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The Game of Life

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I've been thinking . . .

how we make things work.

We finish a day’s work exhausted, burnt out, bone tired. If we were asked to keep going, it would be a stretch — nor a healthy thing. Do we go home to rest? Do we take a nap, rejuvenate and refuel? No, most of us don’t. An hour or two later, you’ll find us out dancing, playing ball, or at the gym lifting weights.

Many of the sports and activities that we do for fun require more physical and mental energy than what we need to invest to get through a work day. Yet, they don’t wear us out nearly as much, and in some cases, they pick us back up.

How is that? It’s no surprise that it has to do with how we think about work.

The Game of Life
Years ago, Charles A. Coonradt tested his idea by turning work tasks into measurable self-competing contests — games that could be won. Folks were asked to weigh the paper they filed every day. Within 3 weeks, a department that had overdue filing for 3 years was ahead and found itself with 3 hours extra each day. The people in the department asked for more work — new work — that they could measure that way. [He called his book, The Game of Work.]

elevators-going-up-a-wall

Sometimes I use this technique to get myself to conquer tasks I’m not fond of doing. Today I’m wondering what life would be like if I took the same approach to everything I do?

Have you thought about that? What problem would be easier if you thought of it as one more level, challenge, quest, in the game of life?

Liz's Signature

How to Play Follow the Leader to Kick Start Your Brain

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Business, Blogs, Living

Outside the Box logo

Did you ever play that game — Follow the Leader — in school? The person in front has an idea, and everyone else does the same thing. You might think it’s a bunch of redundancy. Most times it is.

But it doesn’t have to be.

Here’s a recipe to use this game to kick start your brain.

How to Play Follow the Leader to Kick Start Your Brain

In my class, we made our own rules. The game was not only more interesting. It was a WHOLE LOT more fun! My secret is that I’ve used the premises of this silly game to kick start my brain in every job I’ve ever had.

  • Look around for the great leaders, the great thinkers, you admire.
  • Follow the leaders.
    • Follow the folks who have ideas.
    • Follow the folks who have confidence.
    • Follow the folks who are positive.
    • Follow the folks who are jazzed about what they do.

    Follow the folks who know where they are going.

  • Pick one idea from one of the leaders you follow.
    • Take it apart. Put it back together.
    • Look at the idea from every direction you can.
    • Find the parts that are only like the leader. Find the parts that are also like you.

    Get to know the idea at a cellular level.

  • Take one tiny bit of that idea and replace it.
    • If they’re on a tennis court, move to a movie theater.
    • Move the idea to somewhere you understand.

    In other words, make the idea your own.

  • Here’s the crucial part: Don’t try to write . . . play with the idea. While you do that also do something else that suits you:
    • Listen to music.
    • Go for walk.
    • Take a shower.
    • Dance in an elevator.
    • Clean the refrigerator.

    You know what works.

  • Follow your heart to make the idea your own.

Absolutely, positively do not go back to the source once you’ve started to play with the idea . . . until you’ve made the idea your own. Then all that’s left is to write, tell, or present your thoughts, and to remember to thank the leader who was your inspiration.

You get the idea. Actually with a little practice, my guess is that you’ll be getting more than one.

How do you usually kick start your brain?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

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I Have an Idea — I Have Lots of Them!
Don’t Hunt IDEAS — Be an Idea Magnet

We’re All Creative 3: Three Year Olds Are the Masters

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Creative Curiosity

Creativity at Work

It’s true. It’s hard to get highly creative folks thinking inside the proverbial box. Curiosity gets us looking at the box inside, outside, and from every direction. Creativity motivates us. Curiosity nurtures and energizes us. “What ifs” drive our vocabulary. Put those qualities together and you have Jean Luc Picards going forth where no one has gone before and enjoying every minute immensely.

It had to be a caveperson’s creativity that got us fire. The wheel is surely an example of human creative thinking. Yet, the best example of creativity is any three-year old. [Read more…]

Think You’re Not Creative? That Could Cost You Your Job

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Balderdash and Piffle

Creativity at Work

Creativity comes from the sum of one’s life experience. It pulls from knowledge, abilities, and skills. It uses neural pathways in the brain made by everything a person has learned and makes new ones as new connections form. It calls upon an ability to get beyond the ordinary, automatic response—to explore the inside and the outside of that darned proverbial box.

Still think you’re not creative? Maybe your definition of creative is too narrow. Some folks, who call themselves “creatives,” would have you believe that all creativity lies only in artistic endeavor. That brings me back to balderdash and piffle. Those folks aren’t creative in how they define creativity.

Ordinary folk have the power for creative thinking.

Creative thinking is essential to most every career on the planet. Businesses need creative thinkers to innovate, to manage risk, to meet ever-changing customer needs, to build efficient processes and solve complex problems.

If you argue for your lack of creativity, that could cost you your job. [Read more…]

We’re All Creative 1: The Bunnies Prove It

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I Drive Myself Crazy Crazier

Creativity at Work

Yesterdays post on 10 Reasons Creative Folks Make Us Crazy — The 10 Dimensions of Creative Complexity got quite a response, particularly on a couple of forums. The most interesting part was that in the comments about the post it seemed that

  1. the folks commenting didn’t seem to have read the entire post, only the list.
  2. they also didn’t know this blog or they would understand that I count myself among the people who drive people crazy.
  3. they didn’t catch my personal belief that everyone is creative.

The fact is I drive myself crazy crazier the more I think. The other fact is business schools need creative thinkers more than ever. The whole world does if we want to get anything to change around here.

With those thoughts in mind, I dug out a piece that explains my thoughts on creativity. I’m posting it because the bunnies prove that we’re all creative types. [Read more…]

10 Reasons Creative Folks Make Us Crazy

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As Business Looks for Creative Thinkers — Look Out!

Creativity at Work

In this age of innovation, Business Schools look to fill theirs eats with more right brain creative people. Folks are beginning to take notice of the value and power of the off the wall idea.

Business Week.com devotes an entire section to innovation and creativity and companies have titles such as Idea Czar on their organizational chart. Tom_Peters asks “Where are the freaks in your company?” and goes on to say that they’re the ones who have the ideas.

Yeah, but how do you deal with someone who is one way one minute and the opposite the next? How do you tell a creative person from someone who just irritates you?

What are the traits that creative folks have in common? Are we all creative? Is there anyone who’s not? Can I boost my creativity? Am I a creative freak? Questions follow creativity — what is it, how does it work, and how do we access our Creativity at Work to make our brand and business stronger? [Read more…]