Becoming Creative
There is no one way. There are many.
I’ve met too many people in my life that tell me they don’t know how to invent anything. Smart people. Successful people. Self aware people. Not smart enough to invent anything?
Good followers. Good at executing other peoples’ ideas.
This has troubled me for as long as intelligent successful friends and colleagues have candidly shared these sincere self assessments. Something always struck me as off — but frankly, I lacked the insight for too long to understand how that could be.
I wanted to help and eventually I found a way that I think can help everyone.
Thinking Backward
School indoctrinates many people successfully to think linearly from the start of a subject-matter to the end of it. Students are rewarded for mastering that process of memorizing facts and repeating them at the right time in the expected order. There is a start and there is a finish.
Students that struggle keeping their minds in focus from step to step in the order taught are punished with poor grades and negative feedback.
Jumping ahead to an end-goal and daydreaming original ways to get there instead of mentally-cementing the path being taught to get there interferes with academic success…
