One of the most fundamental and profound ways of being creative is developing the ability to see situations from different points of view, often from angles that others can’t or simply wouldn’t have thought of.
“Point of view" implies using just our sense of sight, but it’s an expression we also use to mean experiencing an event in a completely different way through all of our senses, not just our sight.
Exercising and stretching our senses by practicing this can help us be more open to others as well as making it easier to come up with new ideas and solutions for ourselves.
A simple way we can do this is with the following quick exercise -
Pick a random object in your room. It could be a cup, a paperclip, a chair, anything that's relatively close to hand and that draws you in some way at this precise moment. Choose something quickly without analysing your decision.
Now, imagine spending a day in the life of this object.
Beginning with first thing in the morning, write out, or just imagine in your mind, how it feels to be this object and the journey it goes through in a typical day.
Experience the object's viewpoint, see and feel things from its perspective in as much detail as you possibly can.
For example if you chose a paperclip, imagine how it feels to be picked up by a human hand, the warmth of flesh against your cool steel. Or how it feels as you slide down crisp white pages of paper, the sound it makes and the friction it generates. Or to be in a large jar amongst dozens of other paperclips, all entangled, spiky and fighting for space.
Suspend your scepticism and really get into the senses of the object as deeply as possibly and consider all the activities and situations the object may experience in a typical day.
The more you can do this for a variety of objects, the more you'll open up your senses to different possibilities and this in turn will fuel an increase in your creativity.
Here are some other variations to try:
. Extend the exercise to imagining how it would be to be another person, especially someone completely different from yourself.
. Pick larger objects, like a football pitch, aeroplane or mountain. Notice the differences between this and when focusing on smaller everyday objects.
. Use more abstract ideas to ask questions and stimulate your imagination. For example – what’s it like to be the colour red? Or how far would I travel in a day if I was a water molecule?
Resist the temptation to dismiss these types of exercises as silly or pointless. Remember how freely young children use their imaginations to tell stories and explain the world around them. Take inspiration and aim to regain the same kind of innocence, curiosity and wonder when doing these exercises.
You’ll soon notice the change in your outlook and a difference in how you create...
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