Demystifying creativity

So what do we mean by creativity? Fundamentally, it’s a mixture of original thinking, insight, ingenuity, and innovation. Naturally, some people are born with a greater tendency to tap into their creativity (note how many times artistic and musical talent seem to run in families), but much of that results from encouragement and opportunity. A positive role model always helps. So, if for some reason you think you’re not creative, perhaps it’s the negative belief that is holding you back, or the lack of encouragement, rather than the level of your creative aptitude.

The creative geniuses
Where does this creative spirit come from? The images of the English Romantic poets Shelley and Byron striking a heroic pose on the rooftop in the midst of an electrical storm have seduced the world into believing that all inspiration comes like a bolt of lightning. Dramatic perhaps, but it couldn’t be further from the truth. Archimedes may well have jumped out of the bath and cried “Eureka!” the instant he worked out how to calculate the volume of an irregular shaped object, but we’re fairly sure that he’d visited the bathhouse fairly often before reaching that breakthrough moment. Mozart was writing symphonies at an astonishingly young age, but is he remembered for any those early compositions? Of course not, because he had to serve his apprenticeship before he could fulfill his undoubted genius. And how many unworkable theorems did Einstein devise before he thought up his Theory of Relativity? The truth of the matter is that whichever creative genius you can name, you can rest assured that his or her creation not only took a lot of brainpower, but practice and patience as well.

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Visual thinking and the imagination

Don’t think of a pink elephant. You couldn’t help it, could you? Our guess is that you’ve just pictured a pink elephant. This is a simple experiment to prove
two things: one, that imagination is synonymous with the mind’s eye, and two, we are all blessed with the ability to visualize beyond what is real. Creative thinkers, such as painters and filmmakers, rely on their ability to generate concepts in the visual form. They cast their mind’s eye into the vast sea of endless possibilities and try to search for original solutions to old problems. This ability to visualize allows them to transcend traditional ideas and ingrained conventions to create meaningful new ideas and methods. The practice of visual thinking to solve problems, work through issues, and communicate clearly has been fundamental to human progress in every civilization. You don’t have to be an artist to think visually. It’s all about paying closer attention to your inner eye, seeing beyond the obvious, and entertaining brand new ideas.


Capture the daydream
Next time you catch yourself daydreaming, try to grab the moment by writing down the details. You’ll find that you’re describing a series of images. Or, if you can, keep a pen and some paper by your bed and, as soon as you wake up, note down what you can remember of your dreams. You might find yourself describing a set of surreal pictures that make no logical sense. What you will have done is echo the beginnings of the creative process. It is an example of the kind of visual thinking that people working in creative industries often do. You too can get the most out of your imagination.

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Seeing is learning

In contrast to other types of reasoning—such as numerical and verbal reasoning—visual reasoning is not something directly addressed in most education systems. This may be because it is already used in a variety of subjects, such as art, sports, math, and music, so perhaps there seems little point in isolating it, as you would do with verbal reasoning (languages) or numerical reasoning (math), to develop that particular mental faculty. As a result, most people never learn how to realize their full visual thinking potential. What’s more, some psychologists suggest that the education system is at fault for labeling many visually gifted children as deficient because they do not fit into a verbally geared education system.


Enrich your spatial intelligence
Although your spatial reasoning skills are called upon all the time, it is usually for tasks that you do repeatedly, such as wheeling the shopping cart through the aisles of the supermarket or performing a parallel park on the familiar space of your driveway, and you tend to operate on autopilot. In doing so, you rely on your spatial memory rather than stimulate your spatial intelligence to tackle new spaces, shapes, forms, and dimensions. A simple and efficient way to improve your spatial intelligence is by doing a 3-D mechanical puzzle, such as Rubik’s cube. In addition, research has shown that playing video games has a marked effect on overall spatial awareness. For those of you who aren’t big on shoot‘em ups and racecar simulations, there are other simple ways to sharpen your spatial aptitude.

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Thinking in pictures

Just consider the work your brain does when you walk to the local store to pick up a grocery item. Every step you take, you have to use 3-D visualization to navigate the space to make sure you don’t bump into other people or objects. The task becomes even more complicated when you’re driving a car. Things move faster and you have to use predictive vision to determine where all the other road users might be at any given moment. You use visual and spatial reasoning within days of being born. Your visual cortex begins to adapt to light right after birth and, within weeks, you’re able to separate your parents’ faces from the myriad colors and shapes around you. At this stage, nothing fascinates you more than your mother’s face. Then, as you grow older, you play many games to develop your visual sense. For example, when you are trying to complete a jigsaw puzzle you have to figure out how to put the pieces together to recreate the picture on the front of the box. The way the different shapes fit together hones your ability to reason, deduce, analyze, and solve problems.


Spatial awareness
Visual and spatial thinking is, of course, important in memory—consider how taxi drivers navigate their way through the tangle of city streets. But it’s also a vital skill in many other professions. Any line of work that involves complex design and arrangement, such as architecture or urban planning, demands visual thinking. The people who work in these fields rely on their ability to present ideas diagramatically. On a much smaller scale, if you’re planning a day outdoors and need to fill a picnic hamper, you will have to visualize how to fit the food, plates, and utensils into the confined space before you begin loading.

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How does memory work?

Before we introduce you to the tips, let’s look at three types of memory you possess to receive and keep track of information.


Sensory memory
You receive information from the senses, such as sight and hearing, and hold it for
one or two seconds while you process it and decide what to do with it. What you ignore quickly fades and cannot be retrieved, much as sound dissolves. Remember how you can sometimes catch an echo of a sentence, or a glimpse of someone you sort of recognize when you’re not really paying attention, but then, in an instant, it’s gone.


Short-term memory
If you pay attention to something, the details are then transferred to the short-term memory, which can only store up to seven pieces of data at any one time. For instance, using this memory you can remember the digits of an internet bank account or a pin code for only as long as it takes for you to key it in. As soon as the short-term memory is “full,” it only takes a new piece of information to dislodge an old one because the neural mechanisms, (the meanings and associations) have not been created to allow you to recall the information later on. Some scientists believe that evolution has shaped this memory to have a limited capacity. Can you imagine if you were able to retain all the visual information you picked up in a day? What would happen if you kept a memory of every stranger you walked past and every sign you read? Well, your brain would eventually suffer from data overload. The advantage of a limited working memory is that it allows you to prioritize and focus on the task at hand.


Long-term memory
What makes information cross over to long-term memory? Any information can be committed to this memory through the process of rehearsal and meaningful association. Once processed, the information can be recalled weeks, months, or even years later. To make this effective, you must make as many links as possible to increase the number of starting points for retrieving the memory. Links are established when you cogitate, review, and analyze information. Association, in particular, relies on your visual memory (demonstrated with the Journey Method on p.36), which is an effective way of recalling a list of disparate items. One thing we do know about memory is that if it is linked to a personal experience or emotion it is more likely to be recalled. If you’re not convinced, then think of a birthday. Which do you remember: your 10th, 15th, 18th, or 21st? Chances are it’s your 18th or 21st because of the significance.

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Memory myth

The myth we tend to hear most is that memory deteriorates as we get older. This is false. If the brain is stimulated regularly, it can actually improve with age. People in their 80s and 90s can possess the same memory power as people half their age. Brain cells don’t die off as we get older. As psychology author Tony Buzan reminds us: “senior moments are more to do with absent mindedness than absent memory.” The best powers of recall do not necessarily belong to the young but to those who continue to hone their cognitive skills throughout life. Older people who engage in mentally taxing work, learn new skills, and keep physically active are likely to be in better mental shape than a younger person who doesn’t do these things. Brain training offers a good cognitive workout. So here’s your chance to exercise your brain and boost your memory. Turn over to learn some killer techniques.

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What is memory?

Memory forms a key component of your intelligence. Everything you learn in your lifetime is organized and stored in some way. The efficiency with which you access this information is what defines whether you have a good or bad memory. Scientists have spent much time seeking the location in the brain where memories are stored, identifying the hippocampus and rhinal cortex as possible sites. However, contrary to what many of us might think, the latest research suggests that memory cannot be pinned down to any single part of the brain. In fact, it’s false to think of memory as a storage facility crammed with everything you have ever learned, and a place you delve inside when you want to retrieve a piece of information. Memory isn’t a place, it’s an activity, an experience: when you remember something you are actually reconstructing it from details you consider important. Your memory is selective and interpretive, and the mechanisms driving it are spread throughout the brain. Two people who witness the same event can give entirely different accounts. In short, you remember more clearly what an event means to you than the actual details.

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Brain training and intelligence

According to research carried out by the University of Michigan, a good brain-training program can improve working memory and boost general problem-solving ability, which can raise general intelligence. In the study, after recording the subjects’ mental agility in a variety of cognitive tests, the researchers gave the subjects a series of brain-training exercises. This mental workout was given to four groups, who repeated the exercises for 8, 12, 17, or 19 days. After the training the researchers retested the subjects’ intelligence. Although the performance of the untrained group improved marginally, the trained subjects showed a significant improvement, which increased with the amount of time spent training. This suggests that a good brain-training program is an effective way to boost intelligence.

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