Do you make New Year’s resolutions, intending to improve yourself, achieve a goal, or better the world? If not, perhaps you should begin — these resolutions can help focus your attention and energy. This in turn makes success more certain, whether your goal is to get back in shape, stop smoking, work more (or less), or learn how to cook.
Once you’ve made your list, think about adding another goal — to become more creative in this new year. Here are five tips — with five more to come next week — for those who want to create more in the next year, and to get into better shape for the Innovation Economy.
1. Get a notebook
Start by investing in a nice notebook. And by “notebook,” I don’t mean a computer, but an old-fashioned paper notebook with plain, unlined white paper. Any brand will do, but I recommend investing in something like a Moleskine, available in bigger bookstores, as the quality and craftsmanship of these notebooks make using them delightful. Carry your notebook with you at all times, and write down and sketch thoughts, insights and ideas when they occur. And at least once a month, review your notebook, as previous ideas often spark new ones.
2. Start a Bug List
On the first page of your notebook, write “My Bug List” at the top. Under that write the things that bug you, annoy you, or impede you at work or in your private life. Each item on your Bug List is a creative challenge for you in the upcoming year. For example, if one of your bugs is, “I’m annoyed that our sales target for the year is too high,” you can easily turn it into a creative challenge by making it a “How to?” question: “How to boost sales to achieve an unreasonably high sales target?” Throughout the year, review your Bug List. Add new things that bug you, and turn your bugs into creative challenges.
3. Ideate more
Innovation is a numbers game; the more ideas you have, the more likely it is that you’ll have some great ideas. Throughout the year, produce ideas to resolve the important items on your Bug List. A reasonable goal for ideas is to create eight every workday. If that number scares you, remember that these ideas don’t have to be reasonable, feasible, or fully thought-out. And if you come up with eight ideas each workday, at the end of the year you will have had more than 2,000 ideas, some of which are likely to be very good ones.
4. Imagine and daydream more
Albert Einstein said, “Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions.” Remember this in the next year and regularly take time out to imagine solutions to your challenges. Daydream for a few minutes. Allow your imagination to take you anywhere it wants to go. When you return to reality, use what you imagined to stimulate your creativity. And always, always write your ideas and insights in your notebook.
5. Take more action
Innovation is creativity plus action. No matter how many creative ideas you come up with, you won’t change the world unless you take action on your ideas. Resolve that, each month, you will take action on one of your ideas and turn it into a creative project. This means that at the end of the year, you will have 12 creative projects under your belt. This seems ambitious, but the more creative projects you perform, the easier they get. And remember what Johann Wolfgang von Goethe said: “Seize this very minute — action has genius, power and magic in it. Only engage, and then the mind grows heated — begin it, and then the work will be completed.”
This list of resolutions toward a more creative you will continue in the next column.
© Dr. Detlef Reis 2012. This article was published in parallel in the Bangkok Post under the same title on 5 January 2012.