Blog Assignment 1B- Ways to get ideas

This week in class, we were required to read a really interesting article called "14 ways to get Breakthrough Ideas" by Mitch Ditkoff. You can find the article here: http://changethis.com/


In Mitch Ditkoff's "14 ways to get Breakthrough ideas" he presents new and innovative ways of sparking one's creativity. He asks important questions about how innovation is sparked, what sparks people, and where do inspired ideas come from. He explains many techniques of sparking your creativity from different perspectives that I was surprised to find useful. The only tuition he requires of his readers is that they should come with the willingness to try something new, something I have no problem doing. Here are three of the fourteen suggestions that I found interesting:


In Ditkoff's fourth suggestion he explains that many ideas have been originated by making connections between two completely unrelated things. The way to make these connections? -- Ditkoff says to think outside of your daily confines such as nationality, profession , concepts, or even cubicles. He suggests that a good way to make these connections is to make parallel lists of ten words. The first list? Nouns. The second list? Verbs. The third list? Adjectives. Then look for intriguing new connections between them. My lists:


 Nouns             Verbs              Adjectives
shorts               crush              walnut  
sun                   think              watery 
glasses              surf                arranged 
chair                 sleep              living
cardboard         catapult          brilliant 
mail                  fondle            exaggerated 
photo booth     giggle             frank
grapes              consume        wide 
bush                 sing               idiotic
crystal              birth               yearly


What I came up with-
1) sun powered water purification plant that thinks for itself?
2) cardboard catapult that catapults cows (tongue twister) or maybe a new method of vocal warm up
3) genetically modified walnut bushes?
4) environmentally friendly cardboard glasses?


Although I think his fourth way of getting new ideas is probably a good idea to some, but I don't think that it is the best way to create new ideas for myself. As you can tell, my word combinations are somewhat reaching for possibilities. I have a feeling that this method may be very time consuming, because you have to create so many combinations before you find the right one.  From a business standpoint, I wouldn't encourage this method, but for some people i'm sure it is perfectly applicable. 
                                                                                                          


In Ditkoff's sixth way of generating creativity he says that it is important to define the right challenge or problem. He says that instead of rushing to figure out the answers, you should take you time to frame your challenge in a meaningful way. He suggested that a good way to do this is to: State your most inspired challenge or opportunity as a question beginning with the words "How can I?"Then write "How can I?" in five different ways. Then determine which way is correct.
My questions:


How can I be the most successful in school?
How can I become more involved in school? --- I choose this question as my problem. 
How can I succeed here at Ohio University? 
How can I get ahead of the other students here?
How can I best seize opportunities that come up?


I can easily agree that this method of inspiring ideas is a very effective method and a good idea. In my opinion, I think it is very important to define your goals before you get started and to set a foundation for your thoughts before diving head first into possibilities. This way you will know exactly what your answer is once you find it. 
                                                                                                                        


In Ditkoff's fourteenth technique of finding creative ideas he suggests that it is useful to temporarily suspend your logic. In this final suggestion he proposes that sometimes we let data and facts take over our minds, but if we allow a state of suspension to overtake the facts we might be able to let our creativity to percolate to the surface of our thoughts. This only means that instead of analyzing what we know and the things we observe, we let these things pass through our minds at face value or how they seem. Ditkoff asks his readers to consider what kind of action they can take in order to suspend his or her own practicality, logic, and rationality in service to birthing their big idea. 


Considering this idea, I thought that maybe I could try watching a movie (that perhaps represents a metaphor) and to try not to find what the metaphor may be. 
Another way I thought of doing this was to go to a theater show or concert and let myself indulge in the music or indulge in the suspension of disbelief, taking every line at face-value. 


The experience of following the story might put me in a mood to be as imaginative as the creator's themselves. I know this method is effective on my behalf, and I definitely recommend trying it!
Again, here's the link if you want to read some of Ditkoff's other techniques of generating ideas:
http://changethis.com/