Your Brain Is Messing With Your Head!
Let’s talk about the brain… Your brain. Scientists and psychologists discovered long ago, generally speaking, analytical thinking is done on the left side of your brain while creativity is done on the right side of your brain.
Of course this is a gross generalization and in fact, when challenged with a task, many areas of the brain light up in the fMRI, showing that it takes a lot of your brain to find a solution. Creativity takes image processing, long memory; both short term and long term memory, and many other areas. Generally speaking, creativity lights up the right and analytics light up your left sides. For the purpose of this book, that how we will refer to it.
Characteristics of Left Brain Thinkers
Here are some words that generally describe the thinking patterns of a right brain thinker. Can you think of other Words?
Calculate, Analytical, Linear, Explicit, Sequential, Numbers, Concrete, Rational, Active, Goal-Oriented, Verbal, and Numbers
Characteristics of Right Brain Thinkers
Here are some words that generally describe the thinking patterns of a right brain thinker.
Can you think of other words?
Shapes, Colors, Concepts, Intuitive, Spontaneous, Emotional, Nonverbal, Holistic, Playful, Diffuse, Symbolic, and Physical
Take a moment to write down some words that describe your right brain thinking.Take a moment to write down some words that describe your right brain thinking. (Remember… You have to do the exercises!)
It’s impossible to do two things at once. No matter how cool you think you are. There is NO such thing as multitasking. What you can do is switch between tasks, not undertake two tasks at the same time. When you are switching between tasks, you are doing neither, well.
Come on, you know it’s true. If you want to do a job well, concentration is key. Other task are simply distractions. If you want to be creative and really innovative, you need to believe this and create an environment without distraction. Set aside a certain amount of time, put your phone in a different room, step away from your computer, stay away from your email and especially YouTube, put on some background, non-distracting music and focus.
Moldy Bread
When Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1923, he was in a “creative” frame of mind that morning. If instead, he was in his usual “analytical” mindset, concentrating on his cultures in the dishes, he would have noticed the one dish without culture activity and simply thrown it away. To an analytical mind, an empty culture dish is of no relevance or use. His would have viewed it as an error when he had expected bacterial activity. In his creative mind, it was a clue to something bigger and he asked the question “why was there an absence of bacteria cultures acting in the dish?’
The rest is what they say, “history”.
Lon Safko
Serial Innovator, Keynote Speaker, Trainer, Innovative Thinking
Tags: innovative thinking, creative, creative thinking, Innovation, critical thinking definition, innovation definition, critical thinking skills, creative process