Creative Think_ Heraclitus

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Heraclitus

The Sun Is New Each Day

Let's chec k in with Herac litus, the ancient Greek philosopher whom I consider to be the wo rld'sfirst creativity teacher . His thought for today is:

"The sun is new each day."

Like just about all of Heraclitus' insights, this one c an be interpre ted in a v ariety of ways. But

today, the c reativity strategy I see in his words is:

6/7/2009 Creative Think: Heraclitus

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Think Again.Life co ntinually surprises us.

Problems spring up in places that were trouble-free only just y esterday . Opportunities arise inlong stagnant arenas. Routines that yielded predictable r esults stop working.

Herac litus reminds us that nothing is permanent and we shouldn't bec ome slaves to o urassumptions.

We shou ld also remember that like the sun in Heraclitus' epigram, our own state of mind is alsocontinually c hanging.

Some days yo u may be alert and lucid, while others y ou may be angry or mentally ex hausted.

Sometimes yo u're op timistic abo ut what's just around the corner, and sometimes y ou're filled with melancholy about the past.

All of these states of mind "co lor" the way we think about the p roblems and o pportunities before

us.

What issue do yo u need to rethink? Is the idea y ou reacted against yesterday really so bad? Doesthe idea you fell in love with last week still shine? What would benefit from a fresh look?

Posted on 1 2 May 200 8 | Permalink | Comments (7 ) | TrackBack (0)Technorati Tags: Herac litus, New Perspectiv e, Think Again

Beware of "Moreness"

It's been a while since we've checked in with Herac litus (the ancient Greek philosopher who was

the world's first creativity teacher). His words of wisdom for us today are:"The way up and the way down

are one and the same."

What does this mean? Well, it's pretty enigmatic.

But I think there's a creativ e strategy implicit in this insight, andI interpret it to be:

"Beware of Moreness."

When things are made larger , they take on a complex, new life of their own, and unexpected ev en undesirable things canhappen.

Here's an ex ample.

Let's say that y ou have a recipe for strawberry shortcake thatserves four people.

One day y ou invite ov er sev en friends to eat this desert. To make it, you simply do uble therecipe's proportions.

On another occasion, you make it only for y ourse lf and a friend, and yo u halve theproportions.




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Now, let's suppose that you inv ite 50,000 people ov er for strawberry shortcake. A t thispoint, the biggest challenges confronting y ou hav e nothing to do with the recipe. Theseinclude buy ing strawberries on the commodities market, making deals with the teamsters todelive r enough c ream, traffic-flow coordination, and large-scale renting of tables, chairs, bowls, and spoons.

The same things can happen when situations become larger: issues come up that weren't ev enthought abo ut in the or iginal plans.

Two q uestions to ask y ourself as y ou c ontemplate a c urrent problem or issue:

Where would yo u be be tter serv ed with "less" rather than more?

What problems might hav ing "more" create for y ou?

Posted on 0 5 February 2008 | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBack (0)Technorati Tags: Herac litus, Less, More

What's Your Creative Thinking Style?

It's time again for some inspiration from Heraclitus, the world's first creativ ity teacher (he livedaround 5 00 BC). Today 's insight is: I searc hed into my self.

Herac litus felt that consulting our own knowledge and intuition is a wonderful way to gaininsight. Unfortunately , some of us never learned this lesson. Much of our educational system isan elaborate game of "guess what the teac her is thinking," and we co me to believ e that the b estideas are in someone else's head rather than our own. Herac litus reminds us that there are goodideas within ourselv es if we are willing to dig deeply enough.

I be lieve there's a creative strategy in Herac litus' insight, and it is:

Discover your own creative style. We can emulate Heraclitus by searching for own creativ e tendencies. Here are six of mine:

1 . I get my ideas either when I 'm under a lo t of pressure "the ultimate inspiration is thedeadline" or when I'm away from the problem altoge ther. I rarely get them when I'm




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doing routine tasks that require so me attention.

2. If I'm mentally bloc ked in trying to so lve a prob lem, it's usually because I 'm in love with aparticular idea so much so that it prev ents me from looking for alternativ es. Only when Iforce my self to become de tached from it and "kiss it goodby e" do I find new answers. Letting

go of a prev iously c herished idea can be one of life's great pleasures.3. I try to pay attention to small things: how much frowning takes place in beercommercials, what sorts of patterns dead leaves make around a storm drain, and so on. I dothis partly bec ause I've trained my self to do it, but also bec ause I've been forced to. I'm left-handed, but the world is designed for right-handed people something most "righties" don'tev en think about. I 'm constantly being made conscious of how things are put together. Forex ample, telephone boo ths are designed to make right-handed people feel comfortable andat ease, but lefties can feel clumsy using them.

4. My own ego c an get in the way o f discov ering new things. Howev er, if I allow myself to

lower my resistance to those ideas that I typically dismiss as irrelev ant or unattractiv e, Ifind that they c an become doo rways to solutions I'v e been ov erlooking.

5. I don't know what I don't know. I've got a b ig blind spot, and the o nly way to get ac cess to what's lurking out there is to put my self in a humble, receptiv e frame of mind (not alwayseasy to do) and ask others to point out what I'm not seeing.

6. Rejection of my work in the early phases of the creativ e proc ess doesn't bother me . I'mnot afraid of taking one of my less than stellar ideas and asking complete strangers whatthey think of it. I find their re sponses frank and refreshing.

Questions: What's your creative sty le? What are y our strengths and weaknesses?

Posted on 29 Nov ember 2007 | Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBack (0)Technorati Tags: Creative Thinking, Heraclitus, Roger von Oech

Disrupt Success

"Every walking animal is drivento its purpose with a whack."

In my prev ious post, Embrace Failure, I prov ided one interpretation of the above epigram fromHerac litus, (the enigmatic ancient Greek philosopher whom I consider to be the wo rld's first"creativity teacher").

Like all of Herac litus' epigrams, this one can be interp reted in a v ariety of ways. I b elieve there'sanother c reativ e strategy here, and it is: "Disrupt Success."




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Success c an make us complacent. We think,

"Everything's fine; things are working why change them?"

So we stop try ing new approaches. Often it's only when our suc cess is threatened that we seek tomake improvements. As I 've mentioned before, sometimes we need a good "whack on the side of the head" to get us focused on our purpose.

An ex ample is the "sailing ship syndro me," named after the burst of innov ation in the mid-19th-century sailing-ship industry . Only after it became obv ious that the steamship would dominatethe commerc ial sailing ship did the sailing ship reach its peak o f efficiency .

Faced with the challenge of steam, sailing ships reduced the av erage westward c rossing of the Atlantic from fiv e weeks in 1840 to three weeks in 1860. Many of the changes that made thisincrease in speed possible could have been made decade s earlier, but it was only when faced with elimination that the motiv ation was present to do so.

Moral: to remain successful, sometimes we need to oppose o r destroy the v ery things thatenabled us to be succ essful in the first place.

Question: What prev iously suc cessful assumptions can you challenge?




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Posted on 1 4 September 200 7 | Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBack (0)Technorati Tags: Herac litus, Motiv ation, Roger v on Oech, Succ ess

Embrace Failure

It's been a while since we've checked in with Herac litus, the enigmatic ancient Greek philosopher whom I c onsider to be the world's first "creativity teacher." Let's do so now. His thought fortoday is:

"Every walking animal is drivento its purpose with a whack."

Like all of Herac litus' epigrams, this one can be interp reted in a v ariety of ways. I b elieve thecreative strategy Herac litus is adv ocating here is: "Embrace failure."

Like o ther walking animals, sometimes we need a good "whack on the side of the head" to get usfocused on our purpose. One thing that "whacks" our thinking is failure it jolts us out of ourroutines and forc es us to look for fresh approaches.

Think about it: our er ror r ate in any activ ity is a function of our familiarity with that activ ity. I f we are doing things that are ro utine for us, then we will probably make very few errors. But if weare doing things that have no precedence in our ex perience or are try ing different approaches,




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then we will be making our share o f mistakes. Innov ators may not bat a thousand far from it but they do get new ideas.

Erro rs serv e a useful purpose : they tell us when to change direction. When things go smoothly , we generally dont think about them. To a great ex tent, this is bec ause we function acc ording to

the principle of negative feedbac k. Often it is only when things or peo ple fail to do the ir job thatthey get our attention. For ex ample, y ou are pro bably not thinking about y our kneecaps rightnow. Thats because ev ery thing is fine with them. The same goes for y our elbo ws: they are alsoperforming their function no prob lem at all. But if you were to b reak a leg, you wouldimmediately notice all the things you could no longer do, but which y ou used to take forgranted.

Negative feedback means that the current approach isnt working, and its up to y ou to find anew one. We learn by trial and error, not by trial and rightness. If we did things correctly ev ery time, we would nev er hav e to c hange course, and wed end up with more of the same.

Indeed, most peo ple dont change when they see the light. They change when they feel theheat. A friend of mine who had been fired from a job told me: Y eah, getting fired was really traumatic, but it turned out to b e the best thing that ev er happened to me. It forced me to co meto grips with who I was as a person. I had to loo k at my strengths and weaknesses with nodelusions at all. It forced me to get out of my box and scramble. Six months later, I was in amuch better situation.

The same is true for large institutions, associations, and organizations. After the supertankerEx xo n Valdez broke open off of Alaska in the spring of 1989, thereby polluting the coast withmillions of gallons of oil, the petroleum industry was forc ed to r ethink and toughen up many of its safety standards regarding petro leum transport. The disintegration of the Challenger (1986)and Columbia (200 3) space shuttles c aused a similar thing to happen at NASA. Similarly , thesinking of the Titanic (1 912) led to the c reation of the International Ice Patrol, and legally mandated iceberg reporting. The September 11 terro rist attack on the World Trade Centerforced architec ts to significantly raise their fire retardation standards in new high-rise buildingconstruction. The catastrophic 200 4 Indian Ocean Tsunami forc ed world seismic monitoringauthorities to c hange how they disseminate and share warning information.

We learn by our failures. Our erro rs are the "whacks" that lead us to think something different.

Question: Where hav e y ou benefited from a rec ent failure?

Posted on 1 1 September 20 07 | Permalink | Comments (14) | TrackBack (0)Technorati Tags: Error s, Failure, Herac litus, Roger von Oech

Donkeys Prefer Garbage to Gold, Part I I

In a rece nt post, I introduc ed the following enigmatic epigram from the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus:

"Donkeys prefer garbage to gold."Like mo st of Heraclitus' ideas, this epigram c an be

understoo d in a variety of ways. I think thecreative strategy here is:




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Recognize that things change their value.Herac litus is saying is be careful what you striv etoward because it just might change its value.

This moral is brought home in a prov ocativeepisode of the early 1 960s telev ision series TheTwilight Zone, e ntitled "The Rip Van WinkleCaper."

After robbing a bullion train from For t Knox, fourthieves stow their fortunes in gold bricks in a caveand enter suspended animation for o ne hundred year s, certain that they will ev ade all pursuit.

When they awaken a century later, they find thattheir plan has worked perfectly exc ept for oneproblem: when they try to spend their preciousmetal, they discover that it doesn't have the v aluethey thought it would.

Because o f advances in industrial chemicalengineering in the interv ening years, go ld has become a ubiquitous commodity and is actually worth less than its weight in water.

A few questions to think about:

Will what yo u're str iving for still be valuablein the future?Under what circumstances might its value change?Might something you now consider worthless on take on value in the future?

Posted on 07 June 2007 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1 )Technorati Tags: Creativ ity, Herac litus, Roger v on Oech, The Rip V an Winkle Caper, TwlightZone

Donkeys Prefer Garbage to Gold, Part I

It's been a while since we've checked in with Herac litus, the ancient Greek philosopher whom Iconsider to be the wo rld's first "creativity teache r." Let's do so now. His thought for today is:

"Donkeys prefer garbage to gold."Like just about all of Herac litus' enigmaticepigrams, this one can be interpreted in a variety of way s. Here's one "take" on it:

Realize that people value different things. What's important to one person c an be o f little

consequence to another. For ex ample, how wellthe Y ankees perform this weekend matters




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greatly to a New Y ork baseball enthusiast buthardly at all to a Helsinki accountant.

What's sacred to one gro up can be profane toanother. For example, a hamburger

establishment on Michigan Av enue will attractcustomers: on the banks of the Ganges it will draw outrage.

What's unthinkable in one culture can be asnatural as breathing in another. For ex ample,candy manufacturers in dev eloped co untries usespecial co lor agents to avoid staining the tongue;in developing countries some people preferhaving a candy-stained mouth because it boastsof having disposable income.

Thus, your "golden idea" may be just so muchgarbage in someone else's estimation and v ice versa.

Some questions to think about:

Do other people v alue your idea the way y ou do?How can y ou help them understand your perspective?In what ways do y ou need to educate y ourself about other points of v iew? What are y ou ov erly concerned about that's really not such a big deal?

What's y our blind spot about not seeing cultural differences? Also see : "Donkeys Prefer Garbage to Gold, Part I I."

Posted on 0 6 June 2007 | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)Technorati Tags: Creativity , Herac litus, Roger v on Oech

Forgive

Let's chec k in with Herac litus, the ancient Greek philosopher whom I consider to be the wo rld'sfirst creativity teacher . His thought for today is:

"The sun is new each day."




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Like just abou t all of Heraclitus' insights, this one c an be interpre ted in a v ariety of ways. Buttoday, the c reativity strategy I see in his words is:

Forgive.

The act of forgiv ing can help us let go of past assumptions and also open o ur minds up to new possibilities. Here's an historical ex ample.

After World War I, the v ictor ious co untries, still smarting from the ir huge financial outlays,demanded reparations from Germany. This was the most co stly po litical decision of the entire World War I era. It undermined Germany 's enfeebled eco nomic political sy stem, and fostered

the conditions that led to the rise o f Hitler.

A generation later , after World War II, Europe again faced ec onomic and political chaos. Butinstead of demanding reparations from the v anquished Ax is powers, the Allies took the oppositeapproac h. Through its massive Marshall Plan aid, the United States helped to build much o f the

continent's infrastructure, including Germany's.

In doing so, it created c onditions that encouraged ec onomic health and political stability. By not perpetuating past grievances, they br oke the cy cle of war and pove rty that had cost the

world tens of millions of lives in the first half of the twentieth century .

Question: What can y ou forgiv e in a cur rent pro blem or situation? What new assumptions can you bring into play? What solutions does that now make possible?




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Posted on 3 0 March 2 007 | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBack (0)Technorati Tags: Creativity , Forgiv eness, Herac litus, Marshall Plan, Roger v on Oech

Be Willing to Be Led Astray

It's been a while since we've checked in with Herac litus (the ancient Greek philosopher whom Iconsider to be the word's first world's first creativ ity te acher). Let's do so now and see whatadv ice he c an offer us. His words for today are:

Expect the unexpected,or you wont find it.

As alway s, Heraclitus can be interpreted in a variety of ways. The cr eativity strategy I see hereis:

Be willing to be led astray.

When we ex plore for ideas and information, sometimes we find things that are be tter o r moreex citing than what we were originally looking for. Thus, we need to keep our minds open tounsought-for possibilities.

For ex ample, in the 1930s phy sicist Karl Jansky improv ised a new antenna to study the effects




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of telephone static. Instead, he discov ered radio wav es from the Milky Way galaxy , and in theprocess helped create the science o f radioastronomy.

In 1 856, chemist William Perkin searched for a synthetic quinine to combat malaria. Instead, hediscov ered a dy estuff (he called it Mauveline, which the public shortened to mauv e) that was

the first practical synthetic color.In 1984, biologist Alex Jeffrey s studied the gene for the muscle protein myloglobin, hoping togain an understanding of how genes ev olv e. Instead, he stumbled on a stretc h of DNA in themiddle of that gene that varied gre atly from one individual to another . This led to his pioneering work in the creation of DNA fingerprinting, which has rev olutionized not only forensic science but also other disciplines such as anthropo logy and epidemiology .

Think of the times in your own life when one thing has led to something entirely different. How did yo u get interested in your line of work? How about the times youv e gone to the library insearch o f a particular boo k, and then found something ev en better on the shelf behind you?

As writer Franklin Adams put it,I find that a great part of the information

I hav e was acquired by looking up somethingand finding something else on the way .

Here's my question for y ou: What mindset do y ou adop t when you want to see and takeadvantage of the unexpec ted?

This is what I do (sometimes it works fine, and sometimes less so ):

1. I try to loosen my preco nceptions about what I expect to find in a situation;

2. I pay special attention to the anomalous things I come upon rather than ignoring them; and,3. I try to use what I discov er as stepping stones to something very different.

When Im in a hurry o r narrowly focused on a task, I hav e a hard time adopting this mindset.That's because I tend to filter out information that strikes me as irrelevant. Conv ersely , whenIm relaxed or playful, theres a greater probability that unexpected things flow my way.

What works for y ou?

Posted on 25 February 200 7 | Permalink | Comments (10 ) | TrackBack (0)Technorati Tags: Alex Jeffrey s, Expect the Unex pecte d, Herac litus, Karl Jansky, Roger v onOech, William Perkin

Use Your "Forgettery"

It's time for some wisdom from Herac litus, the ancient Greek philosopher whom I consider to b ethe world's first creativ ity teac her. His words today are : "Knowing many things doesn't teachinsight."




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As with all of Heraclitus' ideas, there are many ways to interpr et this. What stands out for me,though, is this creative strategy :

Practice forgetting.

I think what he's getting at is this: forgetting what we know at the appropr iate time can be animportant means for gaining insight. This is illustrated in the story about a c reativ ity te acher who invited a student to his house for afternoon tea. They talked for a while, and then it wasteatime. The teacher poured some tea into the student's cup. Even after the cup was full, hecontinued to pour, and soon tea ov erflowed onto the floor.

Finally, the student said, "Y ou must stop pouring; the tea isn't going into the c up." The teacherreplied, "The same is true with yo u. If you are to r ece ive any of my teachings, yo u must firstempty out the c ontents of yo ur mental cup." His point: without the ability to forget, our mindsremain cluttered with ready -made answers, and we're not motiv ated to ask the questions thatlead our thinking to new ideas.

For ex ample, one day on his regular walk past the local blacksmith's workshop on the island of Samos, the ancient Greek philosopher Pythagor as temporarily forgot that the banging soundsproduc ed by the smith's hammering of iron bars were "noise" his usual reaction and instead viewed them as "information." He soo n discov ered that musical pitch is a function of the lengthof the material being struck his first principle o f mathematical physics.

Remember: every one has the ability to forget. The art is knowing when to use it. Indeed,nov elist Henry Miller once stated:

"My 'forgettery' has been just as importantto my success as my memory."

Some questions to think about:

What conv entional wisdom are you re lying on? What would happen if you forgot theobv ious answers that spring to mind and searched for new ones?

Posted on 1 5 January 200 7 | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBack (0)




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