This week I thought I would share a post from one of my favorite writing blogs, Tribal Writer. It’s oriented more for writing advice (obviously), but once and a while the author will post something that is helpful for anyone involved in creative work. This week’s post had lots of great tips on brainstorming and creative thinking that I thought were worth sharing.
I don’t want to get into too much summarizing detail for fear of distorting or watering down the article’s points, but here are some quick bullets about what it covers:
- Scientific support for how napping and daydreaming are very beneficial for creative thought
- How brainstorming should be a less binary process (as in “this idea is good” or “this idea is bad”) and be given more time than most people allott for it
- A brief closing blurb about the toxicity of stress and how it can cripple idea generation
The post is broken up into little mini-chapters, and I would recommend skipping section 3, since it’s more about novel creation, characterization and voice, which I don’t think pertains a ton to designing promotional campaigns (though I could be wrong). The rest of the article, called “How to Think Creatively and Come up with Better Ideas,” is fantastic and I really recommend giving it a read. If nothing else, make sure you check out the part about brainstorming (section 2). The points about spending way more time in the idea-generation phase and not seizing on the first concept you feel is good I found to be especially insightful.
See you next week, where hopefully I’ve convinced my bosses to permit napping at work,
Mike
