What do you enjoy doing?
What are you good at?
What are you going to achieve today?
What have you learnt today?
What did you do well today?
What are you not asking yourself?
What questions do you ask yourself usually? Why?
What is going to be good about today?
Which compliment can I give today to somebody?
How can I surprise somebody?
What can I learn today?
What could I do different today?
Who can I help today? How?
What do I want to achieve in my life?  How?
What are my thoughts about this situation? Why?
What am I feeling about this situation?
What can I improve today?
What can I simplify today?
How can I save time, money and energy today?
What would I like to learn?
What would I like to do voluntarily?
What do I worry about?
What can I be grateful about?
What are my achievements? What is my greatest achievement?
What are my qualities? What is my strongest point?
Why I am unique?
What can I focus on?
What other perspective can I approach?
What is the real problem?
What is the easiest and with most impact solution?
What is stopping you?
What is really worrying you?
What is the smallest step you could take?
What would you like to happen?
How much do you agree between 1 to 10?
What could happen to increase a bit?
What are my assumptions?
What are my thinking errors?
What skills are needed to solve the problem?
How to solve the problem with my skills?ç
What would you do if you won the lottery?
What are the activities that you enjoy more during the day? weekly?
What I am really good at?
What could I be really good at?
Which of my objectives will provoke the greatest impact on my life?
What can I do only myself?
What has the problem occurred?
What has been done about it before?
What has not been done before?
Who can help me? Why?
What can I do about it today?  and next week?
What do you want to do in the next 3 years?
What problem is solving your product or service?
What would a baby do?
What would an expert do?
What do your clients want? How to surprise them?
How do you reward yourself for your achievements?
How can you re-frame this situation?
What are you not asking?  Why?
What do you like to think about?  Why?
What do you like to read?  

There are many types of books: bigger, smaller, for children, for adults, with stories, with instructions (educational), different sizes, different thickness, different paper, different size of font, different type of font, different languages, different topics, different materials (paper, electronic), written by different authors, some to read it once, some to consult the information often, some easier to read than others, some with the same topic but approached with a different angle or for a different audience, some summarised, some in deep detail, some older than others, new editions, hard or soft covers, with or without pictures, some with space to write on them, with activities or questionnaires...

Books were my window on the world. Growing up at the Elephant and Castle, which was very rough, my paradise was the library.
Michael Caine


And what about friends?  There are friends that you see very often, friends that you keep in contact very rarely, friends that even if you don´t see them, when you meet them is like you have been always together, male or female friends, older or younger, more or less clever, with different backgrounds, with different motivation, education, families.  Friends with different type of problems, with different thoughts and ideas, with different opinions, friends who see you from different points of view, friends that are more or less successful, friends who are more or less happy, friends who talk more or less, friends who live in different towns, with different level of generosity or selfishness, friends who you have spent more or less part of your life with, friends you have shared your childhood, your teen years, your schooling...


Old friends pass away, new friends appear. It is just like the days. An old day passes, a new day arrives. The important thing is to make it meaningful: a meaningful friend - or a meaningful day.
Dalai Lama


And now...

We can do some funny analogies between books and friends:

For example a thick book, with a lot of pages could be a talkative friend.
A book with jokes could remind us a friend that always is joking and with good sense of humor.
A book about DIY could remind us a friend that is very handy.
There are many examples to think about...

On the other side, we could think about a friend that does not care about his image and think what type of book he could be.

What type of book could be a friend who is always optimistic, positive, encouraging?
There are friends who we keep in contact often, the same way that there are books that are close to us.
There are important friends that we keep in contact once in the while.  What type of books are these?
There are books that can be more friendly, easy to read, with a friendly tone, with useful information.
There are books that can share with you the emotions of experiences around the world.
There are friends that they are very helpful and very good listeners... sometimes you can find books that you think that are saying things that you have thought about before.

Recently I was tidying my accommodation and thinking about giving away some of my books as the place is so cluttered.  When I started thinking about which ones to give away, I started thinking about which ones I would like to keep.  There was an interesting thought about it.  The books that I wanted to keep maybe they are not the ones that are the best ones, but the ones that have a more important meaning attached by me.  Maybe these are the books that I read many years ago and had a great impact on me.  It is like the books become a part of me, not only because of what is written on them, because of the history that we have shared together, the experience of ideas flowing accompanied by emotions, opinions, experiences and questions.

The relationship between a book and its reader can be something very especial.  Even when the reader has been the author of that book.  For some reason, during the creative process of writing, there are ideas that can be very interesting and that the writer is not fully aware at that time.  Thinking about books and friends, it seems that when you are writing something is like if you are writing something to a friend, who is yourself and at the same time that you are writing, yourself is reading, listening, absorbing the ideas and generating automatically more thoughts.

Thinking about books and friends, it can be highlighted the importance of reading and listening skills.  Reading can be done in a fast or slow way, paying attention to details or flying around knowing what is the topic about.  Reading can be done with the intention of learning or with the intention of feeling and enjoying.  When somebody is listening, it can be listening without paying attention or listening trying to understand not only the sentences, but why they are said and how, the matching with the body language, the emotions or thoughts that are behind the words.  The intention of the listener can be just a sounding board to help the friend to better thinking by reflecting, summarizing and asking open questions to check understanding at the same time as encouraging the other to talk.

When thinking about which books to give away and which books to keep, we could think that we could be a business owner having to decide which staff members to keep due to redundancies.  There are many different type of people, and besides other considerations, I would prefer to keep the ones that have something unique to contribute and at the same time the ones I get on well with.


The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of past centuries.
Rene Descartes

http://www.thereadingclub.co.uk/

Do what?  It could be any activity, any task. It could be how to think, how to solve a problem, how to repair something...

The first answer that comes to mind is a type of process, a list of steps or instructions about how to do something by dividing it into small steps.  Something like in a cooking book that explains the steps to follow to cook a dish.

This is the type of steps that we can find in websites such as www.ehow.com, www.wikihow.com or even in videos obtained from www.youtube.com or www.videojug.com when you look in the search engine "how to...".

So, on one side we can answer by telling the steps we follow to do something.

However...

We can think about the attitude with which we do different type of things: We can do it... easily, quickly, slowly, cheaply, often, confidently, enjoying, relaxing, talking, quietly, noisily, simply, happily, singing, dancing, loving, hating, suffering, sharing, learning, observing, judging, frely, under pressure, in a hurry, etc.

We can do the same activity with the aim of enjoying it or pushing ourselves to do as much as possible, or trying to observe what happens while we do it, trying to observe how we feel while doing it. etc.

When thinking about thinking, about your thinking, How do you do it?  There can be many techniques to help you to think, but the attitude can be more important than the method that is used.  You can think with passion, with confidence on finding new solutions, with hope, enjoying it, with patience, practising other skills, etc.

There are routines that can be done in many different ways, physical activities that can be done with different attitudes.  The same activity of moving some parts of the body can be done looking to do it faster, with more energy, relaxing, feeling the muscles, breathing deeply (same activity with different purpose and attitude).

When thinking about our work, about our life, about any activity... we can stop and think: How am I doing it?  What am I feeling while I do it?  How can I do it enjoying it more?  How to do it more efficiently?

We can think about our daily routines and how much time we spend on different activities, and which activities we would like to spend more time (because we enjoy them more) or expend less time (because we don't enjoy them), or we can think how to enjoy them.   This last paragraph reminds me a book I read about "Finding Flow" from Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.

More about flow in:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)

"You are what you eat" is a wonderful title for a book. However, very soon you realise you are not only what you eat, unless the meaning you attribute to "eat" is a metaphorical way of meaning more things, such as the way you feed yourself with thoughts, ideas, experiences, people (meaning not to eat people, but the good or bad things that can influence you according to the people you relate to).

When we are "eating" everyday the bad news that appear in the newspapers, tv and social media, at the same time we are just absorbing part of the reality that has been manufactured for our consumption (and indigestion).

With the use of the internet you can find positive information, encouraging news, etc.  

Thinking about the people you relate to, you can think about people that are more optimistic or pessimistic, with more sense of humour, with more crazy ideas, and funny behaviours, etc.

I would like to suggest to the government the design of a tv channel to show just positive news, the good work that volunteering organisations do, etc.    That will be vitamins to feed our hunger for positive thoughts, feelings and emotions.

That could encourage more young people to become volunteers and enjoy doing good to other people and increment the awareness about their skills, talents and motivations as well as the good feeling of being good.

How to help somebody generating ideas?

Depending on who is somebody and what he/she wants.

What is needed? Mainly one topic you are interested to generate ideas.  It could be a problem, an area of development, a passion, a hobby... anything!  In fact it could be always the same topic, as always you can be thinking new ideas about it.

Personality, process, product, environment...

Personality:  Somebody with interest, with motivation, with confidence on the ability that everybody has to think and generate their own ideas.

Process: There are several tools or techniques to generate ideas, such as brainstorming, analogies, random, questions, visualization, changes, free writing, etc. and different combinations among them. This process can be done online in a one to one basis.

Product:  Different type of products require some type of specific knowledge.  (Can you imagine solving a maths problem without previous knowledge about it?).  Sometimes is better not to have the knowledge to produce something different.

Environment:  Today we have a very easy access to information with the internet.  At the same time, we have some overload of information and expert opinions that can stop our own thinking, thinking that other people have better ideas than ours, forgetting that our ideas can be the best ideas for ourselves.  Or even not having time to think!

It is clear that an environment with information (ideas to “play” with), games, encouragement, is a positive influence for generating ideas.  A bit of structure might be needed for the efficiency of the process.  Issues about language, time, finance, fears or tiredness and lack of motivation can have a negative impact.

But in our busy schedules, even with the motivation and the knowledge of how to generate ideas, we might need a reminder.  Not only a reminder of the importance to innovate or a reminder of techniques to generate ideas, but a reminder of the enjoying, the mystery, the fun, the feeling of generating your own ideas, your own thinking.

When thinking about my experience facilitating a group to generate ideas, also I think about the possibility of doing it on a one to one basis.   This could benefit anybody by having some flexible support to generate ideas, as in one hour from anywhere we could have a conversation online through skype.  In this session we could discuss exactly what you want. Possible options:

·         A session in which I propose techniques and you do them privately in a notebook for yourself, and we discuss just what you think about it and how to adjust them to your interests.  This could guarantee your privacy and your intellectual property as you don’t need to tell me anything about the topic you are thinking about.

·         A session in which we can have a discussion online in which I use facilitation skills such as open questions, summaries, affirmation or reflection in order to encourage to develop your own ideas (not by giving advice but by facilitating your thinking process).

·         A session in which you can dedicate time to think about something and I can help you to analyse the steps you follow and suggest changes.

·         A session in which we can use something like google docs to share the same document and we can write comments at the same time.  I could be typing questions or activities and you could do them and keep the document for yourself to continue working on it during and after the session.

Think about it as a more interesting activity than reading books, browsing internet, reading your email or searching for information, as you are constructing your own knowledge by building upon your own ideas based on your own experiences and motivation.  Fascinating!

If you are interesting in having support to generate ideas or if you have any suggestions on how to do it in different ways,  or how people would like to be supported, you can send me an email with your suggestions.  

Today I have awaken with an idea to write in my blog.  This is one of these mysterious things that proves to me that the brain continues working unconsciously even when you are asleep, as I was not looking for any idea to write about.

How do you generate ideas? Why?

In all my books about creativity I highlight asking questions as one of the top techniques to generate ideas.  When we are children there is some age when we ask a lot of "why" and adults can get tired of it.  However, this is one the most powerful ways to understand, to check understanding, to attach meanings and values to our ideas.

When dealing with problems, it is a very useful technique to ask "Why?" several times to find out the root of the problem and to see the excuses that we make.  Why we did not achieved the goal?  Because John did not do his task.  Why John did not do his task? Because he felt that it was too risky?  Why he felt his task was too risky? Because...

At the same time we could ask "How?", like "How could this have been prevented or avoided?

I love to ask "How?" as it is a wonderful question to make people think, to facilitate ideas.  Maybe somebody is asking you for a very important and abstract "How to...?" and then you return the question to him making it more specific, easier to answer.  

When we are thinking about solving a problem we can think about different approaches, just by asking different type of "how".  Imagine that you are not happy with your business profit.  Then you could ask: How to increment the profit? How to reduce costs? How to increase sales? How to increase the number of customers? How to make our customers to buy different products that we provide?  How to increase the selling price of our products, what extras can be added?  And each question can suggest different ideas to increment your profit.

When you have made a plan to make improvements but these improvements have not been achieved as you were expected, you can think about the different steps you planned to do and there could be some step that it seemed difficult and you could break it down into other easier sub-steps by asking "how".

I love "How to" books as they are books with practical information, tips, etc.  However, for these type of books to be more useful to individuals I find that the question readers need to do when using these suggestions is not only "How to..." but "How can I...?".  This means that the information we obtain in these books or in the internet can be prioritised, adapted to our own circumstances and skills.

By the way some interesting quotations or proverbs related to this:

"If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail"

"Give a small boy a hammer, and he will find that everything he encounters needs pounding".  Abraham Kaplan

"I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail".  Abraham Maslow


In a "blaim culture"  usually when something goes wrong, always the first question is "Who is responsible?" Instead of asking "Why this happened?" or "How could have been avoided?" or "How can we solve it?"

When doing reflective practice, analysing our working practice to improve it, we can ask "How we did it today?", "How could we have done it different (better)?".

When helping people to learn, we can help then to attach more meanings to what they are learning by asking them "Why is this important?", "How could yo apply it in your circumstances?"

To solve a problem on many occasions is to look for the right question.  "A problem well stated is a problem half solved"  Charles Kettering


There can be many "but..." and then you have to adjust the question "How can I do this even though...?"

When we think about brainstorming, there is a powerful combination when doing a brainstorming of questions starting with "Why" or "How".

When thinking about choosing ideas, we can think about other options that are not our favourites to challenge the way we think: Why not? or asking "How this option could be the best one?"  and think about different circumstances or situations when other options could be more useful.

When thinking about a solution for a problem, we can think about how that solution can be helpful for other problems. 

When being criticised always is good to ask "Why the person is saying that?" you can ask it to yourself to see if it is true or partially true so you know what to improve or you could ask the other person why he/she said it, and if the answer is moody or evasive, you could think that the reason why he/she criticised you was not a genuine one, but for personal reasons.

Why? is a very good question to analyse our thoughts, our assumptions, our hypothesis.  Why we think what we think?  Why we believe what we believe? How else could we think if we could do some experiments to proof it different? How can we change our thoughts, our ideas?

To finish this post, enjoy this video from Simon Sinek about "start with why".  A powerful model for how leaders inspire action.