Comments on: Creativity Whacks to the Head – Roger von Oech

By: Marelisa

Marelisa — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 19:37:32 +0000

Jeff: The term used is constraining, but it’s just semantics. If you find it liberating then that’s great.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 17:07:27 +0000

Hi Marelisa, what you said makes sense, and it’s the term “constrain” I think we have different explanations: to me the random word technique is not limiting your mind, but widely liberating it, and I regard evaluative, critical thinking as constraining the mind, trying to limiting ideas to feasible ones.

Can “constrain” be explained this way, so people may find it less contradictory? Or is the random word technique universally regarded as one of the constraining techniques in the creativity field?
.-= Jeff´s last blog ..Why, What, and When =-.

By: Marelisa

Marelisa — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 13:57:15 +0000

Hi Jeff: The explorer looks for for new ideas without judging what he/she finds.

What I use for meditation is the Silva Life System.

There are two types of idea generation strategies: techniques that open your mind, such as brainstorming, and techniques that limit your mind, such as the random word technique. Free thinking and evauation critical thinking are different things, you’re trying to mix up apples and oranges. Constraining techniques are part of the free thinking stage, even though it may seem contradictory. You place a constraint, but you’re still not judging at this stage.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 12:41:52 +0000

Thanks Marelisa for your detailed reply. The story about the Japanese inventor is inspirational, and your summary about the 4 roles makes a lot of sense – I thought the Explorer is like market researcher, collecting and analyzing data to search for new ideas.

And thanks for sharing about your personal best type of free and critical thinking. Are there particular tools for meditation, such as the random-word-based games introduced by Edward De Bon in his book How to Have Creative Ideas?

Please correct me if I’m wrong – isn’t idea generation the same as free thinking, and idea evaluation critical thinking? Then why “Both techniques that open your mind and techniques that constrain your mind are idea generation techniques”?

Thanks, Jeff

By: Marelisa

Marelisa — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 05:39:53 +0000

Hi Jeff: You’ll notice that a lot of these different creativity methods are really saying the same thing, but in different ways. Because you ‘re right, creativity is coming up with new ideas while innovation is turning those new ideas into reality. The artist and the explorer look for new ideas while the judge and the warrior turn those ideas into reality. Awhile ago I wrote a post about a Japanese inventor who holds more patents than Thomas Jefferson did. He has an elaborate creativity process that starts out in a meditation room where he allows himself to think freely and then he goes into a disco-type room where he forces himself to constrain his ideas. As to which creativity method is most complex, I think it depends on the level of detail you want to go into. If you’re more comfortable with the yin-yang approach, that’s a great way to look at creativity as well.

Both techniques that open your mind and techniques that constrain your mind are idea generation techniques. One type works by removing rules, assumptions, and so on, while the other does the opposite: it forces a rule or an element on the situation in order to focus the mind and foster creativity. That is, they both have the same objective but they approach it from the exact opposite direction.

To me the best type of free thinking that there is, is meditation. It’s simply quieting your mental chatter–thoughts about everyday matters–so that you can listen to ideas coming to you from a deeper place inside of you. As for critical thinking, I think it helps to develop a clear set of parameters you’re going to apply to each idea in order to choose the best one (for example, cost, time it will take to develop, what those higher-up in the organizational structure might have to say about each idea, and so on).

I hope this helped, take care, Marelisa