If you want to create space for innovation, you won’t get far by cloistering yourself away from the world and waiting for inspiration to find you. Chance favours the connected mind – Steven Johnson

What do you think? Is it possible to think differently and creatively or is this impossible if you weren’t born with a creative mind?

Have you ever found yourself sitting down, not being able to think of a single “good” idea? When this happens to me I wonder how challenging it really is to think creatively. Most people believe that one is born a creative, but many others believe that everyone has the ability to be creative. The key is to be open to ‘thinking differently’. As William McKnight said, listen to anyone with an original idea, no matter how absurd it may sound at first. If you put fences around people, you get sheep. Give people the room they need.

Creative thinking is present in most aspects of our lives. Whether it’s finding solutions to problems, managing a business, having everyday conversations or writing an article, creative thinking is central. Being able to think differently leads to innovation and this is why it is so important when it comes to business. 

Established Perceptions

People see things in certain ways, not necessarily the “right” ways, but we stand by our perceptions nonetheless. We create our own perceptions simply by accepting certain things as being “tangible” and “adequate” and “conventional”. When enough people agree that a certain perception is “real”, you are seen as “normal” simply by agreeing. This is not a bad thing; it is, after all, a part of human nature and the societies we live in. Communities are called as such because they are a collective of people with the same values and perceptions. However, it is also one of the concepts that impacts our creative though processes the most.  

When we struggle to inspire our creativity, and get stuck in what we know as a ‘mental block’, it might just be easier to strip away the imaginary mental barriers that we’ve picked up along the way. We unknowingly suppress our natural creative capabilities because it is what we are used to and what we are comfortable with. 

If you were born into a freethinking, artistic family, chances are you would be similar. If you were born into a family of accountants and businessmen you might tend to go into the same direction. This is because you are comfortable with a certain life style because it is what you “know”. 

Iconoclasts

Gregory Berns discusses this in his book Iconoclast.  He writes that no organisation can survive without iconoclasts. They are the visionaries and the go-getters. They overturn established perceptions and manage to achieve what many others say are not possible. He explains constrains that the human brain places on innovative thinking. This comes down to fear of failure, the urge to be “normal” and accepted and the tendency to interpret sensory information in recognisable ways. 

Berns discusses the practical ways in which we can unleash our existing potential to think differently. These include seeking out new environments, novel experiences and first-time acquaintances. 

The question is; how do we teach ourselves to think differently and as such behave differently?

Thinking Differently

In his book, Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman points out that we have two thought processes on the go. 

One is slow, building skill and knowledge that enables us to access and categorise a bulk of confirmations about our lives and our realities.

The other style is an exhilarated form of thinking, which takes place when we are forced to recognise new confirmations or respond to emotional urges which in the end impacts how we treat other people. 

Both of these thought processes are active in our daily lives, but the fast thinking one more so than the slow one. What this all has to do with creative thinking is that if we can balance how we think differently with how we grow skill and knowledge we might be able to bridge the gap between the two. 

Creativity is something that can be practiced and the more stimulated we are the more creative we will become. In the end we need to ask ourselves: “Can we create a definite link between thinking fast and thinking slow?” This might just be the answer to being able to think differently and as such creatively. 

The key question isn’t "What fosters creativity?” But it is why in God’s name isn’t everyone creative? Where was the human potential lost? How was it crippled? I think therefore a good question might be not why do people create? But why do people not create or innovate? We have got to abandon that sense of amazement in the face of creativity, as if it were a miracle if anybody created anything - Abraham Maslow

Sound Idea Digital is a full digital marketing agency. For more information, contact 012 66 44 227 or email to info@soundidea.co.za

Carina Claassens is a Writer for Sound Idea Digital l carina@soundidea.co.za l @SoundIdea l www.soundidea.co.za