One of the things that's important in this effort is to try to figure out how to keep developing our own creativity after the course is done. It happens with every course, every workshop, whether it's about mathematics or French or statistics. Here we can plan out what could happen after the course is done. You've got the techniques for doing things better in terms of developing a lot of different ideas, and you also know to redefine what describes any specific problem. Well, here are some things that you can do to keep yourself becoming more creative. First of all, there's a number of the do something different that you could do in additions to the ones you saw here. We used number of these other ones in the regular classes and you can do some of those if they fit your situation. Well, one simple thing that most people can do is wear something different. No matter where we live or in what context, we often dress in a certain manner. It's a business suit or it's jeans and a T-shirt and it stays the same. Try wearing something different, whether it's different socks on each foot. I tried that, I started using that two years ago. Or a bow tie with your suit or different color entirely. People may notice and then you'll be able to explain and reinforce your own drive for creativity. Perhaps inspire them. Now, one of the things that you can do something different with a partner. Finding somebody in your local community or in your family with whom you're willing to try something unusual. Try designing something that only the two of you could do together. This is always a challenge, because they probably haven't seen the course or they haven't been taking the course and they might not be loosened up. So you'll have to help them get started. One of the thing I give us a good assignment though, is to listen differently. Go and find a place where it's quiet and peaceful and you can sit and just listen. Turn off all the electronic equipment and try listen to everything that's there, even though it's quiet. You'll be amazed at the number of different things that you hear. Usually what happens, about a third of the class tends to find some great revelation. When they're doing this, do something different. And by the way, you can always redo any of the other do something different that we've done for this session. A list of do something different possibilities is included with the supplemental material, by the way. Now one of the other things we can do is to learn from taking the Epstein Creative Inventories Test. It's linked on the supplemental materials of the fourth module. The free online test examines four different things that you could be doing to help yourself become more creative. First is recording your ideas whenever and wherever you get them, whether it's on the beach or in the shower or when you get out of bed. A lot of our good ideas come when you're just waking up from sleep. And you need to be able to write things down right away just as you wake up in the morning. A lot of scientific discoveries and inventions were made by people thinking all night while they were sleep, and then they woke up in the morning with this brilliant idea. One of the other things that you can do also is to change your own environment on a regular basis. For example, we all have a laptop or we all have a computer. Most of them have some form of sleep screensaver. And if you set that to change the show different pictures over the course of the day, that will help give you different inspiration. The goal is to try to set something up automatically where you experience different environments, whether you're in your house, or in your room, or in your village, or in your community, in your office. Exposure to different visual stimuli is extremely important. Epstein also talks about learning other things, not necessarily related to our work. My personal favorite is Argentine Tango. But it could be crafts, it could be cooking, it could be a foreign language, it could be improv. I've brought some Tango lessons back to my teaching. You'll all bring in new sets of ideas. Finally, another model that Epstein gives us, try to accept and take on challenges for jobs or projects whether professionally or within your home life. This will help you grow and will help you develop new sets of skills. It's worthwhile and it develops new sets of ideas as well, unbeknownst to people giving you the skill. And one last thing that I tell you to do is to try and take some time to reflect and actually daydream. We all need to put ourselves apart and think by ourselves without other tests that it was so busy. Turn off your cell phone, turn off your computer. Go someplace sit down, think about what you could do and what's possible. Your mind is something that's going to help you develop another number of different sets of ideas and you'll be able to use all of them. This daydream is one of the first steps in terms of what could happen. It's like TE Lawrence, Lawrence of Arabia once said, all men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their mind, wake in the morning to find what was vanity. But the dreamers of the day are the dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes to make this possible.
