INSPIRING QUOTE(s)

The Paradox of Creation

You may read the first and feel validated that an artistic genius said what you’ve always thought. Or you may think it only applies to the arts and not something like business or science. But let’s ask:

👉 Did Blackberry think it made good sense to release a phone without a physical keyboard?

👉 When Copernicus claimed the sun, and not earth, was the center of the solar system, did it make good sense to religious authorities?

The more you want your ideas to be transformational, the more you should reflect on the implications of that first quote. If your solution is merely logical with minor deviations, it might be time to heed Picasso’s advice.

🔥 Creativity and Destruction: Two Sparks of the Same Flame

The second quote illuminates the paradox in how creativity often requires destruction. Frequently, creations which can transform and destroy the status quo are dismissed or blocked by those protecting their status quo. Meanwhile, many times outsiders with nothing to lose exploit the first opportunity to act. History has shown us that people who see change as opportunities rather than threats will transform the world most.

🌀Try This to Break the Logic Loop

• Dare yourself to implement something less logical because it feels right.

• Try "bad idea brainstorming" where you deliberately generate the worst, most impractical ideas.

• Or can you trick your brain into implementing what you think is a bad idea? What? Why?

CREATIVITY SPOTLIGHT

Why Your Childhood Imagination is More Powerful Than AI (For Now)

Remember the days when a cardboard box wasn’t just a box but a spaceship? Or a tea party could host your favorite princesses?

As children, our minds effortlessly transformed the ordinary into the extraordinary, an ability even the most advanced AI still struggles to replicate.

Imagine trading your car for a horse-drawn carriage or Netflix for a flip book.

Never, right?

🧠 Progress in Tech, Regress in Imagination?

While we’ve embraced progress in nearly every aspect of life, our relationship with creativity has taken a different path. AI is an incredible tool, boosting productivity and even assisting in creative work. But our innate childhood imagination holds much more: a kind of magic, a boundless, unstructured originality that algorithms have yet to capture.

So, as adults, why do we so often surrender this innate creative superpower?

“That’s ridiculous,” you say, “My kid spends so much time watching other people play Minecraft instead of playing himself—”

Well, do you watch other people play football or soccer or any sport?
Hmmm.

🧒 Our “Child Mode” Is a Superpower

As you lean into the future of AI, don’t forget your past’s “child mode” holds creative superpowers that will increasingly be more differentiated and valued.

In the 1960s, scientist George Land devised a test to measure creative potential for NASA engineers. Later in the 1990s, his longitudinal study (which isn’t peer reviewed) sparked debate: while 98% of 5-year-olds score as “creative geniuses” (imagining endless possibilities), only ~30% of 10-year-olds and merely 2% of adults still meet that benchmark.

Unfortunately, there’s no research explaining why adults have lower creativity scores. But potential factors that decrease creativity with age include both nature (biological) and nurture. On the nurture side, we may point to societal factors such as schools prioritizing standardization, risk aversion increasing with age, the super-specialization of jobs, and the limited time adults have for exploration. These nurture factors might play a larger role than innate creativity loss.

The proactive, intuitive mind certainly realizes we can improve and change our nurture.

Alison Gopnik’s research reveals that children use "probabilistic models" to explore multiple potential solutions to problems, akin to scientific hypothesis-testing. Adults, in contrast, rely on narrower, experience-based "mental shortcuts.” Through the former method, children’s play creates "playgrounds of the mind,” testing many more imaginary scenarios to fuel creativity.

Gopnik’s study warns adults not to police your creative self with “good sense,” as when adults might say, “No, the couch cushions don’t form a fort. It’s a mess.”

🧨 Creativity Is Destruction in Disguise

But what if the ‘mess’ is the point? Creativity, at its core, is destruction in disguise, tearing down the expected to make way for the extraordinary. AI can remix the past, but only a human imagination untethered from ‘good sense’ can dream up something truly new. So, knock down your own house of cards. Rip apart your executive thesis. Build a new one, not because the old one was wrong, but because reinvention is the birthplace of originality.

ACTIONABLE PROMPTS

The “Sensible” Filter Removal

For your own creative process, try this exercise:

• ✍️ Write down three accepted truths (e.g., “I must wear a suit and tie”) or essential processes in your field (e.g., “Email is the best way to communicate”).

• 🛠️ Then either (a) Ignore one for a week or (b) Replace one with something absurd (e.g., carrier pigeons, interpretive dance updates).

• 🔍 Track the results.