Apr 282013
 
What do you do when physically aroused?

Physical arousal linked to increased sharing The answer to the question “What do you do when physically aroused?” is that you probably share. By sharing, I mean the stories, news and information that people share with others around them. According to this fascinating article published in Psychological Science: We forward online articles to our friends, share stories […]

Apr 212013
 
Cultivate Mental Confusion

Muscle Confusion -> Mental Confusion If you have been to the gym or involved in any fitness for the past few years, you certainly run into the concept of “muscle confusion“. The idea behind the concept is that muscles accommodate to a specific type of stress/exercise when the same stress is continually applied to the […]

Apr 172013
 
Powerful formula for setting and achieving goals

Procrastination be gone! Use written goals. You’ve decided to be more creative, and you want to do something about it; maybe read more books on a variety of topic unknown to you in order to broaden your horizons. Or maybe it’s to travel more, learn how to sketch, pick up a new language (human or […]

Apr 142013
 
Improv techniques to boost your group's creativity

Your brainstorming sessions are going nowhere? Try these improv techniques First of all, I should say that those improv techniques don’t involve having you stand up in front of an audience with a mic in hand and a stool at your side. It’s much less involving than that. In fact, they are extremely simple and […]

Apr 072013
 
Your memory sucks? Blame it on Gutenberg and Google!

The modern man doesn’t know how to use his memory I recently finished listening Moonwalking with Einstein, Joshua Foer’s fascinating book about his yearlong quest to become a top “mental athlete”. His journey is really about how our mind’s memory developed and works from an evolutionary and historical perspective. My reference to Gutenberg is of course about his introduction […]

Mar 302013
 
Need to convince? 6 novel ways to pitch your ideas

Forget the elevator pitch! It’s so 20th century. Everybody has heard of the elevator pitch. Dale Carnegie advised us to be ever ready with our “elevator speech” in case we encountered the big boss. Thankfully, companies have become much more democratic and you often have more opportunities to present your ideas to the “suits”. In […]

Mar 272013
 
Mind pumping: Thinkertoys' style!

Mind Pumping: “Pumping” it’s not for muscle only… I started rereading Michael Michalko’s book: Thinkertoys: A Handbook of Creative-Thinking techniques, as a source of inspiration for a post for this blog. This book is so amazingly rich on ideas and techniques on creative thinking, it’s absolutely dizzying. It seems that any 1/2 page would be enough material […]

Mar 242013
 
Mind mapping: mapping ideas in and out of your brain

A powerful technique to organize and generate ideas According to Wikipedia: A mind map is a diagram used to visually outline information. A mind map is often created around a single word or text, placed in the center, to which associated ideas, words and concepts are added. Major categories radiate from a central node, and […]

Mar 212013
 
Metaphorical thinking

Tap into the power of metaphors to boost your creativity I once heard that Ridley Scott pitched his idea for his movie “Alien” as “Jaws in space” (confirmed here). How brilliant is that?! With that simple 3-word metaphor, the director was able to convey his novel idea for a movie so precisely that it baffles the mind! […]

Mar 192013
 
Selling a new idea? You might be 2/3 short on your persuasion mojo...

A great ideas is only one component of the persuasion cocktail So, you have a great idea and you are convinced that everyone will readily recognize it as such. Think again! As this TED-Ed (What Aristotle and Joshua Bell can teach us about persuasion) brilliantly demonstrates it, persuasion takes more than just idea/argument greatness. The quick video […]