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Ideas: The phrase "thinking up an idea" is a common one.
It is certainly fair to say that thinking, to most people, is the chief, if not the only factor that occurs to them when the job of producing an idea presents itself.
How then, should one think? Have you ever thought about thinking? Surely a subject on which so much depends, deserves at least a very brief survey of some common pitfalls before we get down to actual idea production.
Thinking of the lowest order is day dreaming. The mind flits like a butterfly from one subject to another, not resting long enough to draw a drop of sweet from the flower.
Another thing which often passes for thinking is nothing more than imitation. You do the thing you have always done, based on what you have always seen someone else always do.
Sometimes, on a higher level, is a type of thinking which is done to solve problems. Many people "think" about even the most serious problems on the first level mentioned—the daydreamer or flitter.
The subject is on his mind, and worries him, but none of the processes that go on in his head, if processes they may be called, are directed to solving the problem effectively. A life's savings may be lost because of a wrong idea on the part of a business man.
The highest level of thinking, of course, is performed by the creative thinker. He is the one who works over what enters his head.
In creative thinking, prosaic facts, abstract questions, and oddities of information are transformed into fine literature, cures for dreadful diseases, and ideas which may change the way the world goes.
Most people do not even know that when they are confronted with a problem to solve, they have to do certain things in a certain order to solve it.
Thinking in some respects resembles cooking. The thinker must follow a formula just as the cook follows a recipe. There is a regular order in which the ingredients are added and prepared. Proper combinations are made, proper timing is considered. The dinner suffers if instead of soup, a delicious dessert is brought in before the roast.
The thinker must produce not the right answer to the wrong question but to the right one.
Continued from ....How to Get IDEAS by Estelle H. Ries Welcome to our collection of information resources on a diverse range of subjects, including:
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