Use the Stepping Stones of Analogy
KEYPOINTS
? Thinking by analogy, or analogizing, plays a key part in imaginative thinking. This is especially so when it comes to creative thinking.
? Nature suggests models and principles for the solutions of problems.
? There are other models or analogies to be found in existing products and organizations. Why reinvent the principle of the wheel when it has already been discovered? Some simple research may save you the bother of thinking it out for yourself.
? Honda's story illustrates a principle that we shall explore more fully in Chapter 4. He had a wide span of analogy – who else would have seen an analogy between a Buddha's smile and the front of a motorcycle?
Everything has been thought of before, but the problem is to think of it again.
Goethe
Make the Strange Familiar and the Familiar Strange
KEYPOINTS
? The process of understanding anything or anyone unfamiliar, foreign, unnatural, unaccountable – what is not already known, heard or seen – is best begun by relating it by analogy to what we know already. But it should not end there.
? The reverse process of making the familiar strange is equally important for creative thinking. We do not think about what we know. Here artists can help us to become aware of the new within the old.
? 'No man really knows about other human beings,' wrote John Steinbeck, 'the best he can do is to suppose that they are like himself.'
? 'Last night I thought over a thousand plans, but this morning I went my old way', says the Chinese proverb. Settled habits of thought, over-addiction to the familiar, will smother the dreams and ideas of the night.
? This morning you made a cup of tea or coffee and had your breakfast – the same as yesterday. But was it? You will never even brush your teeth in precisely the same way as yesterday. Every minute is unique.
The essence of the creative act is to see the familiar as strange.
Anon
Widen Your Span of Relevance
KEYPOINTS
? The transfer of technology from one field to another, usually with some degree of alteration and adaptation, is one way in which you can make a creative contribution.
? You may be familiar with a body of knowledge or technical capability unknown to others in your field because you have worked in more than one industry. Or it may come about as a result of your travels to other countries.
? People with a narrow span of relevance are thinking within the tramlines and boundaries of their own industry. Leap over the wall! Develop a wide span of relevance, for there are connections between every other industry in the world and yours – if only you could see them.
? It comes down to your 'power to connect the seemingly unconnected', or at least the things that hitherto have not been brought together in a new and interesting relation.
It is the function of creative people to perceive the relations between thoughts, or things or forms of expression that may seem utterly different, and to combine them into some new forms – the power to connect the seemingly unconnected.
William Plomer
Practise Serendipity
KEYPOINTS
? Serendipity means finding valuable and agreeable ideas or things – or people – when you are not consciously seeking them.
? You are more likely to be serendipitous if you have a wide span of attention and a broad range of interests.
? Being over-organized, planning your life down to the last minute like a control freak, is inimical to creativity. For chaos often breeds ideas. As A A Milne said: 'One of the advantages of being disorderly is that one is constantly making exciting discoveries.'
? Developing your capacity for creative thinking will bring you rewards, but they may not be the ones you expect now.
? A creative thinker needs to be adventurous and openminded like a resourceful explorer.
? Sometimes in life you never quite know what you are looking for until you find it.
Fortune brings in some boats that are not steered.
William Shakespeare
Chance Favours Only the Prepared Mind
KEYPOINTS
? Things that happen unpredictably, without discerning human intention or observable cause, can be stitched into the process of creative thinking.
? Such accidents tend to happen to those who deserve them. Do not wait for them, but learn to watch out for them.
? To see and recognize a clue in such unexpected events demands sensitivity and observation.
? To interpret the clue and realize its possible significance requires knowledge without preconceptions, imaginative thinking, the habit of reflecting on unexplained observations – and some original flair.
? Again, the importance of having an open mind and a degree of curiosity stands out clearly. You have to constantly ask yourself questions about what is happening around you – and be ready for surprising answers.
I have no exceptional talents, other than a passionate curiosity.
Einstein
Curiosity
KEYPOINTS
? 'Curiosity in children is but an appetite for knowledge', wrote the philosopher John Locke. You should aim to retain throughout your life that eager desire to see, learn or know. Curiosity is the mind on tiptoe.
? Creative thinkers tend to have a habit of curiosity that leads them to give searching attention to what interests them.
? Thinking is a way of trying to find out for yourself. If you always blindly accepted what others told you there would be nothing to be curious about.
? One way to develop your curiosity is to begin to ask more questions, both when you are talking with others and when you are talking in your mind to yourself. Questioning, carefully done, helps you to distinguish between what is known and what is unknown.
Go round asking a lot of damfool questions and taking chances. Only through curiosity can we discover opportunities, and only by gambling can we take advantage of them.
Clarence Birdseye, American industrialist
For more Information
* Success & Business Skills, Wisdom, Self Help & Development, Innovation & Creativity *
KEYPOINTS
? Thinking by analogy, or analogizing, plays a key part in imaginative thinking. This is especially so when it comes to creative thinking.
? Nature suggests models and principles for the solutions of problems.
? There are other models or analogies to be found in existing products and organizations. Why reinvent the principle of the wheel when it has already been discovered? Some simple research may save you the bother of thinking it out for yourself.
? Honda's story illustrates a principle that we shall explore more fully in Chapter 4. He had a wide span of analogy – who else would have seen an analogy between a Buddha's smile and the front of a motorcycle?
Everything has been thought of before, but the problem is to think of it again.
Goethe
Make the Strange Familiar and the Familiar Strange
KEYPOINTS
? The process of understanding anything or anyone unfamiliar, foreign, unnatural, unaccountable – what is not already known, heard or seen – is best begun by relating it by analogy to what we know already. But it should not end there.
? The reverse process of making the familiar strange is equally important for creative thinking. We do not think about what we know. Here artists can help us to become aware of the new within the old.
? 'No man really knows about other human beings,' wrote John Steinbeck, 'the best he can do is to suppose that they are like himself.'
? 'Last night I thought over a thousand plans, but this morning I went my old way', says the Chinese proverb. Settled habits of thought, over-addiction to the familiar, will smother the dreams and ideas of the night.
? This morning you made a cup of tea or coffee and had your breakfast – the same as yesterday. But was it? You will never even brush your teeth in precisely the same way as yesterday. Every minute is unique.
The essence of the creative act is to see the familiar as strange.
Anon
Widen Your Span of Relevance
KEYPOINTS
? The transfer of technology from one field to another, usually with some degree of alteration and adaptation, is one way in which you can make a creative contribution.
? You may be familiar with a body of knowledge or technical capability unknown to others in your field because you have worked in more than one industry. Or it may come about as a result of your travels to other countries.
? People with a narrow span of relevance are thinking within the tramlines and boundaries of their own industry. Leap over the wall! Develop a wide span of relevance, for there are connections between every other industry in the world and yours – if only you could see them.
? It comes down to your 'power to connect the seemingly unconnected', or at least the things that hitherto have not been brought together in a new and interesting relation.
It is the function of creative people to perceive the relations between thoughts, or things or forms of expression that may seem utterly different, and to combine them into some new forms – the power to connect the seemingly unconnected.
William Plomer
Practise Serendipity
KEYPOINTS
? Serendipity means finding valuable and agreeable ideas or things – or people – when you are not consciously seeking them.
? You are more likely to be serendipitous if you have a wide span of attention and a broad range of interests.
? Being over-organized, planning your life down to the last minute like a control freak, is inimical to creativity. For chaos often breeds ideas. As A A Milne said: 'One of the advantages of being disorderly is that one is constantly making exciting discoveries.'
? Developing your capacity for creative thinking will bring you rewards, but they may not be the ones you expect now.
? A creative thinker needs to be adventurous and openminded like a resourceful explorer.
? Sometimes in life you never quite know what you are looking for until you find it.
Fortune brings in some boats that are not steered.
William Shakespeare
Chance Favours Only the Prepared Mind
KEYPOINTS
? Things that happen unpredictably, without discerning human intention or observable cause, can be stitched into the process of creative thinking.
? Such accidents tend to happen to those who deserve them. Do not wait for them, but learn to watch out for them.
? To see and recognize a clue in such unexpected events demands sensitivity and observation.
? To interpret the clue and realize its possible significance requires knowledge without preconceptions, imaginative thinking, the habit of reflecting on unexplained observations – and some original flair.
? Again, the importance of having an open mind and a degree of curiosity stands out clearly. You have to constantly ask yourself questions about what is happening around you – and be ready for surprising answers.
I have no exceptional talents, other than a passionate curiosity.
Einstein
Curiosity
KEYPOINTS
? 'Curiosity in children is but an appetite for knowledge', wrote the philosopher John Locke. You should aim to retain throughout your life that eager desire to see, learn or know. Curiosity is the mind on tiptoe.
? Creative thinkers tend to have a habit of curiosity that leads them to give searching attention to what interests them.
? Thinking is a way of trying to find out for yourself. If you always blindly accepted what others told you there would be nothing to be curious about.
? One way to develop your curiosity is to begin to ask more questions, both when you are talking with others and when you are talking in your mind to yourself. Questioning, carefully done, helps you to distinguish between what is known and what is unknown.
Go round asking a lot of damfool questions and taking chances. Only through curiosity can we discover opportunities, and only by gambling can we take advantage of them.
Clarence Birdseye, American industrialist
For more Information
* Success & Business Skills, Wisdom, Self Help & Development, Innovation & Creativity *
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