Roya A Azadi - How to Be a Creative Thinker

Some are creative, some arent this is the myth were dealing with.

There are more myths that creativity and art are one and the same, and that great ideas must be fantastically original but the idea that creativity is gifted to you at birth is the most pervasive, and the most dangerous.

Dangerous because it erases the strength of our will. Dangerous because its a kind of psychological quicksand that we sink into further the more we try to wiggle out of it. Dangerous because its a good excuse to not do much of anything.

From childhood we are fed stories of a creative genius whose ideas miraculously appear in their mind one day, fully formed and imminently funded. Theres a short backstory of something important happening in a garage or some kind of easily recognisable promise shown as a child, and the next thing you know, youre sharing the TED Talk. This is legend-making at work. We have told stories like this for generations, knowing (if only subconsciously) that if we imbue these people with an element of unknowable magic, we might live vicariously through them, believing ourselves lucky for living in a world inhabited by the divine. But in telling and re-telling these stories, generations have been robbed of the reality of things: creativity is not magical or divine or rare.

Creativity can be learnt.

Now, theres a dangerous idea.

Ask yourself, am I creative? The answer is a definitive and resounding yes. The real question we should be asking is, do you have what you need to be creative?

Thats what were here to help with.

Simply put, creativity is connecting existing things (ideas, aesthetics, technology, etc.) into something previously unrealised. Like a LEGO sculpture, the wider the array of blocks you have available, and the more time and effort put into the final result, the more inventive the outcome.

In 1926, Graham Wallas, social psychologist and London School of Economics co-founder, wrote The Art of Thought and walked through what he had distilled as four stages of the creative process. In 1939, A Technique for Producing Ideas was written by James Webb Young, which outlined five stages of ideation. More still have followed in their footsteps and tried to break down creativity into a scientific process something that can be pulled apart, its insides studied, quantified and easily explained to others. Regardless of the number of stages, the processes for creativity all more or less follow the same route:

* Stage One: Preparation. This stage focuses on gathering information and materials, spotting inspiration and acquiring the knowledge you need to deal with the problem at hand.

* Stage Two: Incubation. With the raw materials firmly in place, this stage is about soaking it in. As the ideas percolate, connections are formed and the new concept begins to take shape. This stage can be done somewhat passively as the unconscious mind engages in what Einstein called combinatory play throwing together combinations in your mind to see what will stick.

* Stage Three: Illumination. This is the illusive eureka moment. During the Incubation stage, an insight arises and floats to the conscious mind seemingly out of nowhere, Aha! you have come up with a (seemingly) original idea.

* Stage Four: Verification. This is where pen comes to paper, emails are sent and the vision begins to come to life. The mind focuses and gets to work.

As with all things, creativity lays on a spectrum. Psychologists say that everyone is capable of little c creativity, such as artistic expression or coming up with unique insights. The big C Creatives the ones who come up with industry-altering ideas like the invention of the smartphone, or the wood sponge, a material designed to absorb oil from water tend to be highly trained specialists. And between the creatives and the Creatives is a ladder that we can move ourselves along.

Little c creativity: this is all of us. Its the arrangement of your living room in a way youre proud of.

Mastery: This is where some master their discipline and surrounding knowledge enough to practise the full range of activities required in that area. This is taking that love of arranging the living room and perhaps becoming a paid interior designer, bringing your knowledge and instinct into other peoples homes or workspaces, and making them both unique and beautiful, every time.

Innovation: Of these masters, a small set will encounter and solve problems that require innovative techniques or tools, and this will push the boundaries of what was thought could be done. This might be the interior designer who pioneers a new aesthetic style that comes to represent that moment in time.

Big C Creativity: Of these innovators, an even smaller set will invent entirely new industries or techniques to address previously unforeseen problems. An example is the work of Charles and Ray Eames, the visionary industrial designers who saw design as an agent of social change and became a part of the Wests story of post-war modernisation.

Its a ladder you cant get to the first level without starting at the bottom. When you start out, no one knows (including you) how far up the ladder you might be able to go, but there is success and satisfaction at every level. Getting to the next rung will depend on how well you can create and maintain the conditions you need for your creativity to take root and grow.

Having the instructions is one part, but where are the ingredients in this recipe? How do you go about gathering the knowledge you need at the Preparation stage? Or giving your mind the space and place to percolate those thoughts during Incubation? How do you catch an aha moment when it happens during the Illumination stage? Or maintain the discipline and the self-confidence to actually turn your idea into something real and tangible during Verification?

This book, a coming together of the neuroscience, psychology and philosophy of the various conditions required for creativity to take root, is organised to align with the stages (see upcoming graphic). The Preparation stage relates to what I call Collecting, where we explore how to cultivate the curiosity and generalism needed to collect the dots. The Incubation and Illumination stages align with what I call Connecting, where we look to see how boredom, daydreaming and your environment can help you connect the dots into new and interesting combinations. The Verification stage aligns with Doing, where we dig into how rituals and small steps are crucial in turning those connections into something real.

And because this book is not just explaining a process for creativity but helping you create it, youll find a fourth section titled Feeling, where failure and self-belief come to the foreground.

Because what use is collecting and connecting dots into the greatest idea in the world if you dont think you can pull it off?

In each chapter, youll find out the what and why of each of these conditions for creativity, with studies from around the world, words of advice from thinkers old and new and, most crucially, practical exercises designed by those who know.