Your problems in Creativity. Changing your perspective. Look again, for the first time.
We are learning to see. How can we know where the solutions may lie if we’re unwilling to look? Or, if we’re only willing to look here, where we’ve always looked, and not here, where we never do? What if someone has already solved our problem and we just didn’t know it? What would that mean to us? What would that mean to our company? What would that mean to our industry? What is easier than always doing things the same way because that’s just the way we’ve always done them? Because that’s what has made us successful in the past? Resting on laurels is rarely the path forward. Yes, honor the past, but there’s more to the future than we currently see. Like change we cannot see coming. Like incorrect business (and weather) forecasts. Like other blindsides.
What if there’s a better way to look at this? What if the solution exists, just outside of our own domain, our own perception? What if we’re looking in the wrong place?
It’s no wonder we’ve got creative problems.
What if we took field trips to learn how to see again? We used to take field trips a long time ago, back in elementary school. We left the building to go and to see for ourselves what was happening. We left for new experiences, new perceptions, for the multi sensory happenings. We got outside the building because it was healthy for our creativity. It was a welcome break in our week to leave the rote drudgery of the classroom. We embraced the field trip with open arms as kids, and then we forgot about them as adults because we’re far too busy for that now. Which is why we’ve forgotten how to see. We’re focused on this tiny, 2% of our domain right here and we never leave the building. No wonder we’ve got creative problems. We’re blind to everything else going on around us in other disciplines, other industries, other buildings, other minds.
The irony is as hard as we’re working on solving the problem, great insights do not come from sitting there, contemplating the problem, forcing our conscious brains to dream up the solution. Our insight typically comes when we’re playing, loose from the constraints of work and we’re not focused on the problem at hand. We’ve pushed the problem into our unconscious mind so that it may work on the problem while we do other things seemingly unrelated to the work. Physical activities typically help. Games help. Leaving the building and going for a walk helps. The hard, distracted work we do sitting in front of screens in cubicles doesn’t. Creative release requires a change in context, in environment. You know, a field trip. The things we can do when we decide to leave the building to go and see for ourselves.
Problems are everywhere. They’re complex. They’re lurking. And no one has the time or inclination to solve them.
As Seth Godin reminds us, as modern sales and marketing pros, we’re learning to see. But we have to be willing to learn to see anew. To change our perspective.
How can we know where the solutions may lie if we’re unwilling to look? Or, if we’re only willing to look here, where we’ve always looked, and not here, where we never do?
What if someone has already solved our problem and we just didn’t know it? What would that mean to us? What would that mean to our company? What would that mean to our industry?
What is easier than always doing things the same way because that’s just the way we’ve always done them? Because that’s what has made us successful in the past? Resting on laurels is rarely the path forward. Yes, honor the past, but there’s more to the future than we currently see. Like change we cannot see coming. Like incorrect business (and weather) forecasts. Like other blindsides.
What if there’s a better way to look at this? What if the solution exists, just outside of our own domain, our own perception? What if we’re looking in the wrong place?
We’re too distracted and ironically disconnected to notice.
It’s no wonder we’ve got creative problems.
What if we took field trips to learn how to see again? We used to take field trips a long time ago, back in elementary school. We left the building to go and to see for ourselves what was happening. We left for new experiences, new perceptions, for the multi sensory happenings. We got outside the building because it was healthy for our creativity. It spawned new ideas and connections we wouldn’t otherwise get. It was a welcome break in our week to leave the rote drudgery of the classroom.
We embraced the field trip with open arms as kids, and then we forgot about them as adults because we’re far too busy for that now. Which is why we’ve forgotten how to see. We’re focused on this tiny, 2% of our domain right here. Worse, we never leave the building. We’ve got creative problems because we’re blind to everything else going on around us in other disciplines, other industries, other buildings, other minds.
The irony is as hard as we’re working on solving the problem, great insights do not come from sitting there, contemplating the problem, forcing our conscious brains to dream up the solution. Our insight typically comes when we’re playing, loose from the constraints of work and when we’re not focused on the problem at hand. We’ve pushed the problem into our unconscious mind so that it may work on the problem while we do other things unrelated to the work. Physical activities typically help. Games help. Leaving the building and going for a long walk helps. Field trips help. The hard, distracted work we do sitting in front of screens in cubicles doesn’t.
Creative insight requires a change in context, in environment. You know, a field trip.
The things we can do when we decide to leave the building to go and see for ourselves.
