20 Things You Can Do Right Now To Lead A More Creative Life in 2023.
20 Things You Can Do Right Now To Lead A More Creative Life in 2023.
Ideasicle founder and CEO, Will Burns, and I talk about how to make this the year you release your inner creative kraken.
Well, let me just say once again, Happy New Year everyone! You’ve helped make Strange Alchemy one of the fastest rising creativity newsletters out there. So my deepest and most heartfelt thanks to you all.
In the weeks ahead, you can look forward to some very cool new stuff for paid subscribers that I know you guys are going to love.
Soon, I’ll be adding a podcast that you’ll be able to access right here (although if Spotify, Apple Podcasts or some other platform is your thing, that’s fine too). I’ll be talking with creativity luminaries from all over the place, including advertising, film and TV, and more.
Did someone say merch? Hell, yeah there’s merch! And none of that cheesy crap. Best of all, I’ll be giving it away once every month. That’s the plan anyway. Good times!
But today, let’s talk about you. You as in the you that wants this to be the year your creative self comes roaring out into this world and taking no prisoners. You want that. I want that.
My guest today is Will Burns.
Will is the founder and CEO of Ideasicle X, one of the most impressive idea generating machines out there (Full disclosure: I personally work with Ideasicle X from time to time. I mean, it’s not like I own stock or anything). Will has been a contributing columnist for Forbes and has worked with every high-profile advertising agency in the country, including Wieden+Kennedy, Goodby Silverstein, Mullen and Arnold. He also happens to be a ravenous student of how creativity works and why.
With that, let’s get into it.
E: So, Will, it seems like every time I turn around, you’re talking about some new study or research finding or whatever that reveals something new about how the creative mind works. What got you into this?
W: I just find human creativity to be not only fascinating, but one of the most important aspects of our nature. It’s why I got into advertising. Everyone lives, creates, lives some more, creates, repeat. And not just artists, but everyone in their own way utilizes everyday creativity. Honestly, I think creativity may be one of, if not THE, answer to the old question, “What is the meaning of life?” I’ve built my business around this singular skill and, as a compliment, I like to keep track of the latest science into the subject looking for clues as to how we can improve our creativity.
E: So just so everybody knows how we’ve decided to do this, you’ve picked out 10 ideas that you feel can really jack up the volume on just about anyone’s creative powers.
W: Yes, there are more, but these are my current 10 favorite scientific studies that provide clues to creative improvement. First, for context, it’s important to understand what general state of mind is ideal for ideas to happen. Creativity is the opposite of focusing. Focusing brings our consciousness firmly and squarely into the 3-dimensional world. And that’s great for survival or when you’re doing your taxes or putting together that 600-piece LEGO set, as you don’t want to be thinking about anything else. But it’s horrible for creativity. When your working memory is paying full attention to one physical, complex thing or task (taxes or LEGOs) it necessarily filters out all irrelevant noise. That’s the job of our working memory. But when it comes to creative ideas, who’s to say what thoughts are the noise and what thoughts are the signal? There’s the rub.
As Steven Johnson suggests in his book “Where Good Ideas Come From,” new ideas happen when two seemingly disconnected thoughts collide and form an entirely new thought (an idea). If our working memory overpowers us and we are overly focused on the physical 3-dimensional world, then we are limiting the number of thoughts that can collide in our minds.
Many of the studies below I believe trick our working memory into getting out of the way.
E: What I like is that where your 10 ideas—which we lead off with— are basically rooted in science, in very quantifiable thinking, my 10 come at it from more of a human behavior angle. Not necessarily scientific, but stuff that I know has worked for me personally. So with that, let’s get after it.
1. WALKING INCREASES CREATIVITY BY 60%
Research out of Stanford found that we are 60% more creative when we are walking, regardless of whether that’s indoors, outdoors or on a treadmill. The study isolated the variables of movement without walking and location. Walking is an activity that requires nearly zero thought, but enough thought that it gives your working memory something to do. That means it’s less able to weed out “irrelevant” thoughts as you walk. 60%!
2: DAYDREAMS INCREASE CREATIVITY WHEN TETHERED TO SOME PHYSICAL REALITY.
The Schooler Lab at UC Santa Barbara proved that not all daydreaming is equally productive when it comes to creativity. When daydreaming while doing menial tasks like gardening, washing dishes or showering (or walking - see above), we are more creative. These menial tasks occupy our working memory, thereby making it less able to weed out “irrelevant” thoughts. Detecting a pattern here?
3: CREATIVITY INCREASES DURING NON-OPTIMAL TIMES OF DAY.
Research from Mareike Wieth at Albion College showed consistently greater performance with insight problem solving occurred during non-optimal times of day, when people are tired. Apparently, when you’re tired, guess what else is tired? Yep, your working memory. That means you’re less able to focus and “irrelevant” thoughts can more easily break through.
4: IMAGINE YOURSELF BEING SOMEWHERE ELSE.
Anything that we do not experience as occurring now, here, and to ourselves physically is called creating “psychological distance.” And creating it tricks us into being more creative. Just imagining yourself walking in the Sahara Desert is enough to keep your working memory at bay, as there is nothing physical about the imagined experience, no danger. That liberates your mind. In fact, I believe The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper leveraged this principle because the band pretended they had a different identity.
5: COFFEE SHOP NOISE IS THE PERFECT AMOUNT FOR CREATIVITY.
A study by researchers at the University of British Columbia and the University of Virginia suggests that moderate levels of ambient noise can boost your ability to come up with creative ideas. It’s just enough distraction to occupy our working memory, but not so much we can’t think. Too much or too little noise triggers our working memory to pay attention/focus/ruin everything.
6: MODERATE AMOUNTS OF ALCOHOL INCREASE CREATIVITY.
Professor Andrew Jarosz of Mississippi State University found that those who were brought to the legal limit of intoxication (0.08% blood alcohol level) were better able to solve creative problems. Again, our working memory also gets a little tipsy so…more ideas. However, too much alcohol has the opposite effect.
7: SENSORY DEPRIVATION THROUGH FLOTATION THERAPY.
You’ve seen those deprivation tanks where you climb in and the water is exactly your body temperature, all sound is eliminated, completely dark, etc. Well, Donal and Deborah Forgays proved that by eliminating all of the incoming "noise" in this way - where nothing can be focused on - our creativity increases. I believe, again, it’s because our working memory has nothing to do (at all) and takes a back seat.
8: PEOPLE WITH ATTENTION DEFICIT DISORDER TEND TO BE MORE CREATIVE.
No better example than examining those who are unable to focus. Shelley Carson from Harvard and Jordan Peterson from The University of Toronto have found that reductions in latent inhibition, or the ability to filter out information previously experienced as irrelevant, mean greater creativity. People with ADD are less able to utilize their working memory to focus at all, thereby allowing more thoughts into consciousness, which means more collisions, more ideas.
9: IF YOU TAKE A PLACEBO, YOU WILL BE MORE CREATIVE.
This one is nuts. A study from Lior Noy and Liron Rozenkrantz at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel proves that the power of a placebo increases creativity. They used the aroma of cinnamon to trick subjects into thinking they were receiving a creativity enhancement. It was only cinnamon, but the improved creativity was measurable. The connection to working memory is less clear with this one, but perhaps the subject’s belief in this temporary superpower overwhelmed the doubt that can come from our working memory? Either way, this one blows me away, as it proves that we absolutely get in our own way when it comes to creativity.
10: DIM LIGHTING.
Anna Steidle of the University of Stuttgart did a study that found rooms that are dimly lit yielded better creative thinking than bright rooms. Could be that the more invisible we feel, the less self-conscious we become and, therefore, less fearful we are of new ideas? Or maybe our working memory is turned off because it’s not dark (scary, red alert!) and it’s not so well lit that it has lots to focus on?
11. THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN RUTS AND RITUALS.
Rituals can play a huge role in fostering a creative mindset. Roald Dahl did his writing in a shed behind his greenhouse. Always at the exact same times every day. Lunch was always the same. Norwegian prawns and half a head of lettuce. It gets better. Dahl wouldn’t write a lick until he snuggled into a sleeping bag, pulled it up around his waist and settled himself down into a beat-up armchair. He had to put his feet up on an old suitcase filled with logs which, needless to say, he had to have roped to the legs of the armchair so it was always at the perfect distance. Twyla Tharp, whose rituals aren’t as extreme, is another good example Sounds crazy sure, but for some people, it’s gold.
12. SEE THE SPECK OF SAND IN THE SPECK OF SAND.
I’ve written a lot lately about mindfulness and the outsized influence it so often has on creativity. At first, it seems counterproductive. After all, doesn’t mindfulness mean focus? And like Will says, isn’t focus diametrically opposed to the kind of loose, subconscious mental state that creativity thrives on? It absolutely is. But what I’ve found is that by practicing intense focus for, say, 10 or 15 minutes, then dialing down that executive network that I talked about recently, you can actually increase the chances of big ideas happening. Kind of like warming up before a run.
13. A “WHAT IF” QUESTION A DAY KEEPS THE CREATIVE BLOCK AWAY.
With a normal question, our brain taps into previous information, data or situational experiences to come up with an answer. A what if question though is different. Most of the time, the brain doesn’t have any precedents stored away, so the answer get shunted off to a different area of the brain where we’re forced to speculate, to imagine a possible answer. It’s pretty simple but if you do it often enough, before long you find yourself tuning into a creativity frequency.
13. DON’T BE A ATYCHIPHOBIAC.
You know. An atychiphobiac. Someone who fears failure. Creatives are particularly prone to this. We think that unless our ideas are world-changing, they’ll be seen as small. Clever but of no consequence. If you’re not careful, it can be debilitating. A better attitude is one where we embrace failure, look at it for what it really is. Not a death blow but an opportunity to learn. To take a different turn in the road. Some of the greatest creative minds in all of human history have looked at failure in just this way.
14. THEY’RE NOT TOYS. THEY’RE TIME MACHINES.
Not sure I would have picked the same toys as Michael Kleiss, but I am pedal-to-the-metal in alignment with the idea that toys have the power to reconnect us with our childhood and, for many of us, the most creatively potent time of our lives. So what am I saying, dig out those Army men and Barbies and Mr. Potato Heads? Why, yes I am. Yes, I absolutely am.
15. THINK INSIDE THE BOX.
Probably more than anything else, this one I know something about. So much so that I wrote a book about it. In a nutshell, the premise is that while we’d all like to believe that thinking outside the box is the be all and end all of creativity, the fact is that it’s virtually impossible to pull off. And it’s a good thing since ideas have a hard time forming without obstacles to push off against. Know where the boundaries are. Accept them. Do that and watch the creative sparks fly.
16. STOP BEING YOUR OWN WORST CRITIC.
“You will become way less concerned with what other people think of you when you realize how seldom they do”. David Foster Wallace said that in his novel, Infinite Jest, back in 1996. Since then, psychologists have come up with a name for the phenomenon: the spotlight effect. Basically, it’s the feeling that everyone is judging us at every turn, and that everyone sees the flaws that we think are the most glaring. In a nutshell, the feeling that we suck. Creatives tend to be notoriously self-conscious and so we’re particularly vulnerable to this. One way to get your head centered is to write down the reasons you think your work isn’t what it could be. Seeing them on the page like that, you come to realize it’s you who thinks these things. No one else,
17. THE LAW OF CREATIVE ATTRACTION.
You probably know about The Law Of Attraction. The Law Of Creative Attraction is similar. The premise is that if you start living your life as if you’re already creating amazing things, things creatively way beyond anything you’ve ever done, then at some you actually will. Call it the power of positive thinking. Call it visualization. Call it more New Age bullshit. But somehow it has a way of working. Not all the time. But enough. There’s a scene in The Company Men where Ben Affleck, who’s just lost his lucrative job, is trying to explain to his wife why he can’t give up his membership at the country club or sell his Porsche. “I have to look successful. I can’t just be another asshole with a resume”. He wasn’t wrong. If you want to be a creative giant, start acting like one.
18. DAVINCI KEPT A NOTEBOOK FOR A REASON.
Leonardo kept a notebook for more than 30 years. He carried it around with him everywhere. If an idea popped up, he wrote it down. Some of his greatest works of art, his inventions like the helicopter, even his musings on the human anatomy all started their journey to reality in that notebook. Who’s to say what ideas might get their start in yours. Notebooks work. They force you to document your thoughts, what you see in them, what’s different about them, things about them that could be better.
19. THINK LIKE A SPONGE.
I’ve always been blown away by how much more creative person can be just by soaking up the work of others. It’s a kind of creativity osmosis wherein you literally clone an idea that you believe is genius. Just flat out replicate it as if it were your own. Let’s say you’re a poet and you’ve always been a big fan of Wendell Berry. Pick one of Wendell’s poem. Maybe it’s The Peace Of Wild Things. Pick up a pencil and start writing it. Do this with other poems. After a while, the creativity of other poets will begin to seep into your own talent. When I first started in advertising, I did exactly this. I scribbled down hundreds of ad ideas. Big ones. Award winning ones. Not mine. Someone else’s. Creatives that I worshipped. Just the act of re-creating their work got me to feel what I imagined they felt as they were breathing them into existence.
20. YOU MAY SAY I’M A DREAMER BUT I’M NOT THE ONLY ONE.
Paul McCartney woke up humming the tune for Yesterday. James Cameron got the idea for The Terminator. Jack Nicklaus dreamt up a new way to swing a golf club. James Watson had a dream about two serpents that were intertwined which eventually led him to discover the double helix shape of DNA. It’s remarkable how many brilliant ideas got their start in a dream. As it turns out, highly creative people tend to sleep more. Perhaps because subconsciously they know that their imaginations run wilder in their dreams.
And there you have it. 20 ideas that will get your creative turbo screaming. There are more. And we’ll be covering them in upcoming editions. Also, we’ll be doing some seriously deep dives into many of the ideas we’ve discussed here today, starting with the role of toys and how they really can reconnect us with the most creative years of our lives. Stay tuned. And if you have any ideas you’d like to see us get into, be sure to leave a comment!