Chesters Kevin - The Creative Nudge

Laurence King Publishing
An imprint of Quercus Editions Ltd
www.laurenceking.com/student

Thats because we are all born creative, with the ability to think laterally. To problem-solve creatively in everyday life. Capable of original ideas and thoughts. So, the good news is that its already in there. It hasnt gone for good or shrunk, no matter how long it has been since you last saw it. Your creative self is sitting there patiently, waiting for you.

Creativity isnt a job title. Its not about being an artist. Creativity isnt even about being able to draw (despite what your art teacher may have told you). Some of the least creative people we know can draw brilliantly. Creativity is a way of looking at the world in whatever field you are in. Even a big muddy field. Theres creativity in every industry, every walk of life. Breakthroughs in science or technology dont come by accepting what people have already told us. The future is in the hands of creative thinkers.

Creativity demands that you force your brain out of autopilot. Engage it. Train it to accept new things. Creativity is being brave enough to do new things in new ways exhilarated by the challenge and the fear. Its about taking risks. Being open to new ideas. Following your own path. Turning your back on the familiar and the ordinary. Its about being extraordinary. Creativity unlocks the door to a more colourful and vibrant world of possibilities. Yes, of course its a bit scary. But where would the fun be if it wasnt?

Imagine being able to look and think beyond the constraints and pressures life imposes on you. Imagine being able to sprinkle a little magic onto the mundane. It only takes a few simple nudges.

It doesnt matter who you are, how old you are or what you do for a living, you were born with the ability to think creatively. Its time to unleash it.

You can only teach people how not to be creative.

Creativity is something that we unlearn. Evolution, society, education, the workplace, life, all do a great job in helping us to unlearn it. They tell us how to think, how to behave, how to fit in. Dont rock the boat, stick to what you know, failures not an option. These insidious little thought worms are holding you back. Its very unlikely that there was a point in your life when you decided that you were no longer going to be in any way creative. Instead, creativity has been stolen from you bit by tiny bit without you even noticing. As creatures we are desperate to fit in to be accepted by the herd. Its how we have learned to survive. Were hard-wired to emulate the behaviours of others. This is the reason why the fashion industry, for one, is so successful; we signal our desire to identify with others. Why else would rational beings all wear ripped jeans, then flares, then skinny fit, then stone wash, then hipsters? To reverse the process, were going to help you overcome this biological and sociological double whammy and let all that wonderful, brave, original creative thinking come flooding back into your life.

So, all you need to do is unlearn everything.

Dont worry. Its easier than it sounds. Well, we say its easy more to encourage you than because we really believe it. Nothing worth doing is ever easy. But it is possible.

The brains connections are like a series of roads. The things you know are built like highways, and the things you dont, like single-lane mud tracks. The more familiar you are with a thought or a concept, i.e. the more it is drummed into you, the stronger the connection will be. This means our brains default to working with what we know. So, basically, unless you have an intense and passionate curiosity that forces you to challenge it, your brains sat nav will always default to taking you to the main road. This book aims to give you the tools to turn off that main road, start to embrace the mud track, and reclaim your creativity. Those tools are nudges.

Before we get going on our journey to unleash your creative you, a quick note on nudges. Chances are you havent heard of them yet. Dont worry, by the time youve got to the end of this book, not only will you be bristling with creativity, youll also be something of an expert on the humble but powerful nudge.

What is a nudge? At its most basic a nudge is a little change to our behaviour or thought patterns that can have a disproportionately large impact on an outcome. A nudge can be making things a little easier, a little simpler and sometimes, a little more motivating. Leaving your gym kit next to your bed so youre more likely to go to the gym in the morning thats a nudge. The closely spaced aisles in supermarkets that make us feel like were travelling too fast, so we slow down and buy the items they want us to buy. Thats a nudge too. Putting pictures of kids on road signs to get us to slow down. All simple nudges that can have a huge effect.

Nudges can often seem obvious but as humans we become such creatures of habit that we frequently need to be prodded, both metaphorically and physically, into waking up to the possibilities of the world around us. Nudges can be as simple as renaming or reframing things so that we think of them in a different, and more positive, way. Like the brilliant Organising Committee for the London 2012 Olympic Games, renaming volunteers as Games Makers. It entirely changed the way we viewed a worthy chore. Who on earth wouldnt want to be an Olympic Games Maker? It became the hottest ticket of the entire Games. Another simple nudge of this kind was renaming the non-drinker on a night out as the Designated Driver instantly transforming a zero into a hero.

A nudge is the choice, the action, the use of language or the thing that nudges us in a particular direction influencing how we see the world and decide to act. Nudges dont require a big lifestyle change. You dont have to become a monastic devotee or find an extra three hours in your day for a difficult set of rules and regulations. No one has the time for that. The key to nudges is that they are small, simple changes that can have surprisingly far-reaching effects. (Probably why they are called nudges and not shoves.)

Nudge theory has been about for a while, but in scientific terms it is barely out of nappies. It is part of a field of study called behavioural economics that won a Nobel Prize in 2002. It was such a new thing that the Nobel laureate in question, Daniel Kahneman, had effectively invented a whole new science. In 2010, the UK government, realizing the potential power of nudges to shape the behaviours of the population, launched the worlds first nudge unit. It proved so successful that there are now hundreds across the globe, including the highly influential Social and Behavioral Sciences Team in the USA and the Behavioural Insights Unit in New South Wales, Australia. These small, often invisible, interventions have had us doing all sorts of things that we dont really want to do but, in truth, are mostly for our own good. Like paying our taxes on time, driving at a safe speed, even cutting down on sugar. Lets face it, if they were things that we really wanted to do, chances are we would probably be doing them already.