What Happened to Creative Thinking?
“Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.”
— Albert Einstein
“Minds, like parachutes, work only when open.”
— Sir James Dewar, Scottish scientist
“I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living. It’s a way of looking at life through the wrong end of the telescope. Which is what I do, and that enables you to laugh at life’s realities.”
— Dr. Seuss
Why is it that children seem to have the most imagination? Were we not all children at one point? When and why did we lose our creative imagination? How can we get it back?
One of the primary reasons creativity diminishes over the years is that, as we grow, we hear, “No, you can’t” and “That’s not possible” more and more. The perception of what reality is and what your limitations are is reinforced over and over again. It’s all BS. Don’t let anyone tell you what you can or cannot accomplish, what your reality is, or who you are and what you’re capable of. You create your own reality and your own perceptions. Use your brain. Be creative. Imagine the reality you want for yourself, not the one you’re told you have.
One of the most successful business people in the world, strangely enough, has one of the most abstract and creative minds of all times. His name is Jay Abraham. He uses concepts and strategies that others would call crazy or not even think possible. Yet he employs them successfully and has earned the title “The $9 Billion Dollar Man” because of it.
Some of the most abstract and creative artists of their time — like Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dali — are some of the most famous painters in the world. If they weren’t creative, would they be so famous? I wonder.
Start getting back the creativity and imagination that you have gradually forgotten about. You had it once before! Start thinking more creatively and more strategically. Look outside the “big picture” into a reality that hasn’t happened yet. See what others don’t see, and you could be rewarded handsomely.
What are you working toward right now? Have you mentally created the life you want to have, or are you settling for what you think you’re capable of? Create the life you want to have. Then work toward it. It doesn’t work very well the other way around. That is why most people never live the life they want. They spend their whole lives working toward an undefined purpose. What is your purpose?
“His head is made of stars, but not yet arranged into constellations.”
— Elias Canetti
Random Fact
Cows can go up stairs, but not down stairs.
