Transcripts
1. Trailer: solving a serious off problems is what life and every job is. To solve these problems, you have to come a with ideas and solutions. For decades, people have used brainstorming to generate ideas and to come on with creative solutions to problems. However, you need to use brainstorming correctly for you to be fully effective. And this is the goal of this class. I'm gonna teach you how to get the most out of brainstorming. This class is divided into three parts. First, I'm gonna talk about the importance of stating the problem clearly. Then we get to the main part brainstorming where I'm going to give you some practical tips so you can be sure you'll find that great idea that you were looking for. Finally, I'm gonna teach you how to have a closer relationship with your subconscious, which is the source of all your creative power. Well, it's time to move on. Let's start
2. State The Problem: state the problem before your start coming with ideas, you need to be certain. Ah, why you're doing it on a problem statement is a way to stay that clearly in a way that the problem statement tells both your goal and your constraints. It is crucial that you get the problem statement right, because if you make it too broad, you might come with designs that don't meet your true goal. And if you make it too narrow because you were focusing on solutions instead of the problem , you might cut yourself off from some clever solutions. There are three advantages of clearly setting your problem, brother. Creative space. Most people jumped solutions to fast and store their creative process there. If you start your process at the problem instead of at the process solution, you'll be able to explore a brother creative space and find solutions that are hiding where no one else is looking clear. Measurements. You have a clear measurements of the quality of processed ideas you can on the sun. Better. How will they solve the problem? Better communication when you're working with a team, communication is much easier if the problem has been clearly s stated very often, collaborators will be trying to solve quite different problems and not realize it. If the problem has not been clearly s stated. Sometimes you will have already explored several ideas. Before you realize what the problem really is, that's fine. Once you see what it is, just make sure you go back and restate the problem. Clearly. Remember that people who come with clever solutions are almost always the same people who take the time to figure out the real problem. So he already to tackle your problem. Now comes the fun part brainstorming. But it's fun on Lee. When the ideas come when they don't, it's terrifying. So how can you make sure they do Come in the next lecture, we're gonna give you some practical brainstorming tips so you can make sure the ideas come
3. Brainstorming - Part 1: brainstorm tips. The right answer. You stated your problem. Now start writing down every solution that comes to your mind. But why should you write them down on, not just sit on, think onto the brilliant idea comes to you. The first reason is that your memory is terrible. You're gonna want to mix and match little pieces from dozens or hundreds of ideas, and you will never be able to remember them all. The second reason is that when you have many disconnected ideas in your head, they crown out new ideas. So you should make room for new ideas with writing them down on paper. But how does writing things down on paper makes room for new ideas? Have you ever been really mad at someone so your Oldham a nasty letter and immediately felt better, even if you never send it Something magic happens when you put your ideas on paper, so do it. Write or type. The best way to record your ideas is one of it that works best for you. Some people like typing best. Some like writing, but personally, I like writing on unlined paper because it allows form or expression and creativity you can circle ideas, draw little sketches, connect ideas with arrows, cross things out and etcetera, and it can always type of the good stuff later. Skitch Some ideas cannot be easily expressed through text, so dress on pictures and it doesn't matter if you can draw. Just try when you express your ideas. Visually, you will remember them more easily, and they will treat care more ideas. You need to write a little story about cats. Start drawing some cats, real rough circles and triangles and a cat tale. I guarantee you will find ideas popping to her head that simply were in there a minute ago . Try to sell. You will be surprised at how well it works. Toys. I just said that it's great to get your mind visually engaged in your problem. One way to do that is to bring some toys to disable. Why do you think that some restaurants have some crazy stuff on their walls? Is a just decoration? No. When people see a think of things to talk about, they get ideas. So pick some toys that have something to do with your problem, and some that have nothing to do with it. Toys don't just visual engage your creativity. They also engage it in a tactile way. Even better, why not bring a big lump of clay or Plato so you can make little sculptures of your ideas? It sounds silly, but creativity is silly. Change your perspective. Try to look at your problem from different perspectives. But why self there? Dude Physical to don't just brain a storm Sitting on your cozy chair, stand up on your chair. Things look different up there. Go to different places. Immerse yourself in different things. Brain a storm on the bus, at the beach, at the mall or in a toy store while standing on your head. Anything that sports your imagination and makes you think of new things. Is Worf on doing He Maris yourself? You stated your problem. Now he immerse yourself in it. Go to different places. Study people, see what they're doing on why read books, Watch fields, cushion everything. Do research. Do voter that is related to your subject or problem. This transports you to stay at which you can come up with such ripe ideas that later you will be amazed by the fact that it was you who came up with him. Crack jokes. Dont be nervous about using humor to do serious work when you're brainstorming. Sometimes jokes are what get the job done. Jokes. Loosen up our minds and make us see thinks from a perspective that were missed before a new perspectives are how great ideas happen. Be warned, though jokes can get you off track, especially in a group setting. So it's your responsibility to get things back on track. Spare no expense from childhood. Most of us are trained not to waste. Resource is they told us not to use the good markers not to waste paper, not to waste money. Brain storing is now the time to be frugal. He should not lend materials. Get in the way of your creativity. You're going to be trying to find the $1,000,000 ideas. You can't let a few panties for a paper or ink get away. You need to do what feels right for you. Every little thing you do that makes you a little more creatively comfortable increases the chances that a great idea will come. I like to use a fancy pen and heavy gauge paper, and I like to writing big letters on Lee using one side of the paper because it feels right to me. But what is writes for one person isn't right for everyone. You must constantly experiment to find what works best for you. One big rule to remember if he can get the materials you prefer. Do not wine about it. Use what you've got. There's work to be done.
4. Brainstorming - Part 2: the writing on the wall. If you are brainstorming in a team sitting, you will need some kind of solution that everyone can see at once. I prefer giant posted sheets or a sheets off butcher paper with masking tape expensive, but we spare no expense this way. You can write lists on the wall but easily reposition them when you run out of room. Even better, you can take them down, stag him, roll him up and store them. A year later, when somebody says, Hey, what were some of those ideas we had last year? It can go pull them out, stick them up and restart your brainstorming session as if it had never stopped the space remembers. One more reason to put things on the wall is that our memory for lists is bad, but our memory for where things are positioned around us is very good. By positioning your ideas in the room all around you, you can more easily remember where they are. This is crucial, since you will be trying to find connections between dozens off different ideas and you need any help it can get, particularly if you will be brain a storming over several sessions. It is quite remarkable. If you put a bunch of ideas upon the walls and go away for a few weeks, you will forget most of it. But work back into that room where the ideas are posted and it feels like you never left. Right? Everything you've got your fancy pens, your fancy paper, your fancy coffee, some toys, some modeling, clay, everything you think you might need to be creative. Now you're waiting for that brilliant idea to come wrong. Don't wait. Just start writing down everything you can think of that is remotely connected to your problem right down Every stupid idea that comes into your head and a lot of them will be stupid. Why do you have to get this stupid ones out of the way before the good ones start showing up and sometimes is stupid? Idea becomes the inspiration for a genius idea. So write it all down. Don't censor yourself. You have to give up your fear of being wrong and your fear of looking silly. And if you're brainstorming with other people, certainly don't censor them. Their stupid ideas are just as good as your stupid ideas. Number your lists. Much of your brain storming will consist of lists. When you make lists, number them. This does two things. First, it makes the lists easier to discuss. You can say I like ideas three through seven, but eight is my favorite. Secondly, when a list of things is numbered, the numbers somehow give a certain dignity to the things in the list. Consider these two lists. Don't the items in the numbered list Seymour important? Somehow, if one of them suddenly disappeared, you would be much more likely to notice. This dignity will make you and others more likely to take the ideas on the list. Seriously. Destroy your assumptions. Make a list off everything about the subject your own that you're assuming to be true. This can be a long list because we assume so much once you have a good list Gulf reach item and think about how your job would work. If that assumption wasn't true, most of the time the assumption must stand. But once in a while, blowing a one of your assumptions will give you a grating side mix and match categories. A great technique for helping ideas come together is to brain a store in categories. First, you should make multiple lists in different categories. Then again, a star mixing and matching ideas. For example, we want to come with a film idea here, using V's lists by mixing and matching, I can say, a horror animation about a butcher in social freedom that's an idea or a crime Live action feel about a spy in search of love. That, too, is an idea, but I should mention that these example lists or to a small, don't be afraid to make up more and more categories with more and more entries cause you will need him. Talk to yourself. There's tremendous socialist stigma against talking to yourself, but when brainstorming alone, some people find it really helpful. There's something about saying things out now that makes them more Rio than just thinking them in your head. Final place, where you can freely touch yourself without getting funny. Looks another trick. If your brain is storming in a public place, hold a cell phone next your head while you talk to yourself. It's silly, but it works. Find a partner when your brain assume with other people. It is very different experience than brainstorming alone. Finding the rights brainstorming partner can make your world off difference. Sometimes the two of you can get to great solutions many times faster than either of you could alone. As you bounce ideas back and forth and complete one another senses just having someone to talk. I allow to, even if they say nothing can sometimes move the process along faster. Do keep in mind that adding Mawr and Mawr people doesn't necessarily help, though usually a small groups of no more than four are best groups work best when brain a storming and narrow problem, not a broad open ended one. And honestly, most groups go about brain a storming all wrong. Research shows that a group just showing up in a room trying to brain a stone cold on an idea is a recipe for wasted time. Much better is to have each individual brain a store, independence the first and only then get together to share ideas, mix and match him and solve problems together. Also, certain people make bad brain is soaring partners. These are usually people who try to poke holes in every idea, or people who have very narrow tastes these people are best avoid up and you will be more productive without him. Team brainstorming can have tremendous benefits and tremendous perils. In the next lecture, which is the last lecture, you're gonna learn how to make it creative partnership with your subconscious, which is the source of a tremendous creative power.
5. Your Silent Partner: your silent partner. Most of our good, clever creative ideas are not arrived at through a process of logical reasoned argument. The really good ideas just seem to pop up out of nowhere. They come up from somewhere blows surface of our consciousness, a place we call the subconscious. The subconscious mind is not well understood, but it is a source of tremendous and possibly all trade of power. In this lecture, we're gonna give you some tips so you can make your partnership between yourself and your subconscious in a way that it can be your silent partner. Bizarre as it sounds, treating your subconscious like another person can be caught useful because as humans with that you anthropomorphize things cause it gives us a well understood model for thinking about and in tracked him with them. So if we present our creative subconscious is another person, what is that person like? You might already have a mental picture of yours. But some common characteristics of the creative subconscious that most people seem to share or these it can't talk mostly communicates through imagery and emotions. It's impulsive, doesn't plan ahead, intends to live in the moment. It's emotional gets swept up in whatever you're feeling. Happy, angry, excited or afraid. The subconscious seems to feel things more deeply and more powerfully than a conscious mind . It's irrational, not bound by logic and rationality. The subconscious comes with ideas that often make no sense. For example, you need to go to the moon. Perhaps a long ladder will work. Sometimes the working with the creative subconscious can make you feel like you have an unbalanced four year old living inside your head without the rational mind to plan things out and set things straight, this guy would never survive on his own. For this reason, many people get in the habit of ignoring what the subconscious mind suggests. If you are doing your taxes, that is probably a good idea. But if your brain is storming, your silent partner is more powerful than your. Here are some tips for getting the most out of this unusual creative partnership. Pay attention. The keys. Listening to yourself sort off the subconscious is no different from anyone else. If you get in the habit of ignoring, it is going to stop making suggestions. If you get in the habit of listening to seriously considering its ideas on thanking it. When you get a good one, evil starts off, ERM or and better suggestions. So how do you listen to something that can talk? What do you must do? He spake ulcer attention to your thoughts, your feelings, your emotions and your dreams. For those are the ways the subconscious communicates. This sounds really a stretch, but it really does work. The more you pay attention to what the subconscious has to say, the more Warrick it will do for you. For example, you're brainstorming an idea for a surfing game. And suddenly this stupid idea comes to your mind that what if the surfboards where bananas , which is crazy, you can ignore it, or you can take a few moments and seriously consider the idea You can go. OK, what if the surfboards rare bananas invent? Another idea comes with monkeys on those bananas. Suddenly, that doesn't seem so stupid anymore. Even if you ultimately reject the idea, your subconscious might feel a little more respected and take part more seriously, the brain a storming process because off the time you spend considering suggestions on what did it cost you on Lee a few seconds off. Quiet reflection. Record your ideas. Certainly you would record your ideas enduring a brainstorming session. But why not record him all the time? The human memories. Terrible. By recording all of your ideas, two things happen. First, you'll have a record of many ideas that you will likely have forgotten otherwise. And second, you'll free up your mind to think of other things, manage its appetites. The subconscious mind has appetites someone wish our primal. These appetites seem to be part of this job, just as it is the Rational minds job to determine which appetites can be safely fed on how to go about doing that. If the subconscious mind feels one of these appetites to a strongly, it will obsess about it when it is obsessing, it can do good, create iWork. If you're trying to come up with new ideas for a novel, and all you can think about is candy bores or how your girlfriend left you or how much you hate your roommates, you aren't going to be able to get much good work done because of these interests of Fells will distract your subconscious, so it's not gonna do any ward for you sleep. We used the thing that asleep was for the body. But it has become clear that asleep is primarily for the benefit of the mind. Some strange process off sorting, filing and reorganizing seems to be going gone. When we sleep clearly, the subconscious is wide awake, inactive for at the support of the sleep cycle LePore that features dreams. If you build up your relationship with your own creative subconscious, you will understand that sometimes he is around, and sometimes he is not around. And he will certainly know this that when you haven't had enough sleep often he's in around . Don't push too hard. Did you ever try to think of a name during a conversation? Maybe someone you know, maybe some movie star and you know you know it but just can't think of it. So you squint your eyes and try and force the answer out of your mind. But it just doesn't come. So you give up and move on, talking about something else. A few minutes later, suddenly the answer pops into your mind. Now where do you think that came from? It is as if the subconscious was working on the problem of finding that name in the background while you moved on to other things, lenders found the answer. It gave it to you. Don't expect immediate answers from our subconscious. Give it a problem to solve. Make clear to problems, importance and leave it to do its work. The answer might come quickly. Might come slowly or it might not come at all. But nagging and looming won't make it come any faster. It will just slow things down.
6. Final Words: Our goal in this class was to think of an idea after a little brainstorming. You probably have 100 and this is how it should be. It wants to be able to come up with and dozens of ideas on any topic. As you practice, you'll be able to come up with Maura and better ideas in less time. But this is just beginning off the final goal we have. The next step is to narrow down this broad list of ideas on a star doing something useful with them.