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Last week I posted a list of some of the intelligence blogs that I visit frequently. Today I’ll list some of my favorite creativity blogs. All of them have different focuses and styles, but all of them are extremely useful and informative for any creative person. Enjoy them, and please don’t hesitate to suggest more!

• Creative Think
• cecil vortex
• Idea Sandbox
• Just Creative Design
• Endless Innovation
• The Berkun Blog
  
• Creativity Central
• Wishful Thinking
• Creative Generalist 

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The difference between people who haven’t yet discovered their hidden genius and others who are supposedly “smarter” or “more creative” is that they haven’t understood what triggers are the most conducive to the creation of ideas.

Once you know and understand those prime conditions for creativity to flourish, a great fountain of new ideas will flush open. Here are the 3 elements which will trigger this wonderful release:

1. Believe that you harbor creativity and intelligence. This is an essential pre-requisite for creativity. You don’t necessarily need to accept the “law of attraction” and similar theories, but Read more »

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I believe that creativity and intelligence doesn’t rely exclusively on knowledge. It relies, more importantly, on sensibility to your surroundings. This is the story of how I came to that conclusion:

I have a fairly good life, but I still like to disconnect from reality sometimes. That’s why I’ve gotten into the habit of walking in the early morning at least two or three times per week. I normally carry my iPod and listen to my favorite songs while I walk but in this particular day I couldn’t. You see, I woke up more tired than usual, and dragged myself through the routine: brush teeth, roast coffee, dress, drink coffee, drink water, pick up iPod. And then it hit me: I hadn’t charged my iPod. I thought, “Now this is going to be a bad walk.” In fact, the thought of skipping this session briefly passed through my mind, only to feel like a quitter, so I went out the door to walk without my trusty gadget. The walk started out slow, Read more »

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If you find yourself reading this post, it’s pretty likely you’re interested in learning ways to increase your intelligence. For this reason I’ve listed the following blogs, which all have to do in one way or another with intelligence. Some are targeted for the general public while others are more science-minded, but I visit them regularly and always find useful stuff, so I trust you will too. As I discover more, I’ll share them with you, but enjoy these and please suggest new ones in the comment section.

• Litemind
• The Urban Monk
• Tune Up Your EQ
• Mind Tweaks
• Lumosity Brain Health
• Developing Intelligence
• MindHacks
• Deric Bownd’s MindBlog
• Intelligence Testing

P.S. I’ll be gathering similar lists about creativity and productivity, so keep visiting!

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Frequently we’re all faced with moments when we are forced to learn. Perhaps you’re a student who needs to pass a test. Or maybe you’re a top executive who has to absorb a new process as part of your job.

Regardless of your specific learning situation, it’s pretty common to not be totally enthusiastic about it. But it’s still necessary to learn some things in order to do other things. In other words, learning isn’t always fun by itself.

But there are some things you can do to ease the learning process and improve the absorption rate of information and skills. Here are 7 of them:

1. Find the connection between the subject and your own interests: Once you find out how the topic will help you in areas that do interest you, it’ll be a lot easier to learn.
2. Invent games: This doesn’t have to be too complicated. Just exercise your creativity and think of some way to make the subject more enjoyable. After all, this was how most of us learn our first lessons in life! Who didn’t learn at least a little something about money from Monopoly?
3. Reward yourself for learning: This is a tactic used a lot in dieting. Follow your diet to the tee during the week, and reward yourself with a piece of cake on Sunday. Use the same logic for learning. Maybe you can watch that new movie if you finally dominate a difficult lesson.
4. Teach others what you just learned: For some reason, whenever I do this I start to remember stuff I didn’t know I knew. Somehow I feel I need to know the material well enough to teach it, so I’m forced to learn it.
5. Compare subject to things you already know: This is one of the most effective learning methods available.Use analogies to use your present knowledge as leverage to acquire new knowledge. This is also a very effective memorization technique.
6. Translate subjects into drawings or poems: Simple: Images are easier to remember than words. Drawings are images, and poems elicit images.
7. Watch and listen to entertaining presenters: One of my favorite websites is TED. I get absorbed by the entertaining speakers, and therefore by the information they convey.

As you see, there are plenty of ways in which you can make learning fun. What other tactics to you use?

Image: iloveconor.com

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Last week I posted about How to Read a Book in 5 Easy Steps. Actually reading a book is definitely one way to increase intelligence. But by writing a book review you can take it one step further.

Writing book reviews is the embodiment of critical thinking, which is essential to raise intelligence. You have to think and process information and not just accept it without reserve. It exercises your mind as a filter that discriminates between valuable information and pure junk.

This shouldn’t be a monotonous chore that you have to do after reading every book you get your hands on. I certainly don’t. Nevertheless, I do write book reviews in my journal when I’ve come across a life-changing or deeply challenging book. When I do it because I want to, I learn a lot more than when I do it when I have to. So, do it when you want to.

The type of book review I’m talking about here isn’t the one that’s going to be published in The New York Times. It’s the one that you’ll write privately, for your own mind’s benefit and self-improvement. Feel free to develop your own style, but keep in mind the following:

• What’s the theme of the book? This will direct your thinking and prove if you really understood the book.
• What does the book’s title tell you? Don’t prejudge the book based on its title, but give some thought to it. It can help you understand the book’s main theme.
• What are the main points you want to get across? List them before you start writing. Don’t dilute your thoughts toward unimportant side points.
• Use one paragraph for each of those main points: Again, develop your own style. But this guideline is good at first, just to maintain overall order. Remember, you’ll likely want to re-read this in the future.
• What did you like and dislike about the book? This question sets your mind into motion, going from merely describing the book to analyzing it.
• Why did you like or dislike the book? This is perhaps the most important question to ask yourself, since this is where you’re actually going to apply critical thinking. Merely stating what the book is about isn’t enough to activate your mind.
• What is the author’s background? Knowing about the author’s previous works and experiences will probably help you to understand some of the book’s elements.
• Share it: O.K., I know I said this was supposed to be private. But you could share your reviews with friends not so that they critique your writing, but to gauge their reactions. You’re on the right path if they’re convinced to read the book after reading your review. It’s always cool to share the love.

Obviously, this isn’t an exact science, so bullet-points like these won’t teach you all the ins and outs of book reviews. But I humbly suggest you add the art of book reviewing to your arsenal of intelligence-increasing tools.

Image: faeryan 

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The reason why many problems seem unsolvable is that we concentrate on directly finding solutions for them. We either believe that time will solve our problems, or that we’ll solve them by doing the same thing over and and over again. Neither will work. If we don’t actively pursue solutions, most of the times the problem will not be solved. If we repeatedly apply the same failed alternatives, we’ll repeatedly fail.

The key, then, is to be curious about the situation. See problems as opportunities to increase your creative and intellectual powers, and not as eternal roadblocks. It may not be easy at first, but having this perspective will enable you to be more objective and arrive at a solution more quickly.

So how do you achieve this, then? By asking questions. Here are seven practical ones that will make any problem easier to solve:

1. Is this really a problem? You’d be surprised at how often there really isn’t any problem. Remember, a big part of stress comes from your mindset towards a situation, so if you’re determined to view it as a problem, then it most certainly will be.
2. What is the problem? Define the problem. Don’t get trapped into thinking that if you’re moving, your progressing towards a solution. Stop and determine what it is that you really want solved, or what it is you really want to accomplish. It’ll save you time and money.
3. What other problems have to be solved before solving this one? Frequently a problem is just a collection of lesser problems. By solving these lesser problems one by one you’ll be more efficient than if you were trying to deal with one giant blob.
4. When did it start to surface?
5. Who else will be affected by this problem? You’re likely not the only person touched by this. Find other people who might be affected by the consequences of not solving the problem and tap into their ideas. Since their own wellness is at stake, they might be willing to contribute.
6. How has it been resolved in the past? You’ve all heard it: “don’t reinvent the wheel.” More likely than not, this situation has happened in the past.
7. How is it similar/different from past situations? This is pretty obvious but worth saying: Pick the parts of previous solutions to the same problem that were successful and discard those that weren’t. Avoid applying a generic solution to a problem which probably has different variables.

These questions will put you on the right track to finding a solution for your problem. You have nothing to lose and a lot to gain. Remember, this obviously isn’t an exhaustive list of questions, so if you still feel trumped after going through them, then create new ones until you find your solution!

Image: -bast-

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A book is a beautiful art form, but reading it is equally artful. More than half of the books you read will be erased from your mind within a couple of months, unless you learn the delicate art of reading them. This certainly used to be true for me, before I learned how to best approach the fine art of reading books. Reading is a beautiful thing, and perhaps the most important tool in your quest to more intelligence and creativity. But the use and enjoyment you get out of reading will depend on many factors. There are two that I believe are essential:

• Purpose: You need to know why you are reading a book, so that you have some kind of yardstick to measure your success. What makes the difference between just browsing a book and truly devouring it lies in the mindset you have toward the reading.
• Method: Most people just pick up a book and start reading from page 1, word for word. That may be the best method for some people at some times, but there are other more effective ways to read.

So with these two factors in mind, here are 5 useful steps that you should follow if you want to get more out of your book-reading: Read more »

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This presentation by Sir Ken Robinson at TED 2006 will make you think. Sir Ken Robinson is a leading expert in innovation and creativity who wrote the book Out Of Our Minds: Learning To Be Creative. The reason why I particularly enjoy this piece is because he tells a very basic truth: our schools increasingly kill creativity, and we need to do something about it. Here are other tidbits I identified with:

• Human beings are born with creative potential, but the ’system’ suppresses it.
• You can learn to be creative

If you want to be inspired and informed about the subject of creativity, you should take 20 minutes of your time and watch this video. Enjoy!

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7 Rules For Maximizing Your Creative Output: Steve Pavlina writes about entering the “flow” state for optimum creativity.

Boost Your Creativity: Very useful creativity-boosters coming from a graphic designer (Just Creative Design).

9 Ways of Cultivating Creativity: One of my favorite blogs, Think Simple Now. The post outlines simple yet practical ways to cultivate creativity.

8 Ways To Reclaim Our Childhood Creativity: As we know, we are usually most creative during childhood, for a host of reasons. This is another of my favorite blogs, LifeDev.

7 Idea Dumping Tips (How To Manage Diarrhea For The Brain): Self-explanatory, also from LifeDev.

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