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Ways To Think Differently

This lesson is a review of sorts and a collection of ways to think differently. Let's start with one we haven't covered before:

Creative Crazy Vivid Visualization

More conservative thinkers, like myself, will have a difficult time with this exercise, but it is worth the effort if you want more creative ideas. Essentially, you sit on the couch, on the roof of your house or on a hill (whichever works better for you), and visualize crazy things. Take notes on paper or with a small voice recorder, and then try to make something useful out of them.

I just took ten minutes to lay in bed and visualize crazy things. Among the many images, I saw houses floating in lakes, giant turtles climbing Mount Everest, and restaurants floating in the sky. The latter gave me an idea.

In areas without hills or mountains the view is often limited. What if restaurant patrons could float up above it all and take in the view while they ate? This could be done with enclosed dining areas that are carried into the sky using tethered hot air or helium balloons. An hour in the air and you are reeled back in. Meals are prepared in a building on the ground and sent up with you.

My image of houses floating on lakes made me think of houseboats. They are used by many in southern states, in part to avoid property taxes. What about making floating platforms for normal modular homes? With some modifications of the water and sewer systems, this might work. Putting a house on a lake using one of these flotation platforms might be a lot cheaper than buying a lakefront lot.

Let your images get as wild as they can, and see the details. You won't find any use for most things you visualize (turtles on Everest did nothing for me), but that's okay. Have a lot of ideas, and one or two may be worth something. This is a way to generate ideas you might not have using other ways.

Create Your Own Definitions

Sometimes existing definitions for things are just plain faulty. In any case, even decent definitions of words limit our thinking. The solution? Redefine them, and see what ideas this suggest. here are a few examples:

Maturity: The state of holding recognition of reality above any ideals.
Confidence: Insensitivity to the many possibilities of failure.
Duty: A hypnotic trigger-word used to get you to stop thinking and start obeying.
Social Security: Politically correct welfare for those who wish to stop working.
Logic: A way to use bad premises for reasonable-sounding conclusions.

Each of the above suggests a different perspective from which to view a concept or issue. Try some of your own. You may find that the humorous ones have as much to suggest as the serious ones.

Invent New Concepts By Playing With the Old

Rearranging the words that use us, as I just did in this sentence, is a great way to think differently. The more common expression is "the words we use," but I like the new concept of "the words that use us." It suggests that as much as we think our words are our own, they also determine where we go with our thoughts, as surely as a car limits us to traveling only the existing roads.

Find other ways to express things, and your perspective changes. "Earning a living," for example, may not be as ideologically productive as "creating and exchanging value." "I am afraid" makes the feeling much more personal than "I have fear." The latter is how it is expressed in many other languages, by the way. Rearranging "the meaning of life" to "the life of meaning" might also lead to some new insights.

Crazy Solutions

For radical new ideas, think of "crazy" solutions to problems. This doesn't mean you'll be able to use the first or even the fiftieth crazy solution. Most ideas generated this way won't be of much value - but some of them will be. Quantity makes quality more likely.

Remember to work with ideas a bit before throwing them aside. Can you imagine if your problem is buying a home, and you have the idea, "What if I could trade this paper clip for a house?" You might quickly reject that one, right?

Well, Canadian Kyle MacDonald did turn a paper clip into a house in a series of steps. He first traded his large red paper clip with someone online for a pen shaped like a fish. He traded the pen for a hand-made ceramic doorknob, and continued "trading up" until thirteen trades and a year later, he made his final trade and moved into his new home with no mortgage. (If you want to read about each trade, you can probably still find this story online by searching "Kyle MacDonald paper clip.")

A Review Of Ways To Think Differently Already Covered

Challenge Assumptions - Do houses really need windows? Do cities need streets? Are you sure you have to go to work tomorrow?

Use Different Metaphors - "Out of the box" or "beyond the ego-word net?" Are you on a spiritual path or a spiritual treasure hunt?

Argue From The Other Side - We sometimes miss a lot of ideas because we reflexively defend our own. You might have a better arguments than your opponent if you mentally take his side.

Find New Ways To Measure Things - Did that last purchase cost you $50 or four hours at work? If we installed a cost-per-minute meter in cars, would we drive less?

Look At Purposes - What is a television for? To entertain us and therefore to make us happier? Does it do that very well, or is there a better way?

Silly Questions - What is the favorite kind of music of cats and dogs? What if smart computers were given the right to vote?

Try Different Perspectives - How would you design a house if you wanted to move about as little as possible? How would your past self see you current life?

Challenge Implicit Premises - An argument about how to fight a war carries the implicit premise that war is necessary for defense. Is this true?

Question Everything - Would it be better to have just one tax for all federal, state and local purposes? Who are you really?

Get At The Root Of The Matter - What is the purpose of morality? Where and why does the need for a political party arise?

Get Beyond Logic And Words - Meditate on or observe something without thought, and you may see things that words prevent you from seeing.

Think Differently - An Exercise

Choose three different radical thinking techniques from the above selection. Use each one of the three to generate new ideas about something. Be sure to apply them to the same issue, problem or topic, so you can see clearly how the different ways to think provide different ideas.

Until next time,

Steve

www.RadicalNewThoughts.com