The one-sentence summary

You can be more creative if you train yourself to think differently.

WHAT THE BOOK SAYSART OF CREATIVE THINKING

  • Once you understand the creative process, you can train yourself to listen, look and read with a creative attitude. Techniques include:
  • Using the stepping stones of analogy (use normal things to suggest new uses)
  • Make the strange familiar and the familiar strange (analyse what you don’t know about something you know well)
  • Widen your span of relevance (many inventions were conceived by those working in other fields)
  • Be constantly curious
  • Practise serendipity (the more you think, the more it appears you are in “the right place at the right time”)
  • Making better use of your Depth Mind (trust your sub-conscious to sort things out and generate solutions once you have “briefed it”)
  • Learn to tolerate ambiguity
  • Suspend judgement
  • No one should wait for inspiration –you have to make it happen

WHAT’S GOOD ABOUT IT

  • This rather brilliant short book was originally written in 1990, so it is not riddled with modern jargon or method. It just tells it straight.
  • Chance favours the prepared mind. By keeping your eyes open, listening for ideas and keeping a notebook, you can capture stimuli as they occur.
  • It is full of inspirational comments from artists, scientists and philosophers:
  • “I invent nothing; I rediscover.” Rodin
  • “Everything has been thought of before, but the problem is to think of it again.” Goethe
  • “Discovery consists of seeing what everyone has seen and thinking what nobody has thought.” Anon

WHAT YOU HAVE TO WATCH

  • Nothing. Everyone should read it for life use as well as just creative thinking in business.