A segment from a recent episode of This American Life featured a story about Kristen Finch, a speech therapist whose work with children with Asperger’s syndrome led her to wonder if her husband might have Asperger’s, too. Finch’s husband often struggled with being emotionally distant, being a slave to his routine, and not picking up on social cues. At one point in the story, after being diagnosed (he did have it) and learning about Asperger’s and how to deal with it, Kristen’s husband remarked that “it was as if someone had finally handed me a user’s manual for myself.” I have to say that reading Jonah Lehrer’s new book, Imagine: How Creativity Works, made me feel that, at least in some small way, the same thing had happened to me.

Imagine is about something that has been shrouded in mythology and speculation for centuries: human creativity. Even the most creative among us are frequently unsure of where their ideas come from. They often attribute their moments of insight to some otherworldly source, like a muse or genius which takes hold of them. Lehrer’s premise is that recent studies have helped us to now understand and explain a lot more about how creativity works than most people, even the professionally creative, might think.

As a graphic designer, I have to be creative every day. And yet, despite my familiarity with the process, there have always been certain parts of “being creative” that have always made me uncomfortable. For example, early on in every project when a client would describe their needs to me, there would come a point when I felt like I had NO IDEA what to do and I would get a sinking feeling in my stomach. Of course, the client wasn’t looking for a solution yet. They fully intended to tell me the problem then let me go work on it for a bit. But the initial feeling of uncertainty made me feel awful. This feeling would sometimes last for days. It led at times to feelings of doubt in my mind. “Maybe I’m not cut out for creative work, because I’m sure “truly creative” people don’t feel like this,” I would say to myself. I hoped and hoped that as I got used to doing creative work that this frustrated, no-idea-what-to-do feeling would go away. But it didn’t.

One of the first things Lehrer reveals is that before there can be a breakthrough, there must first be a block. An obstacle. A seemingly insurmountable problem which we wrestle with and lose. Only then will our brain be forced to search for clever alternatives. It’s this shift into a completely new and different thought process that lies at the heart of creativity. And it’s impossible to get there without first being frustrated.

Eureka! In an instant that very same feeling of frustration which before had caused self-doubt and trepidation was shifted, almost magically, to being a good thing and an indicator that what I was doing was not only not bad, but meant that I was on the right track!

And this was only the first chapter. Lehrer goes on to discuss other stigmas of creativity including how to keep creative teams from stagnating, why hot showers and cups of coffee are good for creativity (but not at the same time), and that it’s possible to cultivate creative genius much like we currently train athletes.

With so many industries changing radically everyday, it’s in everyone’s best interest to harness the power of our own creativity. The good news from Mr. Lehrer is that it’s possible for all of us to do so, whether we currently think of ourselves as creative or not. I wore out my highlighter reading Imagine. It’s a book I’ll be reading again and again in the coming years, right up there with Dan Pink’s Drive and Malcolm Galdwell’s Outliers. If you are or have a vested interested in helping other be as creative as possible, Imagine is a must read.

A good teacher ought to be able to practice what they preach, and Nancy Duarte is an excellent teacher.

The above video, from a few weeks ago at TEDxEast, is a perfect example of Nancy’s ability to communicate. In this video, she relates many of the points from her new book, Resonate, so watch the video if you don’t have time to read it!

The best part  comes at the end when Nancy shares a very personal story of how she overcame obstacles in her own life to become the communicator she is today. She uses herself to prove that changing the world is possible. Nancy practices what she preaches, and that makes us feel that we can, too.

P.S. – Don’t Be A PowerPoint Felon is now available in Spanish. Many thanks to David Gomez for his willingness to do the translation and adaptation. Thank you, David!

No Sea Un Criminal Del PowerPoint

“Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.”
– Arthur Schopenhauer

In a comment to one of my posts from earlier this week, Nathan Cashion said something that reminded me of this quote. He was talking about the post I wrote on mastery, and said that it almost seems like experts have some kind of magic but that this is probably just because they know in their heads what they want it to look like before they start and we, the audience, don’t. I think Nathan’s right. Experts have to have a picture or idea in their mind before they can begin to work. Maybe that idea isn’t completely formed when they begin working on something, but as they work to refine their idea it comes into focus for them. Once it’s fully formed, their efforts then become less of a discovery and more of a labor to realize the vision they see in the mind.

The word for this kind of foresight is prescience (pre-shince), which can mean divine omniscience of future events, but can also connote “a human anticipation of the course of events.” (Merriam-Webster)

Michaelangelo is quoted as saying about his genius for sculpting, “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” The finished product was fully formed in his mind at the outset and he simply worked until it was realized.

It almost seems like the sculpture is trapped inside and he's just removing the excess stone.

[Image by Akbar Simonse]

There are many ways to clarify ideas in your mind. Speak them out loud to a test audience member, draw them in a picture or diagram, or write snippets of the idea on post-its and reorganize them until you’re happy with their flow and the overall image they paint. Continue to develop your ideas until you know them inside and out and have considered them from many angles. You should be able to visualize every step of your presentation — every point, every word, every diagram, every picture you’ll draw — before you get up to speak. You should also be very comfortable with how all the elements fit together into an overall whole.

When you do get up to speak, your goal is to get the ideas and images in your mind to appear clearly in the minds of your listeners. If the ideas are not clear in your mind to begin with, how understandable do you think the messages received by your audience will be?