Creativity tools to help you develop your inventions
If you have already come up with an invention and wish to fine-tune it, jump here.
Keep an invention journal
It has been psychologically proven that you get more of what you reinforce. This is because our brains are physically made up of a super-complex web of neural networks that build and reinforce themselves each time you perform an activity. This means that whenever an idea pops into your mind and you reinforce it by writing it down or typing it out, you are actually reinforcing the act of getting ideas. By failing to write or type it down, you are telling your mind that they are not that important to you and you consequently become less creative. This is why I suggest that you keep an invention/ideas journal. Often you get a great idea and think that you will remember it. When you try to recall it at a later time, it has often disappeared out of your consciousness. By keeping a journal, you will develop a powerful storehouse of all your ideas and inventions. This will allow you to choose which ones are the best and most profitable and you can begin to develop them further.
I use a great program called The Journal to keep track of all my inventions and ideas. The reason I like it is because it allows me to categorize my inventions and keep track of the stages in their development. It also gives me the opportunity to keep a personal journal, as well as a dream journal (inventions often come through dreams).
But how do I get the invention ideas in the first place?
Good question. There are a wealth of creativity tools that help you generate ideas for inventions. Here are some of them:
Image streaming
Image streaming is the best technique that I have yet to come across for super creativity and imagination in any area of your life. For inventions it fits perfectly. To learn the technique for free, go here. If you want more advanced techniques (as well as all the foundational ones) check out The Einstein Factor.
Brainstorming
This is a classic creativity technique. Throw down random thoughts onto a large piece of paper without pre-judging or editing what comes to mind. This is important as often the most insightful ideas are the ones that you never thought were good when you first wrote them down. Also remember: the best ideas are generally the ones that come last, so spend at least 15 minutes on this exercise.
Mind-mapping
This is a revolutionary technique developed by mental performance expert Tony Buzan. It is basically a visual method of connecting and exploring ideas and thoughts in a similar way to the way your mind links up information. For a comprehensive bible on Mind-mapping, I suggest you check out The Mind Map Book. I use it as a guide whenever I am mind-mapping. I especially love the section at the back where it shows you how great geniuses like Einstein and Edison recorded their ideas.
Dreaming up inventions
Great innovations or inventions often come to us through our dreams, but most of us do not remember them or even recognize as an invention if we do. It often “pays off” to keep track of your dreams.
Keep track of your dreams with a journal. As you wake up in the morning or at any time in the night, write or type out in as much detail any dream you can remember. The principle of reinforcement is very true in dream journaling: you get more of what you reinforce. If you consistently record your dreams, you will find that you will begin to remember 3-5 dreams a night. If you wake up and think that you will be able to record your dream later, all if not most of it will be forgotten by the time you feel like recording it. This is why you must record it as soon as possible from the time when you wake up. If you use a software program like The Journal to keep track of your inventions, you can easily add a new category to keep track of your dreams. Soon, like me, you will be identifying key symbols that keep popping up in your dreams and what they mean to you. Sometimes these recurring patterns in your dreams will reveal a great new method of doing something, or even a great new invention. Do not expect the invention to work the way you would expect it to in reality however, it rarely does in your dreams. This is why the invention is sometimes totally original and unique.
If you have become consistent in recording your dreams, you might want to take it to the next level and explore something called Lucid Dreaming. Lucid dreaming is a way to take control of your dreams and use the dreaming state as means of heightened creativity. You will learn how to be awake during your dreams and have the greatest fun in this way. Why waste a third of your life being unconscious when you can use your sleeping time to develop inventions, solve problems and learn new skills? The book that I have found the most useful in learning the process, written by the world’s leading expert on Lucid Dreaming is Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming by Dr. Stephen Laberge.
|
|
Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming |
Fine-tune your invention
The following exercise will help you enhance your invention and fine-tune it for success in the marketplace. Read this exercise a few times until you remember what to do, or get someone to read it to you while you are doing it. It is important that you be as specific as possible and describe everything that comes to mind. Take as long as you need to do the following. Do not ignore anything that your mind is telling you and SAY IT OUT LOUD in the present tense!
Sit back or lie down, close your eyes, and breath deeply for a few minutes. Allow yourself to become incredibly calm and relaxed. Switch on a tape recorder or get someone (whom you trust) to listen to you. Keep your eyes closed for then entire exercise. Now describe your invention using all your senses. Don’t be afraid to say whatever pops into your mind, the fact that it is in your consciousness means that it is important:
1. What does your invention look like?
2. What does it smell like?
3. What does it taste like?
4. How does it feel?
5. What sounds does it make?
Pretend that you have superpower abilities and can transform objects and the world into any way you can imagine. Enlarge your invention until it is enormous and you are as small as an ant in comparison. Jump onto your invention. What tiny details do you see that you haven’t noticed before? Walk around your invention. Does anything look wrong or out of proportion from your viewpoint? If it does then change it until its perfect. See your invention performing the action/ in the environment where it is to be used. Make sure you are outside the invention still. Is it designed properly to do the task for which it is designed? Are you sure? Does anything feel wrong about the way it has been designed? Listen to these feelings, they are important. Tell the listener or tape recorder if you can think of any improvements to the design. Now go inside the invention (if the invention is not designed in this way or is one-dimensional then ignore this part). Can you see everything working properly? Are you sure? Walk around and check everything. Maybe for instance the ventilation unit is not bringing in enough air, or the electricity is short-circuiting at a certain point. Do you see a better way that something inside can work? If you do then say it out loud. Is there something extra you can add to enhance the performance or accuracy? Is there something that you can take away or minimize and still get the invention to achieve its purpose? If there is then take that component out and watch it working or not functioning at all and try again.
Now jump out of the invention and turn it back into its original size with all the changes you may have made. Can you think of any other purpose that your invention can achieve besides its original one? Maybe you can see some other invention in your mind (that you may have just unconsciously invented, or maybe it is some other invention already in existence) that could work in conjunction with your one. See them working together. Maybe you need to change one or two aspects of either invention to get them to do this (if this other invention is not your own, then you could suggest this change to the manufacturers of that invention and earn a fee for it). If you don’t see any other invention then that’s also great, your invention fits into a niche or emerging market.
Open your eyes. Hopefully you have come up with some clever little ways to improve upon your invention, if not then don’t be disheartened, you can always redo the exercise later. Now this part is essential for you to remember everything that you have just done: Get out a pad of paper, or load up your word processor and write down or type everything that you just experienced and keep in the present tense. This often brings new insights into mind and makes sure that you reinforce and remember everything that you have come up with. Make drawings of the new ideas or innovations that came into your mind.
You should now have fine-tuned your invention. Why not fine-tune it some more? You can always repeat the exercise with the refined version of your invention and re-refine it! This will make it better and better.
I hope that the Fine-Tune exercise helped. It is based on techniques from Win Wenger’s brilliant book, The Einstein Factor. Read more about it here.