I find taking some of the free courses on Udemy to be fun diversions. Without committing too much time, you can take a short free course on topics you might not have considered learning about. Best case scenario, the course is helpful and introduces you to a topic you find out you enjoy, worse case scenario, you spend half an hour on a topic that you discover you really don't like. Most likely scenario, you learn something new or reinforce what you already know. Most of the free courses are pretty short and focus on a handful of concepts along with a few applicable ideas. The most recent one I watched was Simon Jack's "Skool Of Creativity: Essentials".
The videos total at just over twenty minutes with a few text assignments. The idea behind the course is to help viewers think more creatively with an emphasis on using that creativity to design solutions.
From the exercises, one that I find myself using from time to time is choosing an object and then think of 10 uses for it. The uses can be practical or silly. For example, a fork. It can be used to eat with, it can be used as a name card holder, it can be used instead of a rake in a miniature garden, etc... There are a few other steps in the exercise, but I won't give those away. I've found doing this exercise on a regular basis helps prime my mind into thinking of different possibilities, which makes it less rigid in thinking.
Another concept Simon talks about is redefining a problem to find new and different approaches. Sometimes it is the way a problem is defined that is what keeps someone stuck, but when you reword the problem it helps to come up with new ideas. The example he gives is an executive asking his workers what he can do to make them more productive. When the executive reworded it as, "what can I do to make your work easier" there was more of a response from the workers than from the original question.
One final idea that I really liked is to take the perspective of someone else. Choose a character or a real person and try to think how they would approach a situation based on their background, way of thinking, behavior, etc... This gives you a new way of looking at a problem that can be different from your default approach.
There are other ideas Simon talks about, which makes the videos well worth watching. I'm actually leaving it on my dashboard to refer back to sometimes when I need a reminder of how to think more creatively.
The videos total at just over twenty minutes with a few text assignments. The idea behind the course is to help viewers think more creatively with an emphasis on using that creativity to design solutions.
From the exercises, one that I find myself using from time to time is choosing an object and then think of 10 uses for it. The uses can be practical or silly. For example, a fork. It can be used to eat with, it can be used as a name card holder, it can be used instead of a rake in a miniature garden, etc... There are a few other steps in the exercise, but I won't give those away. I've found doing this exercise on a regular basis helps prime my mind into thinking of different possibilities, which makes it less rigid in thinking.
Another concept Simon talks about is redefining a problem to find new and different approaches. Sometimes it is the way a problem is defined that is what keeps someone stuck, but when you reword the problem it helps to come up with new ideas. The example he gives is an executive asking his workers what he can do to make them more productive. When the executive reworded it as, "what can I do to make your work easier" there was more of a response from the workers than from the original question.
One final idea that I really liked is to take the perspective of someone else. Choose a character or a real person and try to think how they would approach a situation based on their background, way of thinking, behavior, etc... This gives you a new way of looking at a problem that can be different from your default approach.
There are other ideas Simon talks about, which makes the videos well worth watching. I'm actually leaving it on my dashboard to refer back to sometimes when I need a reminder of how to think more creatively.
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