Free thinking is like dreaming, you can enjoy it, play with it, make it big, have fun, feel especial…
Sometimes people ask me what creative thinking techniques I use… and there is not an easy answer: depending on the circumstances.  When I wrote my book “Essex Creativity”, I did an acronym to simplify a group of different type of techniques called B.A.S.I.D.O.N.   B stands for “brainstorming”, however, the techniques I shortlisted are mainly to be used individually, so there is a variation of brainstorming, like “brainwriting” (there could be other variations using social media, such as twitter, WhatsApp, blog, youtube comments, email, etc.).  I especially make an emphasis about it as an attitude, a mental environment in which you allow yourself to generate all type of ideas.


What is interesting about this acronym and what I found more helpful, relates to de fact of using 7 different types of “techniques” or tools and the fact that you are7 times thinking about the same topic and generating similar ideas with variations.


In that book I wrote, I already expressed the possibility of thinking about yourselfor about others.  After attending a conference of James Altucher, I understood the benefits of being consistent generating ideas about improvement (of yourself or others, or anything).  His idea is to write 10 ideas every day about something. Since some time ago, when I go to work in the tube, I write 10 ideas about something, usually about myself but sometimes about others.  I realised some time ago about the benefits of forcing myself to generate ideas regardless of using any method.  At the same time, I have learnt that the same day I have an idea I feel I should do something about, I ensure I do it (or, at least, I start it) that same day, as in the past, many of my ideas are lost in a paper…


My last development has brought me to appreciate the benefits of networkingand the use of social media for different purposes.  I could ask questions about some topics and also answer questions about other topics, or comment on blogs of other people… but I can also suggest things to people that I think could benefit them.  The next step also could be to link with people like minded and try to do projects together.   When doing something, thoughts become precious.  Doing something for somebody, giving ideas for free, returns gratitude and inspiration, what is a wonderful motivation to continue thinking as a type of virtuous cycle.  Thinking about yourself is good but thinking about others and sharing it with them is better because at the same time, is feeding you back about your own thoughts, so it is helping you.  Even if you don´t share your thoughts about others, thinking about others give you the motivation to do something about them. Prayer is a “powerful tool” to generate motivation to do things: a motivational inspiration to act.  Thinking and praying could have some links connected with feelings, motivation, topic subject to work on and action.Feelings, thoughts, behaviour.  Crede ut intelligas-intellige ut credas, ora et labora.
Thinking is interesting but doing is productive.  Doing can start by writing an idea on paper (or in a book) or sharing it with social media, even contacting somebody in particular.

This is a short post about the power of analogies.

Thinking about "I Have a Dream", I was thinking about the doing an analogy to update the speech.   This analogy consists of changing the topic of skin colour to the topic of economy of the country and how to link different economies to work together.  The idea is to reflect on this history of Martin Luther King fighting to end racism with the history of fighting to end poverty.  What elements of the speech, what elements of the process, what actions could be learnt from it?

Below there are some videos about Martin Luther King, the speech of Robert Kenedy after Martin Luther King had been killed and then some videos about Amnesty International and Cafod, connecting the poor to the powerful to finish with a video of the original Band Aid.  Maybe another analogy between any ordinary day and Christmas day?

Last Thursday, 28th January 2016 I was invited to a wonderful event with conferences and workshops in The Royal College of Psychiatrists about “Enabling Environments”.


As it is explained on their website:
“Good relationships promote well-being, but many organisations and groups fail to address this aspect of people’s lives. The Enabling Environments Award is a quality mark given to those who can demonstrate they are achieving an outstanding level of best practice in creating and sustaining a positive and effective social environment.”


As it mentions on its Standards Document:
“The Enabling Environments standards apply to a wide range of environments ranging from those providing health and social care, to criminal justice settings and education. They also apply to workplace settings and leisure facilities such as offices and gyms.”


Thinking about all these, I want to raise awareness about the importance this can have in all type of environments such as workplaces and family homes.  In an informal way, I want to develop a website called www.enablingenvironments.clubto contribute with suggestions that can help to increase these standards in a global level.  Something informal that anybody can contribute suggesting ideas they have applied to improve any of the particular standards (belonging, boundaries, communication, development, involvement, safety, structure, empowerment, leadership and openness).


The original title for this post was going to be totally different.  It was going to be a quotation from Albert Einstein: 
“The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.”
Then, I remember two different type of situations: One of the situations is when somebody ask you some question and tell you something like: “I love your aspect of being confused when I ask you a question” or other situations in which you are told “Don´t ask me these stupid questions!”.  In both situations, there is some type of process in my head in which I am thinking, I am asking questions to myself without being allowed to do it in the way I am more effective.  Sometimes I need to ask somebody a question that is really addressed to myself and that is way the other person feels annoyed as cannot give me an answer or doesn´t want to think about it.  Very interesting situations… is like a type of counselling in whichthe benefit is not on the answer of the other person, but on the opportunity that gives you to talk about something… and as you are talking you are thinking about it.


So, I want to talk about some useful tool I use called “Quora”.  It is a type of social media in which you can be asked questions about a topic of your choice.  In my case it is mainly about creative thinking.  After having answering several questions, I was inviting to post 10 questions, what I found very interesting.  Now, besides questions being sent to my email, I am also receiving answers to the questions I proposed, what is very engaging.


I have found this tool a very engaging way of continuing learning and thinking about any topic you  are particularly interested.  The opportunity to answer questions about the topic of your choice is an excellent way to become aware of your thoughts, to learn about things you can construct but you haven´t because of other distractions.  The reason why I love Quora is because while other social media can be more distracting, Quora is reminding you about a specific topic, focusing your attention on it from different angles.


Since I attended a conference from James Altucher, I became aware of the power of writing every day 10 ideas to improve yourself or somebody else or… anything (something that I do every day while travelling in The Tube) and the benefits of doing something about it or sharing it with somebody you want to help.  Now I am thinking about the possibility of not only writing 10 ideas about something every day, but also about the possibility of writing 10 questions about something.  Questioning is a very powerful tool to focus your attention and your action as it happens which questions such as “What is stopping you?” or after you give a reason of a consequence that could happen when you try something, then you ask again: “What would happen then?”
By forcing yourself to think about new questions, you open doors to have new thoughts about things you already know but you haven´t looked at them from these different angles and at the same time, to have the motivation for new initiatives.

I hope 2016 becomes a year in which parenting classes are pushed forward.
I am developing my own system to help parents of teens.  It is with sadness that every day I find people with poor problem solving skills, people who did not know there were other options to solve their problems… and what could be more useful than parents able to help children to learn how to solve any type of problem effectively?  How much confidence and hope can that bring to anybody?


Hopefully children have the proper parenting they deserve and they become healthy teens.  How to help parents to achieve this?  In my experience, parents need to help their children to learn to think.  This is as simple as helping them to see other options (or to look for them), think about the consequences in the short and long term, to be disciplined to commit to plans to achieve what they want, to be able to learn what they want because they know how to study and enjoy doing it, etc.


When I created www.learningmentor.org, my main purpose was to have a list of websites where people can learn things for free.  Regrettably, it is so difficult to access the wonderful educational programmes that sometimes are shown in the TV.  With the internet, again, it is so difficult sometimes to find the websites that can help you to learn what you want, the way you want.  Not only that, but to provide access to free software that children can create things with what they are learning, publish things, etc.  In our era of content marketing, everybody should use their educational years to find out the topics they are more interested and think how to combine them and present them in unique ways, in their own perspectives, in their own formats such as papers, books, comics, presentations, videos, etc.
I would suggest books such as “Reinventing education. A Thought Experiment by 21 authors” edited by Vincent Nolan and Gerard Darby, where among other things, it is promoted the need to encourage in children the desire to learn and teach children how to think.  When I createdwww.microworkshops.org my idea was to organise some videos about personal development that can motivate people towards their own improvement.
It is important to think about social change, about ways of life, about learning how to live in a society with so much consumption, so much publicity and social media…


It is not easy to change, to improve, unless you keep out of distractions.  That is why I have started a website called www.onlinegym.club, not thinking only about the physical health, but also about the mental, social, emotional, financial and spiritual health, and the importance of having some social media influence to remind us the need of healthy routines.  I am creating some more websites, such as www.professionaldevelopment.club, to help workers to be ready for their next move.  In a society with a high level of uncertainty, in which changes happen at any time, it is important to be ready for the next move.  You can move yourself or get ready for when the right time comes.


One of the projects in which I am more interested is on my other websitewww.thethinkingking.com. Through this website I would like to provide effective education (seminars for teens, facilitations for parents, innovation for employees and businesses).  Parents need to be able to compete, not only with the content of social media, but with the attraction and the time that they take away from children to think.  This means that parents have to be very effective in the way they help their children, not by just telling them what to do, but by listening carefully, asking the right questions, with the a helping attitude, in the right time, in a collaboratively exploring manner, humbly and trying to understand and learn, so that children can think about it (Is it not that same approach we would like from our children?).  In my own experience with a teenager that when he was 15 years old was a bit challenging, I was amazed by how using techniques learnt from being a facilitator, from using cognitive behavioural therapy and motivational interviewing, not only contributed to help the child to think better (what also lead to a sustainable improved behaviour), but also to change from having some type of discussions to having interesting dialogues based on ideas and thoughts, what lead myself to learn by thinking from other perspectives.  Some of my books explore this topic, specifically, I would recommend “Creative Thinking for Londoners.  Learning different things in different ways”.


When thinking about our social media and about computers, my thoughts are about how to change the programmes that some children have, the instructions they have learnt that lead to their own destruction, to their continue distraction, their lack of thinking time, forgetting they already have access to the tools to improve their lives.  We need to understand the long life possibilities of change and the enormous availability of resources that can be used to improve ourselves.  More important than that, to stimulate the desire to use the tools we have in our hands to improve ourselves and our society.

First published in www.miguelacha.com

Sometimes there are things that are combined in interesting ways…
Some of the topics I am thinking about, relate to analogies (as tool to think out of the box, creatively), the concept of introvert (defined by Susan Cain as people who are at the most capable when they´re in quieter environments), canvas tool (to think about a business model) and the power of networking (not mainly to sell, but as a way of listening, helping, learning and creating connexions).


Probably I will start by highlighting the benefits of networking to link with partners, clients and suppliers… and to develop relationships and support networks.
Thinking about introverts, as Susan Cain said in her Ted Talk:
“This is especially important when it comes to creativity and to productivity, because when psychologists look at the lives of the most creative people, what they find are people who are very good at exchanging ideas and advancing ideas, but who also have a serious streak of introversion in them.”
She mentions the collaboration between Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs to start Apple Computer and also how groups famously follow the opinions of the most dominant or charismatic person in the room, even though there's zero correlation between being the best talker and having the best ideas.  She also added:  “Stop the madness for constant group work. Just stop it.”
Susan Cain Ted Talk “The Power of Introverts”   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0KYU2j0TM4
Susan Cain website   http://www.quietrev.com/


Thinking about creativity, there are benefits and disadvantages when thinking individually or in group, ie. Groupthink(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groupthink) or Anchoring(http://www.fastcompany.com/3033567/agendas/brainstorming-doesnt-work-try-this-technique-instead).
I have always found analogies a very useful tool to innovate (http://www.oceansofexcellence.com/synectics-creative-connection-making/)
There are many useful ways to use analogies, especially trying to relate things  that are unrelated (http://www.tallerdecreatividad.com/blog/analogies-between-books-and-friends).  https://www.mycoted.com/Analogies
Finally, I love the idea of canvas for business model generation:http://www.businessmodelgeneration.com/downloads/business_model_canvas_poster.pdf


My suggestion is to organise networking events in which people can attend with their own canvas.  They will meet with somebody who has his/her own canvas.  It is expected that they belong to a different type of business or they should look for somebody else.
Then, the idea is to share item by item of the canvas (for example, each of the customer segments respectively), in a type of analogy activity in which there is a discussion about what would happen if one of the individuals would have as a segment market, the same segment market of the other business (after this discussion, the next discussion will be the opposite, if the other individual would choose to have the segment market of the other).  By exchanging ideas from a different type of business, they force themselves to think from another perspective, plus having some opinions from the person who is in the other business.  So, the idea is to make an effort of thinking from the other perspective and allowing permission to think about a variety of options and analyse what would happen. Also trying to help the other person by suggesting ideas.
  The rules are not fixed, but it could be interesting to change only one item of the canvas at a time, to see how it would affect the other items of the canvas.  At the same time, it might not be possible to use exactly the same item of the other business, but it can trigger other types of ideas, other options.

First published on www.miguelacha.com

One of the benefits of living in London is that you can attend many events where you can learn things at the same time you are entertained.  It is a mix between networking and learning.

There are many training sessions, seminars, workshops, etc. where you can learn tips useful for many different areas of life, for personal and professional development.

Always there is an opportunity to re-think about your projects, ideas, etc.  
From the creative point of view, I tend to search for questions that trigger new thoughts.  In the case of yesterday´s session with Simone Vincenzi, I found among others:
​

• How to balance between being yourself and professional image?
• How can I create something that is easy to understand for my clients?
• How to divide whatever I am presenting, teaching, etc. in 3 parts, as it will be easily memorable?
• What kind of value can I give to my customers?

Besides, we learnt many other things: 4 pilars of business (vision, target client, packages and ability to sell the product and rate your clarity-confidence on them), productisation...  It was very clever the way of linking your life, the most important things you have achieved (between 3 to 7) to generate a product that is "from your heart".

Besides the fact that his seminar is very useful (always there is something easy and practical to learn),  I enjoyed the "pressure factor" in which I felt as in little time you had to think about creating something, what is a first draft of something that you take away with you.

Thank you Simone!!!!!

By the way, here is the link to his book:

69 Buzzing Question to turn your life Upside-Down: Change Your Life Asking Better Questions

​It seems to me that my ideas have different value according to where they are expressed.  Recently I was looking at a notebook where I wrote some ideas by pen (handwriting) and I could revive the strength of the emotion I had while I wrote them months ago.

I have learnt that it is convenient to act on my ideas as soon as I have them or at least record them appropriately.  However I have noticed that if I had typed my notes, the effect (I don´t know why) is not the same as when they are handwritten.

I guess it can be similar to doing a mindmap by hand, in a rush, writing your thoughts as they come or using a mindmap software, which will produce a very nice image to show to others, but it might not mean exactly the same to you as when you do it handwriting, with all the spontaneity and flexibility.

I have written books that when I read them, I feel impressed with myself and the type of thoughts or ideas in it. Sometimes the ideas that are written in a moment in a small paper or notebook have a valuable impact because they remind you of a special thought that can activate a massive action.

So, where do you express your ideas?

In a paper? Handwriting them, so that you have all the flexibility and originality-spontaneity, freedom of not feeling that you have to do it "perfect" but enjoying thinking about them?

Typing them? They can be stored and read in the future, but sometimes they can loose that special feeling you had when originally you wrote them

In your mind?  Usually is when you are thinking, starting combining concepts, experiences, etc.  maybe in the bus, in the bath or in the bed? It can happen even when you are sleeping... they could have the strength to get you up and start working on them at that same moment regardless of the time being 3.00 am.

With software? Maybe using a software to express them to colleagues in a way that impress.  It might be important to thinking about them in depth and express them in a way that highlight the benefits for the audience.

At home, in a park, in a cemetery, in a car, in the tube, in the plane?  This week I came back from Spain and I always find the two hours flight ideal to think about something, to generate ideas, etc. and the change of country, the change of environment, people, weather, town, libraries, bookshops, museums... with new stimulation to think differently.

Where do you express your ideas can have an impact on how you express your ideas.  Since I was a teenager I carry a small notebook where I write anything that comes to my mind as often it is not the result of a conscious mental process, but any link that happens for some random reason or stimulation: a word, a sound, a smell, an image...

Using different ways and places to express your ideas can have an impact on the way you think and perceive them generating more connections, links and combinations.

Sunday breakfast.  Yesterday I went to a wedding so today I have awoken ready to have some breakfast... Then, I had to do one of these important decisions you have to do on Sunday morning: jam or honey?


I chose honey!  Why?  I guess I am still a bit tired from the wedding, so I wanted the easiest one and the honey is in a squeeze bottle dispenser, what make it very easy...

My next chain of thoughts or questions: why they don´t sell jam on squeeze bottles? Should I check in google if they do? Should I ask any jam manufacturers to consider it?  Will it be more expensive than the  jam in usual containers (as it happens with the honey)?  Would I buy it even though it is a bit more expensive?  Would I prefer that than emptying a jam container and try to see if it works in a squeeze bottle dispenser?

Analogies with other ideas: I think this morning I would have preferred jam and the reason for choosing honey, was because it was easier.  This has made me think about other situations in which we choose something, not because it is the best option, but because it is the easier: For example, we tend to buy things in the same places, to ask for support to the people we feel happy with, we tend to follow routines because it is easy.

That is why it is good to decide to break routines, to try new things.

Thinking again about ideas we want to implement or to sell, once the idea has been developed, there is an important step of "personalisation" adapting it and its benefits to the person we are selling it.  How can we make the idea easy to be implemented? How can we create the SQUEEZE BOTTLE DISPENSER that makes the idea more interesting than others?

There are many ways to choose ideas: pros/cons, cost-benefits analysis, voting, voting with criteria, etc. etc.

One step further we could use is "how to make it more interesting?"   Even though it is not very specific, it will make us think about the interests of each person involved in the implementation of the idea.

Maybe visualising the SQUEEZE BOTTLE DISPENSER, we can remember that sometimes the idea that can win is not the best one (jam), but the most interesting (for some reason, ie. laziness) for an individual.

This can suggest many ideas that can eliminate middlemen or uncomfortable filters and substitute them.

After being in Australia on holidays (thank you Bernie!) I am back to normal life... It has been a wonderful period where my routines have changed, I have met new friends, I have been in a different environment, I have enjoyed the sun, the beach, the sea..., I went also to Hamilton Island, where the view from my balcony was breath taking and different type of birds came to my window.  Specially I had nice conversations, the ones that make you think and reflect, the ones that while being on holidays sink in more in your brain, in your emotions and the type of thoughts and ideas that lead you into actions.  I also saw crocodiles, kangaroos, koalas, and a incredibly large burmese python!

I experienced even that situation in which I saw something in another country that you would wonder if it could be replicated in other places, such as a small beach with water in the middle of a city (Brisbane).

During the holidays, I had time to write some ideas, time to think and to incubate thoughts (Wallas: preparation, incubation, illumination, verification...).  After coming back from holidays, I had the opportunity to attend an event in Whitechapel Idea Store, from Vicenzo Simone (Gtex), in which he mentioned the 3P´s: Passion, Profitability and Problem, when thinking about self-employment (doing something you are passionate about, that is profitable and that solves a problem).  For some reason, it came to my mind that maybe I should focus my work on the people that they need it the most.  Not only the business people that want training to improve their innovation but for people who need to change their thoughts to heal their behaviour.  I love the next two pictures I took of Kangaroos: In the first one they might be thinking and in the second one, it might be ready to implement the ideas and to jump over the obstacles.