6 exercises that really get your creativity going

Creative geniuses like Galileo Galilei, Vincent van Gogh, Albert Einstein and many others had groundbreaking ideas that still have an impact today. But what distinguishes such a creative high achiever? Why did they come up with these unique ideas? In this article, I’ll explain what you can still learn from the creative geniuses of the past. And I’ll show you what simple exercises you can do to awaken your own creative genius.

Have you ever wondered where the creative geniuses of our history got their groundbreaking ideas? What did Leonardo Da Vinci, Galileo Galilei, Vincent van Gogh and Marie Curie have in common that we rank them among the most creative minds of mankind? The surprising answer is: remarkably little!

Galileo Galilei was considered particularly impatient and showed narcissistic traits. Vincent van Gogh was known among his fellow painters as being quarrelsome. Albert Einstein was always primarily focused on his work and his projects. However, this did not stop him from staging himself as Casanova with his numerous affairs. Marie Curie, on the other hand, was not only a two-time Nobel Prize winner but also a devoted wife and a self-sacrificing mother.

The 6 exercises at a glance

1. 10 Questions

2. 7 Days, 7 Ideas

3. The worst ideas first

4. Long List

5. As unusual as possible

6.Chain of associations

Research on contemporary creative minds also shows that creativity is much less a question of character traits, but rather a very complex construct of different causes. However, almost all creative geniuses have one thing in common: it is the enormously high productivity and thus the enormously high number of works and inventions that they bring to life. Only by their ceaseless work on more and more new ideas they finally came to their all-important works and inventions.

Creative excellence is something we first have to acquire

Being creative is not a one-time state that falls from the sky in an eureka moment. If we want to be creative, we have to acquire it first. Don’t worry, you don’t have to create 2,000 paintings and drawings like Van Gogh or publish over 300 scientific papers like Einstein.

However, two things are crucial for your own personal eureka moment: You need a proven systematic process to get you there (see my articles on Creative Thinking). And you should constantly train your mind like a creative muscle so that you can unlock your creative potential whenever you need it.

Let yourself “flow” into a creative mood

In our daily lives, we can’t always be as focused as van Gogh or Curie. But that shouldn’t stop us from pushing our minds beyond what they’ve been able to perform creatively so far. Frequent practice is the magic formula that helps us to achieve this. All you have to do is consciously let yourself “flow” into a creative mood and use that moment for your best ideas.

Sounds strange? Don’t worry, you will feel the state of creative flow first hand in a short time. For this purpose, I have put together a series of small and larger exercises that you can easily integrate into your daily routine. Whether our creative geniuses of the past used one of these exercises for themselves is not known. But I can assure you from my own experience that they are nevertheless a lot of fun!

1. 10 Questions

When confronted with a problem, try to better understand the problem before thinking about possible solutions. It will help you to take as many different perspectives on the problem as possible. This opens your view for connections that you did not recognize before.

Here’s how you do it

Write down ten as different formulations of your problem as possible. Do this quickly and don’t pause between each statement. This is how you get your subconscious mind to come up with surprising ideas. In creative thinking, there are no right answers or right solutions; instead, there is an abundance of new combinations of ideas.

There are two common mistakes that people make when they decide they need to be more creative: Thinking that you only need to be creative occasionally and hoping there’s only one great idea out there.

Keith Sawyer

2. 7 Days, 7 Ideas

In this exercise, you get your mind to go one step further. It is exclusively about the quantity of ideas, not about their quality. Every idea, no matter how absurd, is welcome.

Here’s how you do it

Pick a specific problem for which you would like to find a solution. Write down the first seven ideas that come to mind. On the second day, take out your paper again and write seven more ideas to go with the first entries. Repeat this for seven days.

3. The worst ideas first

As unbelievable as it may sound, it is actually often our bad ideas that lead us to completely new combinations. That’s what this exercise is all about.

Here’s how you do it

Again, start with a problem. Write down the absolute worst ideas you can come up with. In the next step, try to identify potentially good approaches from those bad ideas. With these fresh impulses you are inspired to a second round of brainstorming. Good ideas are explicitly welcome this time.

4. Long List

This exercise is simple but highly effective. Always have a list of problems with you and practice exercises 1-3 on them. Each day you should take at least 15 minutes to do this.

5. As unusual as possible

This exercise is also about training your ability for divergent thinking. With divergent information, we bring our mind to see things that it has never seen before in this context.

Here’s how you do it

Choose an object out of your surroundings. Take it into your hand and look at it carefully. Now write down for five minutes what unusual things you can do with this object. Try to find as many ideas as possible. The more unusual these ideas are, the better.

6. Chain of associations

All ideas about something new essentially consist of combining two things that already exist in a way that no one has done before. The more different the two things are from each other, the more creative the idea usually is. In this exercise, we’ll practice just such skills.

Here’s how you do it

Make a list of at least ten unrelated words. The further apart the words are in content, the better. Now combine these words into meaningful sentences. Each sentence must end with the next word in your list.

A final advice

All the exercises I have explained here work especially well with real problems from your own life. However, try them with made-up questions and invented problems as well. You will notice an amazing difference. Comparable to how a marathon runner doesn’t run a full marathon every day and a sprinter doesn’t practice only on the 100 meter track.

Photo Credits: Photo by SHaHraM Anhari  on Unsplash

Written by

Dennis Grönger

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My name is Dennis Grönger. I am an innovation developer, product manager and certified Design Thinking Master with a passion for complex projects. In the 25+ years of my career, I have worked with and for a wide variety of companies – from large international groups to agile start-ups.
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