Learn to be More Creative with These 4 Tools

When I say anyone can learn to be more creative, I mean anyone. Even me, as I sit here feeling much less creative than usual, trying to write about creativity! I’ll ask you to simply commit to the process, alongside me, and get more creative by the end of this post. Deal?

What is creativity? You may bring to mind artists and musicians, people with visible creative skills that a technically-skilled person looks at thinking, “I could never be creative like that.”

True, maybe you can’t produce a creative work of art or music. But that’s only a specific type of creativity. The true definition of creativity, in my and Edward de Bono’s opinion, is “breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way.”

Anyone can get stuck in patterns — based on conditioned perceptions, biases, convictions, and habitual routines. Even already-creative people can get stuck in their own patterns and need to find ways to shake up their process, or seek diverse viewpoints.

So, how can you learn to be more creative? Let’s look at 4 tools you can start using right now to come up with something different, and creative. These all can be done alone, but are also very effectively used by bringing a diverse group of minds together to brainstorm.

1. Movement (versus Judgement)

Ever come up with an idea and immediately think of reasons why it wouldn’t work? You are blocking your own creativity by judging yourself — you’re afraid of getting it wrong.

Remember, you’re in a creative process. You don’t have to be right, right now. The very first thing you need to do in order to reach a creative solution is to remove judgement and agree to “Yes, And” the situation in order to get to a new idea (“Yes, And:” an improv technique used in comedy to move a scene forward, and likewise is a technique you can use to move your creativity forward, and to create an environment of openness toward your and others’ ideas).

Let’s look at the creative process like a maze, with infinite doorways you could potentially walk through. When you commit to the process, you enter that maze. Defined by Edward de Bono (lots of him in here), Movement is a tool that is “not JUST a suspension of judgement,” and “not JUST a technique,” but an active mental process, an operation, and you’re using Movement to navigate this maze.

When you judge a thought or idea, it leaves that particular door shut and that area unexplored. Movement allows all doors to open, and allows us an openness to walk through them, AND to find other doors to open behind that one. It may not initially be the RIGHT door that leads to the end of the maze, but saying YES to it AND intentionally, skillfully moving beyond, creates the springboard necessary for breaking out of our regular patterns and seeing, well, some new and different doors we normally would never have opened ourselves to. Where the solution to the maze may lie.

2. Random Stimulation

Sometimes you need something to kickstart the creative process, an external force to introduce a pattern disruption for you. That’s OK, and very helpful!

Random Stimulation, or random association, is best done by introducing any random noun into a brainstorming (self or group) process and coming up with ideas around the problem at hand, based on that noun.

For example, let’s say the problem I want to solve is coming up with a new workshop to offer through my coaching business. I’m having trouble thinking of something myself, but I can find a random noun generator or grab a dictionary, and prompt myself using the word that comes up or that I randomly open to. Just now, when I opened the link for the random noun generator, the word “Failure” came up.

What ideas come up for you? Some initial thoughts that come to mind for workshop topics are “How to Fail Well,” “Bouncing Back from Failure,” “Facing Failure Daily.” I actually could go on — that was a good one.

But maybe noun #1 doesn’t click for you — that’s fine! Just go back and generate another noun, maybe even think of how the two new words could work together in a solution! Ooooh the second word that I got was “Affair.” Interesting! Although my coaching business has nothing to do with what typically comes to mind, extramarital affairs, I’m still thinking about failure…so what if there was a way to do a workshop about “An Affair with Failure,” talking about how it’s okay to fail sometimes and how you should actually LOVE failing because it helps you learn from your mistakes.

I’m 100% honestly coming up with all of these workshop ideas as I write this post, and feeling exponentially more creative. Did you start using the tools for anything you’re working on yet?

3. Analogy

Another way to kickstart your creativity, or continue on that path after using some of the other techniques, is Analogy. An analogy is when you compare one topic to another by saying that “this is like that” and describing why.

Using the Analogy tool, first you want to pick any typical daily action that seemingly has no connection with the current problem you’re trying to solve. Staying with my workshop example, I’m going to try coming up with more of a framework for it by comparing it to taking out the trash. For best results, have someone else come up with this random situation for you. I just yelled for my husband to give me something he would typically do during the day to get my example.

So, failing is like taking out the trash. Doesn’t sound very similar, but the next step is to dig for similarities, and use those ideas to find new ways to look at your problem. What’s similar here?

• Removal of smelly stuff is like failure because you need to cut out what causes failure.
• When you fail you throw away mistakes and put in a “clean garbage bag” to start over.
• When you take out the trash, you don’t keep it in your house. When you fail, you generally don’t keep doing the same action that caused that.
• Before you take out the trash, or accept failure, you want to evaluate what you have to dispose of, and what to keep/learn from: trash (things you know you won’t do again), recyclables (things that you can try again in a new way), and compostables (the lessons learned that you’ll keep around and as they break down and become part of you, you’ll use to feed other, new ideas). This one is going somewhere, I think!

And I could go on. I’m actually inclined to do a workshop on trash failure now! Are any good ideas for analogies coming up for you?

4. Reverse Thinking

When you are having trouble arriving at a solution to a problem, try Reverse Thinking. It’s exactly what it sounds like — thinking opposite of what you’re trying to address. So, instead of saying, “how can I help people have ‘an Affair with Failure?’” think, “how could I suggest that people resist failure?”

I’ll admit, I’m not sure how this one is going to help my workshop brainstorming, but this is about Movement, not judgement, and I’m going with it! Please join me.

First, brainstorm ideas for the reverse question — how can I suggest that people resist failure?

• Resist new things and don’t try anything new. There is safety in the “known.”
• Take pride in everything and never admit you are wrong.
• Take small steps, slowly, to make sure they work. Never try big things, only the small things.
• Take extreme caution at all times. Be very anxious about what other people think.
• Always give into fear. It’s not worth it.

The next step is to reverse all of those ideas again, to flip the negatives and come up with what to address in my workshop:

• Trying new things = life experience. The unknown is where learning, excitement, and LIFE happens.
• Admitting you are wrong is an essential part of learning and growing.
• Be willing to take big leaps. Baby steps only get you so far.
• No one ever became well-known for playing it safe. If others are criticizing you, it means you’re on the right track. Be willing to stand out.
• Overcoming fear is what makes you truly great.

Miraculously, I actually think I just came up with a very viable workshop topic through that process. I could use any of what I just came up with to teach people to have a passionate relationship with failure.

I’m actually going to offer a fifth BONUS tool, because I believe that all of this centers around one very important thing: Presence.

Presence is created through a dedicated practice of mindfulness, or meditation. It cultivates greater self-awareness, awareness of your surroundings, and willingness to be open to new possibilities. It encourages bringing a Beginner’s Mind to every situation and observing, rather than judging, among many other benefits. As a result, we can become more open to the process creativity and find breakthroughs that take us around our regular patterns, much more readily.

Are you ready to break out of your patterns and explore creativity? If you’ve had any creative breakthroughs during this process today, I’d invite you to please share them with me in the comments!