Do you see yourself as a creative person? You can be if you want. There is nothing to say that one person should be more creative than another.
If you are trying to become a better writer, build an online presence or start an online business then it really helps to have a strong creative side.
You’re going to need to come up with lots of ideas to keep moving forwards.
And, no, you can’t just keep using the skyscraper technique (if you don’t know what that is, here’s Brian Dean to explain).
Besides, it’s seriously good fun being creative and coming up with new ideas every day. It’s like a firecracker going off and each pop is something new to explore.
It is within everybody’s reach to become a creative genius, an ideas machine, a visionary. I’m going to go through the tools I’ve used to be more creative. They don’t actually involve much effort, just a little bit of your time, every day.
The Ideas Machine
The first and perhaps most likely method to succeed, comes from James Altucher. I doubt he came up with the phrase ‘Ideas Machine’ but he certainly has run with it.
James is renowned for his creativity, people go to him for ideas even if he’s not an expert in their field. He got this way through a practice of idea generation. Every day he will come up with 10 ideas. That’s the practice. Sometimes there will be restrictions, sometimes none. But he sticks to doing this every day and eventually the ideas start coming more freely, they are more varied and they are more useful.
When I am working with people to become better writers or to build their online presence, I always get them to start an ideas bank. I got this from my colleague at Better Work Heroes, Ollie Holloway. The concept is simple:
- Use a note taking software that you can access on your phone and computer. It needs to be searchable. For example, I use Notes on iPhone. This is your dumping ground. In fact, you can open a note and call it exactly that if you want.
- Every time you think of something that you need to remember or that you might want to explore later or you find a website you want to come back to, put it in here. Dump it and forget about it until later. If you’re a clumsy typist on the phone, like me, then you can dictate a note into it.
- At the end of every week, spend half an hour going through this dumping ground and organising your notes. Get rid of those that you don’t actually want, sort the others into relevant groups. You can do this in any number of note taking tools such as Trello, Roam, Notion, Evernote.
This is a basic practice to get into the habit of doing. There have been so many times in my life I’ve come up with something I thought was brilliant at the time and trusted my memory to remind me about it later.
Never trust your memory with an incredible idea.
Now that you have the ideas bank practice going, add in the ideas machine practice of coming up with 10 ideas every day. Put them in your dumping ground and then come back to them at the end of the week or sooner if they are relevant to something you are doing now.
These 10 ideas could be completely random subjects or you could use a relevant topic that you actually need ideas for.
For example:
- Yesterday, I came up with 10 ideas for a creativity article, because I wanted to write one today.
- The day before, I came up with 10 awesome names for paint colours.
- The day before that, I came up with 10 ideas for a business that involves rocks.
The point is that you are exercising your creativity muscle. That is what all of these tools are doing. It’s not so much about what ideas you come out with, but that you go through the process of creating ideas. I believe in the concept of ‘Use it or Lose it’ for a lot of things we often take for granted in life, especially creativity.
Dream Your Creativity
Nobody actually knows why we dream. There are several theories, but no way of knowing right now. All we can go on are what results we get when we do dream.
A really powerful way of tapping into some of your brain’s unused resources is to ask it a question when you go to bed. In the morning you might, briefly, get some answers. Your subconscious will work on it overnight because that is the last thing (ideally!) you thought of before sleep.
I’m not going to lie, it doesn’t always work, but it has worked spectacularly for me at times.
Besides this little practice, the act of writing just after you wake up is another way of tapping into different areas of your brain. There is a period just after you wake up where you are in two minds, you will have experienced this as being a little confused about whether you’re awake or still dreaming, and then the dream is gone.
A great way to use this time is to write down everything you remember about your dream. If you can’t remember anything, just write and see what comes up.
On this note, try writing at different times of the day, in different places (hint: I truly recommend the bathroom). We use our brains in different ways at different times of the day and in different environments so experimenting with these to find creative hotspots can help you uncover your creative side.
The Creativity Gym
I’ve talked about a couple of daily practices that really help grow your creativity over time. But there are quite a few other tools you can use to exercise your creative muscles. These are more like the gym equipment of the creativity world. They will get results, guaranteed, but you don’t need to use them every day.
Alternate Uses
This exercise encourages divergent thinking. You start with an object or idea and then come up with as many ideas as possible of how to use the object in different ways in 3 minutes.
- Start with a blank sheet of paper in landscape.
- Write or draw an object in the middle of the paper. For example: A Rock. I seem to like rocks at the moment.
- Create a spider diagram on different ways you could use the object by either writing or drawing the alternative uses.
Being able to generate new ideas from one single source is a valuable skill and your ability to do this will improve with this exercise. After you’ve done this several times (doesn’t need to be on the same day) go back to your original object and try again. You should see the improvements in your creative thinking.
Two Become One
I’m not going to get you to sing the Spice Girls song.
This exercise is all about working creatively from two objects into one hybrid object. Whatever the two objects are, you need to make them work together to create a completely new object.
- Think of an object.
- Use this random object generator to come up with another object (so that you don’t pick an easy combination – I know you thought about it!).
- Come up with a hybrid of the two objects and either describe it or draw it. Think in great detail about what it can do, what it is made of and why people need it (developing your marketing skills at the same time!)
Write to Your Younger Self
An exercise that is both creative and enlightening. Think of something you’d like to have been told by your current self when you were younger. Or think of a moment in your life when you’d have liked advice on how to proceed or just to discuss it with your younger self.
Talk to your younger self about anything you’d like and see what happens. This will engage an emotional side in your creative thinking which is a valuable resource when talking to a particular audience in your writing.
Turn Something from Boring to Exciting
Pick an object, use the random object generator above if you like. The uglier, the more boring the better. Then describe the object as if it was your most prized possession. You don’t actually need to find something that you actually love about it, just pick an attribute and describe that attribute as if it was the only thing that mattered at that moment in time.
For example:
- Object: Coffee mug.
- As I look intently at my coffee mug I notice that the handle is in the shape of half a heart. If I can adjust the position of the mug just right I can make a whole heart appear on its shiny surface. I am momentarily overwhelmed by the passion I feel for my coffee mug right now as I start to notice the interplay of its shape and the reflections of surrounding objects. Each coffee stain adds an element of randomness that works beautifully with the curvature of the mug.
You’re just surprised I didn’t choose a rock, aren’t you? Me too. I decided to think a bit more creatively!
Being creative is not reserved for ‘creative people’, it is within everyone’s grasp. I would go further and say that if everybody practised at being more creative then they would add in a little more enjoyment to their lives.
I am in the privileged position of doing something creative as a career, but if you think about it, doesn’t every job involve some element of creativity? If we brought more creativity into our lives, would we find it easier to find the elusive career that makes us happy to get up in the morning?
Perhaps I’m looking too much into it, but it certainly is important to keep exercising your creativity muscle if you want to get better at writing, especially online where you need to stand out a little bit.
I’d love to hear from you in the comments if you have taken up any of these creativity practises and seen improvements.