Posted by Luke Houghton in How do you know if you are being creative? Today I want to talk about five ways you can check your creative pulse.
1. Staleness
Staleness is the problem of being used to creating things that are not working. Ultimately I think we become stale when our lives fall out of balance or something distracts us from what we are supposed to be doing. Staleness is when what we create is not fresh. This can happen for a variety of reasons all of which you need to seek out. Staleness often opens up the door for people to question your ability when really you are just having a bad week. Find out what is causing your staleness. I can almost guarantee it will be pressure of some sort. Find it and get rid of it.
2. Repetition
The oft used quote about repetition goes something like this: ‘the definition of madness is doing something over and over again to get a different result’. When repetition emerges out of you it’s because you are finding the same answers to the same problem over and over again. That is, you have not given up your favourite solution yet because you are still applying it to different problems. This sounds counterintuitive but think about it. We often have solutions in mind (i.e. the garbage can model of decision making) looking for problems or decision making opportunities to air those solutions. Repetition often occurs because we think our solutions are sound. If this is you write down the solution you automatically think of in each context. I think you will find over time that you are indeed apply the same old ideas unconsciously. To change this you need to perhaps talk to other people or read this or this to help you out.
3. Innovation is not innovative
Innovation is a word thrown around a lot. When we innovate we are really changing something slightly or tremendously NOT representing it as something different. In places I have worked (no names) there have been strategic initiatives introduced that looked like something new. Over time you realise that it was just a smokescreen to maintain the status quo. It’s not innovative to keep things the same. If you are being innovative then change must come through on the building blocks of the effort made by yourself and others. Re-presentation as such is not making things new… it’s simply re-presenting the old as if it were new. This is sleight of hand trickery not innovation. To be innovative you must present something that was previously working as improved, better or totally transformed.
4. Ideas don’t make anything better
Have you ever noticed how your ideas don’t make anything better? That’s a problem! I have had entire periods of my life in recent times when my ideas simply did not improve anything. This is troubling. Here is where you need what Napoleon Hill calls a mastermind group. You need to find a handful of people you can trust to be honest who will tell you like it is. For me my wife and a fellow by the name of John Beard are the people I turn to. Whenever I talk to them I can know that they will tell me if I am stuck in a rut. If your productivity wains find people you know and trust to help guide you out.
5. Trapped in the logic box
Sometimes you are simply stuck for ideas because of wrong thinking patterns. No amount of counsel or otherwise will help you there. I have spoken about how we become trapped in our own ideas here and here. Again, the problem in such cases is our limited perspectives. When we commit to something that we know isn’t helping we trap ourselves in our own logic. In such cases we need a perspective shift to get us out.
In all of these things remember that true innovation occurs when we are internally committed to improving things. If we are finding ourselves stuck creatively it can be for reasons as varied as: stress, tiredness, false beliefs and so on. Life becomes very hard to manage when you are stale. It can be terrible when you know you have to do something and you aren’t doing it. The problem is, you will never really have the answers laid out until you try something. When we rely on these predictable patterns of thought and action, all we are really doing is deceiving ourselves instead of admitting fault and moving on. It’s good to make mistakes! Remember this as my final point… there are more reasons that I can think of that true creativity is inhibited. Search yourself carefully for the answers and when you need to, talk to people who can help.
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