Here's the great news: Generativity research shows that everyone has creative abilities. The generative mechanisms that underlie the creative process operate all the time in each of us. Every one of us has the creative potential of Mozart or Picasso or Edison or Einstein. To boost your creative output, capture your new ideas as they occur, challenge yourself in order to get ideas competing, broaden your training so that many new repertoires of behavior will be available to compete, and surround yourself as much as possible with diverse and ever-changing stimuli.
Anyone can master these creative strategies. They're all that stand between you and the most creative people in history.
Fun and Games
Over the years, for various audiences and university classes, I've developed many exercises and games that both spur creativity and Illustrate how generative processes work. Here are a few of my favorites:
CAPTURING A DAYDREAM. You can perform this exercise in a group or on your own--right now, if yon like. Just close your eyes and let your mind wander freely for a few minutes. You might drift off to the stars; you might see things you've never seen before. Just let your thoughts wander without deliberately guiding them. Okay, relax and get started. . . .
Did you leave the room? Did you leave the earth? Did you see or hear or experience anything that's impossible to experience in reality? Given enough time and an absence of distraction, everyone answers yes to each of these questions. Behavior is generative--even the covert perceptual behavior that we call "thought." This simple exercise is especially powerful because it can quickly convince anyone that everyone has enormous creative potential and that capturing skills are essential to unlocking that potential.
I've conducted this exercise all over the world, but I've been most deeply moved by its effect on audiences in Japan. Even bright, professional Japanese people believe that the Japanese are not a creative lot--this, in spite of the fact that Japanese patents now dominate many categories of Invention worldwide. But after a few minutes of capturing daydreams, Japanese audiences report daydreams every bit as bizzare and rich as Salvador Dali's: "I saw you, the teacher, small, in my hand, and you turned gray and you shrank and disappeared." (What would Freud say about that? Who cares?) "I flew to the top of the building next door, and I saw this building crumble to the ground while I ate a sandwich." (IBM was located next door. Was this fellow hoping for a better Job?)
BUILDING A BETTER CAPTURING MACHINE. Ask a group of people to invent machines that will help them become better inventors. Specifically, give them five minutes in which to invent a device that will allow them to capture good ideas on the fly. They can use any materials at hand, including odd items you may supply, except traditional writing implements (pens, crayons, paper, computers, etc.).
At a club one evening, I was faced with one of those challenges that every single person dreads. An appealing woman offered me her telephone number, but I couldn't locate anything with which to write! I grabbed a napkin, tore off one corner to indicate my starting point, and then made a pattern of small tears around the edge to capture the number. First seven tears and a space, then two tears and a space, and then--the rest is none of your business.
THE SHIFTING GAME. Generativity Theory suggests that some of the common methods now used to promote creativity have limited value, at best. Brainstorming, for example, works to some extent because it exposes team participants to multiple social stimuli (a "surrounding" technique). But It also Inhibits creativity by exposing Individuals to disapproval. Participants may try to withhold signs of disapproval, but eyebrows are still raised, and most people hold back a wealth of good ideas.
The Shifting Game uses a team optimally to increase creative output. Two teams are selected from the larger audience. One is instructed to stay together for a 20-minute brainstorming session. The second team is instructed to "shift" twice from five- minute private work sessions to five-minute team meetings. Each team must generate names for a new soft drink, and each has a total of 20 minutes In which to accomplish the task.
The "shifting" group typically generates twice as many Ideas as the brainstorming group. Why? Because creativity is always an individual process, and social disapproval is the major deterrent to creativity our entire lives. Groups are far better at selecting good ideas than at generating them.
ILLUSTRATIONS
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