The artist actually reduces the number of tools he has as he gets better at his craft: he knows what works and what doesn't.

Nothing will work without passion. What wakes you up in the mornings? What keeps the flame burning? What is the one thing that you'll die if you don't do? Sometimes people with talent are overtaken by the people who want it more. Think the hare and the tortoise. Ellen Degeneres once said that if you're not doing something that you want to do, then you don't really want to do it. And that's true. Sometimes you just want something so bad you become a virtual unstoppable. And that is passion. Passion will keep you going.

Don't worry about inspiration. You can't force it; inspiration hits when you least expect it to, for those unpredictable yet inevitable moments you should prepare. An idea could strike you on the subway, yet alas, you poor unfortunate soul; you have no sheet of paper to scribble down a thought that could change the world. Avoid these disasters. Have a pen and paper within your arm's reach at all times.

Keep in mind that you're doing these things for your own satisfaction and not anybody else's. But soon enough they will notice, and everything should snowball from there.

The Myth of innovation

You probably know the myth of innovation as a sudden flash of insight that comes from nowhere. We read about that "aha" moment, or that light bulb turning on in the mind of some inventor or innovator, and this is true to an extent. Einstein really did get flashes of insight while shaving in the morning. However, he was of course working on the particular problems he had insight into, and he didn't suddenly have ideas for new kitchen gadgets or movie plots.

Einsteins innovations, in other words, no matter how "sudden" the original ideas were, came from past and present mental work. It is like a singer who works at his craft for ten years and then becomes an "overnight success." Innovative people only have "sudden" new ideas because they have habitually worked and thought in certain ways for some time. If you want to become an innovative thinker, then, why not start cultivating those mental habits?

Mental Habits Lead To Innovation

Problems can be opportunities. "Problem" may have a negative connotations, such as being a hassle or stressful, but any problem can lead to an innovation that improves our lives. Not knowing the time lead to clocks small enough to put on our wrists. Nasty diseases lead to sanitary sewer systems. Start looking for opportunity in every problem. Even a mundane problem like not having enough storage space could lead to a new innovation. You may just build a plywood floor in the attic, but you could invent a new type of outdoor storage unit.

Innovation begins with understanding the key elements. Metal, wood or glass are not key elements of a door to an innovator. A way to get in, a way to keep others out - these are key elements. Begin with these, and soon you're imagining new ways to make a door. You could design a door that is opened by your voice (nice when your hands are full), or one that shuts and locks itself when anyone else approaches. Think of the key elements in things.

Attitude helps innovation. The creative problem-solving technique of concept-combination involves combining two ideas to see what new idea or product results. The crucial point is that you assume there will be a useful new idea. Starting with that assumption, your mind will work overtime to produce something. A shoe and a i pod have nothing to do with each other, but it took just a minute to imagine a i pod that only plays the music correctly if a jogger maintains his ideal pace. When you assume there is something there you'll often find something.

Playfulness helps innovation. A playful mind is a creative mind, and while high IQ doesn't correlate with creativity, put it together with playfulness, and you have an Einstein. Remember, he imagined himself riding on a beam of light in order to arrive at his theory of relativity. Why not start playing with ideas and things, in your mind and in your surroundings. Innovation should be fun.