8+ Ways To Train Yourself To Be Creative
February 27, 2008
by John Hoff @ eVentureBiz.com
A short time ago I received an email from a young entrepreneur asking me how he was suppose to compete in a marketplace where the competition was high and more established companies had big advertising bucks. I mentioned a few ideas to him but the one that concerned him the most was creativity. Give him numbers and he’ll work them, but tell him to come up with some creative idea, forget it.
He said he doesn’t have a creative bone in his body.
People who tell themselves that have already lost unless they decide to do something about it.
The development of a creative thought process is no different than learning martial arts. At first, someone shows you how to stand, execute proper body movement, and teaches you a Kata (a.k.a form - a set of movements that help develop your technique).
Once these techniques are learned you must practice them to become a good fighter. When fighting, it is taught that the best place for your mind to be is no where at all, called Mushin (means “no mind”). The point of Mushin is to blank out your mind so that you are in a state of “openness.” In other words, it allows you to simply react and not worry about what might happen when fighting.
To be creative, you have to first believe you are creative.
The same can be said when learning to be creative. You first learn what techniques help develop a creative thought process and then you have to practice them while keeping your mind open to endless possibilities no matter how ridiculous they may seem.
But how do you train your mind to become a well-oiled creative thinking machine?
Like the first sentence of this post says, you have to first believe you are a creative person. Following that you need to exercise your mind in various ways.
Let’s take a look at some creative mind-pumping ideas and activities that will help widen your mind’s creative eye.
I. Listen
Don’t Jump the Gun
It is important listen to everything and not judge or come to your own conclusion prematurely. This is vital if you are to create a product that wins in the eyes of your customers and employer. Remember, listening does not equal simply hearing.
The Essence of Business Success
January 17, 2008
By: Brian Tracy
The essence of a successful business is really quite simple. It is your ability to offer a product or service that people will pay for at a price sufficiently above your costs, ideally three or four or five times your cost, thereby giving you a profit that enables you to buy and to offer more products and services.
Add Value in Some Way
The key to a successful business is to add value by bringing the product or service from another place to where you’re selling it, or by creating the product or service and selling it at a price higher than your total cost of production. You become wealthy by either selling a few products or services at high prices, or by selling many products or services at lower prices with smaller profits.
The Best Strategy of All
The best strategy, of course, is to aim to sell a larger volume with a smaller profit on each item. Most great fortunes in America have been made selling large quantities of products over a wide area, thereby broadening the market and reducing your dependency on just a few customers.
Read more
Don’t Dog on Yourself about the Dumb things You’ve Done.
September 27, 2007
Give yourself pep talks.
Take a moment in the morning of each day, to actually tell yourself how much you love yourself. Talk to yourself and remind yourself of your successes. Focus on the future, and live in the moment. Learn to get better each and every day.
The more that you focus on the negative and dumb stuff that you have done, the more that the guilt and the feelings of inadequacy pops into your existence.
Gratitude is the most powerful word in the English Dictionary.
Here is a podcast that I did back in 2005 for Hunatrainer.com Community Boardcast. It was an interesting moment in my life where I had an epiphany pertaining to relationship and abandonment. I let it go, and with the magic of a song it creates a pretty interesting 15 minutes or so of audio.
CG019.mp3 Abandonment Issues via HunaTrainer, Sept 2005
Successfully,
Travis Wright
CG.com Podcast #017: Jim Kouzes - CoAuthor of “The Leadership Challenge” 25 year Study on Leadership
September 20, 2007
On January 20, 1961 Jim Kouzes was first inspired to dedicate himself to leadership. That was the day he was one of only a dozen Eagle Scouts who served in John F. Kennedy’s Honor Guard at the Presidential Inauguration.
CG.com #017 Podcast - Jim Kouzes
I was very honored to interview with Mr. Kouzes. For over 25 years, they have interviewed countless leaders and developed the widely used and highly acclaimed Leadership Practices Inventory (LPI), a 360° questionnaire assessing leadership behavior to over 250,000 individuals.
He talks about some of the key traits for leaders to explore new ideas and to dive into helping their members grow as people.
He talks about The Five Practices of leadership, which are:
- Challenging the process
- Inspiring a shared vision
- Enabling others to act
- Modeling the way
- Encouraging the heart
And he answers questions such as:
- What is the one thing you have done this week to make you better than last week?
- What are some of your productivity tricks?
- What advice would you give a CEO of a startup company?
- What are the most troubling aspects of leadership today. What are people encountering problems with?
Jim Kouzes is the coauthor with Barry Posner of the award-winning and best-selling book, The Leadership Challenge, with over one million copies sold. He’s also an executive fellow, Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University. Pick it up and absorb the wisdom.
Books that Jim Kouzes Recommends:
Anything by Warren Bennis
The Change Masters- by Rosabeth Moss Kanter
Leadership - James McGregor Burns
