Page 151 - THE DO-IT-YOURSELF LOBOTOMY Open Your Mind to Greater Creative Thinking

142 AIDS TO CREATIVITY

Sometimes we’re shaken into action by a big problem when we real-
ize that what we’re doing doesn’t work. But it’s the great minds (or it’s
us when we’re thinking at our best) who, when faced with a situation
that does work, still wonder how it might work better. That happens
from observation.
I don’t know about you, but when I think of observation I think of
my eyes observing. Well, if observation as a concept is ill understood,
the listening aspect of observation is even less understood.

LISTENING ISA GREAT CREATIVE SKILL

A number of years ago, I attended a communications workshop and
learned something about conscious listening. We all think that we lis-
ten all day long. But let’s say you’re in a business meeting or a brain-
storming session, listening to a speech, or listening to a voice-mail
message, and someone’s remark sends your mind immediately off on a
tangent of how you might follow up or respond. If you’re thinking of
what your answer is going to be, you aren’t listening. You may be miss-
ing the answer to your own question being discussed by the other indi-
vidual. For example, in a lecture, you may not be getting everything
you desire from the speaker because you’re too busy going off on your
own mental tangent.
Listening means being engaged with the speaker. And one aspect of
listening that leads to tremendous ideation possibilities is the concept
of jotting, which we’ll discuss next. Whether you’re in a dialogue with
someone, watching a program on TV, sitting in a classroom, or attend-
ing a business meeting, jot down the thoughts that come into your
mind while you’re listening. Notice, I intentionally use the word jot, not
write down. Just jot down the gist of the ideas that are coming into your
mind; take yourself away from the active listening for just a brief
moment and jot. Or, if you’re more graphically inclined, sketch. Don’t
draw, sketch. Either way, briefly capture the gist of the idea that you
have. And when you’re done, you can go back to being an active lis-
tener. You can go back to hearing more, to observing more. Jot rather
than taking the time to write things down.
The same thing is true in brainstorming, as we’ll discuss on page
209. Often, when people have an idea during brainstorming, they
start writing it down in detail, finding out what’s wrong with it, and
deciding how to make it happen. While they’re in this state, what I call
the execution mode, they’re not in sparking-of-ideas mode. Our minds oper-