Tag Archive for ideas

A change of concept is as good as a holiday?

June 19, 2008 / Luke / 2 comments

*Image Credit: Fish

Ok so I am bit short on ideas at the moment.  But after my last post and some work I nailed during the week… I got to thinking.  How powerful are concepts in our lives?

A concept

Academic Peter Checkland coined the phrase, “a framework of ideas” to describe really what a concept is.  I think in our lives there are all kinds of ideas we make use of on a daily basis.   We have concepts of family, concepts of community, concepts of society and so on.  A concept is really a set of ideas.  Take the current media hype about petrol prices.   We have a concept of crisis that’s framing those issues at the moment.

Using another concept to create tension

Let’s now express the problem as an opportunity.  What opportunities could come from the high price of petrol?  More ethanol, hydrogen?  What about a new concept?  What about teleportation?  No need for fuel or even parking vouchers.  Just zap and you are there.  How about more working from home solutions… more flexible working hours… cars that run off water.   Every crisis breeds opportunity!

The concepts of what we think stuff is

In life there are things we build up in our minds that tell us what stuff is.  There are people, places and things that demand our conceptual attention.  Say for example you are an upwardly mobile single person who is getting older and older.  You have no partner and desperately want one.  What’s your concept of the future?  Do you see my point.  Why not start thinking ‘opportunity’ instead of ‘crisis’.

So here we are for some reason talking about change of concepts.  I am wondering if this blog would survive without commentaries… probably not.  That said, this was an interesting post and as I wrote it I realised… I need to use better concepts of the future… at the very least!

Category: life problems / Tags: ,

Why you should keep an ideas book

January 31, 2008 / Luke / 4 comments

light bulb clipart

I have heard many people say that they don’t think they are creative. Rubbish! You are creative. You have creativity inside of you for something. Most of us live our lives without ever using the creative ability that we have been given. Here’s a little test you can take to see what your creativity lies in.

Keeping an ideas book

Ideas are like gold to those that capture them. Consider this quote from eclectic film director David Lynch:

“The ideas dictate everything, you have to be true to that or you’re dead.” courtesy of: Think Exist.

What do you have ideas about? I didn’t realise that I had so many ideas about various things until I started writing them down. As I began to study the ideas, I noticed how I could use them in my work. Some of them helped me to understand issues I was having with other people and so on. You may really like gardening. There will be moments throughout the day when your ideas about gardening will come to you. Do yourself a favour and write down that idea. You will forget it if you don’t!

What to do with your ideas once you write them down

Make a commitment to follow them through. Even if you can’t do it right now make plans to do it soon. The ideas you follow through on you probably wouldn’t have if you hadn’t of written them down! I know, it sounds stupid but keeping an ideas book helped me to gain an edge in my life and I know if you do it in yours it will help you too.

Category: creativity / Tags: ,

Why should we teach students how to manage real life problems?

January 2, 2008 / Luke / 5 comments

The answer to this question may seem very simple. University lecturers (like me) should not be responsible for teaching students how to manage real problems. However, I disagree. Why?

High school does not teaching practical skills as such

While I admit there are a lot of useful ideas for reaching teenagers and getting them to cope with real life issues and problems, there is still a long way to go.  What happens is that students leave high school and then go into university then go into the workforce. Some, do trades or just get a job. Yet the process of learning is exactly the same. They go from high school to the outside world and then that’s it.

University courses are not that practical in general they are specific

Most university courses I have taught will not teach you how build great responses to problems. One of the reasons I started this blog was because I noticed people who were coming through university courses with no life skills. Yes, they could read and write (and do maths) but where were their problem solving skills? What about creative thinking skills? What about learning how to cope with relationships? If life is all about work then what do we do the rest of our time?

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90% of what you do at work is NOT academic

This is hard to admit but how often do you reach for your economics book? Or wonder what Maslow would have thought about your jerky boss. It’s time for bone dry honesty… how useful is the information you get at university, high school or college (TAFE included)? Theories are wonderful… I have a lot of them. But unless something helps me to solve a problem I throw it away. What good is knowledge that doesn’t work? It’s like having a Porsche with no motor OR a Monet with a hole in the centre of it.

Once upon a time university was a place where people expanded their minds. Now, I think it’s a sausage factory. People go out to work after studying and I wonder all the time just how useful this knowledge is?  I have written papers in the past and then thought… is this even meaningful… I mean is this ever going to change our lives? I doubt it. We should be teaching people at University, high school and other places of education how to manage and cope with life. Why? I think there is a responsibility here for educators to realise that a portion of what we teach should be how to manage real life problems. If it isn’t then we are not preparing people for a life in the business world where learning curves are steep and lessons are harshly learned.

Category: ideas, life problems / Tags: ,
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