If you feel anything like us, your potential for creative thinking has noticeably diminished in the year of Corona.
Sitting at home, fear of the future, social distancing instead of brainstorming – all of this has not exactly helped us to be bursting with creative energy.
So how do we get back on track and increase our sagging creative potential? If you take a moment to search Google for ways to be more creative, you'll come across tips like daydreaming, meditation and relaxation as the key to finding creative ideas. The motto is: If you give your mind the opportunity to develop freely, your subconscious opens up and you can magically conjure up innovative ideas.
Since this line of thinking didn't fully convince us, we sat down with Shai Winiger, practicalpal.net's co-founder and Chief practicalpal.net Maker. Shai is a former design lecturer and product leader and has guided hundreds of students and employees on their path to creative thinking.;
Shai brings his – slightly different and unique – perspective on how to become more creative:
"In my experience, relaxed, unstructured thinking is the last thing you want when you're trying to come up with new ideas. Creative thinking requires an incredible amount of energy - it's a boxing match between your left and right brain. The left side fights for logic, while the right side wants to guide the process using emotions and explore the unknown."
So, how can you get your right and left brains to work together? Spoiler alert: It doesn't happen at the push of a button, but rather through a conscious action that requires a specific strategy.
Here they are, Shai’s personal creativity techniques:
1. Limit yourself
A common belief is that the key to creativity is the absence of boundaries – when in reality, the exact opposite is true.
Unlimited freedom leads to overextending your creative energy — exhausting yourself before any significant breakthrough can occur. Instead, says Shai, you should limit yourself to more structured thinking.
"Try to set some boundaries for yourself. Start by choosing one part of a larger problem - perhaps even completely at random - and focus all your creative energy on that one small aspect."
Let's say you're thinking about a possible campaign for your business, a handmade hat shop. Set yourself some boundaries during the process - something like the time of year, target audience, theme, etc.
For example, focus on hats for men with beards. The limitation you set may make you wonder - why only men ? Then you may have a good idea for a campaign that features female hat models with artificial birds. And that is more likely to attract people's attention.
2. Give yourself permission
One of the biggest hurdles to creative thinking is the fear that someone might reject your idea. This inner fear fuels many of our professional insecurities and often causes us to avoid crazy ideas.
Before you embark on your creative journey, Shai recommends the following:
"Make sure you have enough artistic freedom to express even completely crazy ideas freely and with a good feeling. You won't be able to produce anything good if you're constantly wondering what other people will think."
Don't be afraid of crazy ideas and let your creative thoughts run free.
3. Find your muse
Creativity doesn't happen in a vacuum. To be creative, you need to create an environment that encourages creative thinking, says Shai.
"Find out what you need to get into a creative flow. For some, it's working alone in the middle of the night with a glass of wine in hand. Others need an audience."
Although there are no hard and fast rules, most people need to be in a relatively good mood before they sit down to think creatively. In general, a positive mood helps solve problems in a creative way.
4. Find inspiration
The truth is that there are no truly original ideas – if you're lucky, you might stumble upon an original combination of ideas, says Shai:
“The more ingredients you give your brain, the more likely you are to stumble upon a great, original blend.”
So where do you find inspiration? Chances are that whatever topic you want to tackle already has a website for inspiration. If you're working on a UX project, start with Awwwards or the CSS Design Awards, or try out a few different products.
Remember, though, there's a fine line between inspiration and imitation. When looking at other people's projects, remember that they're trying to tackle a very different problem than you. Ultimately, this part of the process should be a bit like window shopping.
5. Write down your thoughts
Grab a pen and a piece of paper (yes, old school) and write your goals in capital letters on the first line. This will help you stay focused on the essentials. Then start putting your ideas on paper. Shai recommends the following method:
"After you write down your first idea, assume it's not good enough. Come up with 20 additional ideas. Identify the ones you liked and then take a closer look at them."
Don't evaluate your ideas as you write them down, and don't write complete sentences - this will only slow down the process. Let your writing become the flow of your creative consciousness, within the framework you have created.
Choose an idea you like and start working on it. Then ask yourself these tricky questions:
- Does the idea have the potential to significantly impact others in one way or another?
- Does anyone even care about my idea?
- Can my idea grow and impact more than 1,000 people?
After you've expanded on your favorite idea, there's a chance it won't make it through your three filters. For this reason, you should never get stuck on a single idea. You don't want to end up holding on to something that's less than ideal. Don't be afraid to throw the idea in the bin and start fresh. Or perhaps pull it out of your repertoire of ideas at another time.
6. Let your craziest idea guide you
Creativity requires permission to be open and fearless - not just to others, but to yourself too. Once you give yourself permission to think crazy thoughts, there are no limits to your imagination.
Confidence is the key to creativity. Avoid thinking in ways that limit you, such as what is and isn't allowed. And ultimately, choose the idea that is outside your comfort zone. Shai says:
"Your most outlandish ideas are often your best ideas. Even if it doesn't work the first time, make sure you keep pushing yourself to come up with boundary-pushing concepts. Creativity is a muscle that needs to be trained - just like many other skills."
Don't always play it safe and don't worry if your idea doesn't hit the spot right away. And don't worry if others don't understand it right away.
7. Organize a creative workshop
If the creative process involves several people, several short meetings are often not enough. On the contrary: they only prolong the creative process and tear you out of your flow.
Instead, Shai suggests holding targeted workshops to leverage your team as a creative resource.
“Find an inspiring environment, put on some pleasant music and bring everyone together for a long brainstorming session.”
One of the keys to successful workshops is to hold them outside the office. If the workshop takes place in the office, that is not ideal. Not only are there a thousand distractions, but the same environment makes it even more difficult to break away from familiar thought patterns.
Another key to running an effective workshop is to foster a creative environment. Be the first to voice an idea that goes against social norms and support colleagues who do the same. Creating an environment that encourages risk-taking, the opportunity to fail, and free expression leads to higher creative output, according to a study by Harvard professor Amy Edmondson.
8. Don’t be afraid of your inner misfit
If you've decided on an extremely creative idea, this is a good filter for you: If you were to present your idea in a corporate boardroom full of suits and ties, would you get some strange looks? If your answer is 'no', you're probably not thinking creatively enough. And now again in Shai's words:
"If you conform to everyone else's standards, you are not breaking any norms. Creativity comes from those who go against the flow, those who break the rules."
Let's go! Get ready to break some rules.