ANOTHER GREAT book on creativity is written by Todd Henry, entitled, “The Accidental Creative: How to be Brilliant at a Moment’s Notice.” In the book, the author starts with identifying the factors that kill our creativity. He would call them the creative assassins.
Creative Assassin 1:
Lack of Simplicity - We don’t have that mentality of simplifying
things. We’ve been using the same routine with our work because we were
told by our boss it’s done that way, when there is always a better and faster
way and we are just lazy to think more about it or to try it out. Or we
are stuck with a project that has no clear objectives, thus we can’t come up
with a more creative solution.
Creative Assassin 2: Fear
- This fear comes from our peers. When we have a great idea, and try
to pursue it, we get scared because we might stand out from the group, and be
lonely. Or we don’t want to try out our ideas because we are afraid that
we might not be able to sustain it and would just be mocked.
Creative Assassin 3:
Too Much Expectations - The author says, creativity requires a gradual
accumulation of ideas. It needs a series of poor ideas to be accepted before
great ideas can be found. But oftentimes we dismiss poor ideas
instead of letting them develop in our mind because we think it’s a poor idea
and doesn’t live up to our high expectation of getting that one big great
idea. We ought to remember that big things come from small things.
It’s the accumulation of small things that comprises a big thing.
Todd Henry says, we have to
get rid first of those creative assassins in our thinking habit and once
removed we can then embark on his creativity enhancing practices that has an
acronym of F.R.E.S.H for Focus, Relationships, Energy, Stimuli, and Hours
explained below.
Focus - Think of three
problems you currently have in your life or in your workplace that you want to
solve. And while you do your usual day-to-day activities like reading the
news, conversing with people, reading a book, etc. always relate the
information you get from these activities to your three main problems and see
how you can generate a relationship that could lead to a solution or
solutions.
Relationships - Expand your
creative thinking by talking to people who have rich experiences in life.
The more people of this kind you talk to, the more ideas you can
generate based on their life stories.
Energy - Creative
thinking is energy intensive. Build daily rituals for sleep, exercise, and
healthy eating to remain fully charged. A healthy mind comes from a
healthy body. Our national hero Jose Rizal said exactly this same mantra:
a healthy mind goes with a healthy body.
Stimuli - Carefully choose
what you read and watch in your free time. The author says, “If you want
to regularly generate brilliant ideas, you must be purposeful about what you
are putting into your head.” If we are just watching too many movies,
or worse, reading senseless showbiz gossip, we will not be able to
generate creative ideas because it’s simply garbage in and garbage out.
Reading good books is a totally better alternative.
Hours - You need to
allot time for all the previous practices that were mentioned. You need
to find time to regularly talk to experienced people, read interesting books,
manage your energy, in your weekly calendar. It’s better scheduling it
weekly of course rather than daily because you just can’t do all of them (some
of them can be done daily like taking care of your health) every single day.
(ECC)
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