Light Your Creative Spark

Sudden ah ha insights are an ultimate source of creativity. Imagine if YOU could learn to summon them at will.

What happens in your mind when you get a sudden ah ha creative insight? When a light bulb seems to go off in your mind, and you suddenly just know the answer to a question or problem?

Such creative insight almost always comes suddenly, according to psychologist Jonathan Schooler of the University of Pittsburgh.

When you solve a problem in a methodical way, you usually know whether or not you’re coming close to a solution.

But with insight-type problems, most people have no clue when they are about to get a solution, Schooler explains. The solution almost seems to be delivered to you.

 Ah Ha Insights Unveiled
Science is yielding new insight into this ultimate form of creative thinking. And these insights can help YOU increase your creativity. Psych professor John Kounios of Drexel University and Mark Jung-Beeman of Northwestern University are studying ah ha insights using high tech equipment.

The researchers are asking people whether their answers to a complex word puzzle just popped into their heads  or if they used a more systematic approach to coming up with their solution. While all this is going on, the people are hooked up to EEG and fMRI machines to monitor their brains.

The EEG measures the when, Kounios explained, it records patterns of brainwave activity over time.

The fMRI, a brain imaging device, on the other hand, measures the where. It takes a picture showing which spots in the brain get the most blood flow  indicating they are more active during a given task.

The researchers discovered some surprising brain activity patterns occur at the moment the right answers just pop into one’s mind as a sudden insight.

The EEG showed a burst of brain activity in the right hemisphere about a third of a second BEFORE the research subjects hit a button indicating they had the answer.

The fMRI revealed that a tiny spot in the right temporal lobe just above your right ear lights up when people get an answer through insight. Have you ever noticed you might put your fingertips to your right temple when you’re searching for an answer to a question?

Insightful Precognition

 Chance favours the prepared mind.~~ Louis Pasteur

But then … the researchers discovered something even more remarkable:

Those who would later get the answer with insight had increased brain activity before they even saw the question. This brain state before the problem is presented actually predicts whether the subjects will solve it with insight or not. Kounios said. 

What happens is those who use insight to solve problems actually put their brains into a state in which they were more likely to have a flash of insight, he explained. It seems these people pulled a chain to turn on their mental light bulbs  just like they show in comic strips.

Here’s Two Clues
Krounos’s results suggest there’s something truly unique about ah ha insights. There’s been this long debate over whether insight is anything special, he said. In his experience, it’s definitely something special.

Clue 1: Psychologist Jonathan Schooler, who has also done insight experiments, found that people have more trouble getting ah ha solutions when they try to talk themselves through the steps. Sometimes it’s better to just shut up, Schooler concluded.

 Humm.

Clue 2: Kounios also reported that insight comes more easily when people don’t try so hard. They let go a little bit, he said. They relax and turn their focus to other things.

The Ah Ha State and Creativity
Like insightful problem solutions, creative ideas in the arts also often seem to come from out of the blue.

In a radio interview ex-Beetle Paul Simon once said he was just fooling around with some chords one day, when suddenly he began to play Bridge Over Troubled Water for the first time. He said it was as if the song just created itself in his brain.

Work like that in Kounios’ lab helps to demystify creativity by connecting it to a very real brain process, Christoff Koch, a neuroscientist at the California Institute of Technology tells us.

I agree.

We’re only conscious of a small fraction of our true brainpower

Insight, creativity, and our other most treasured mental abilities seem to flow out of the subconscious mind and just suddenly burst into consciousness. What a marvel our human minds are.

Entering the Ah Ha Zone
Anyway, it now seems there IS something to the sensation of a light bulb going off in our brain when we get a sudden creative insightful.

Stop and think about the moments you’ve had such experiences. You will likely recall being very relaxed. Einstein claimed to get his greatest creative insights in the shower.

Ask yourself what activities tend to best help you empty your mind? Then get these activities into your life when you’re trying to solve a problem, or get a creative insight.

Here’s a brain smart key: Logical analytical thinking is just the opposite of creative ah ha thinking. Your mind can only do one or the other at a given time.

If you have a particular problem you’re trying to solve, try this approach. First do your logical analysis. Then just let go. Do something totally different and relaxing. Just forget the problem

Allow your subconscious mind to play with the question or problem. Just go about your life, and allow the insight to flash into your conscious mind.

You CAN do this. It’s actually built into your mental hardware.

You’ll recognize it when it comes. That light bulb will flash.

Feel Like Your Memory is Declining?

Yikes. New US research says  that after peaking at about age 22, our mind power starts to decline at about age 27.

Professor Timothy Salthouse of the University of Virginia found reasoning, spatial visualisation and speed of thought and memory all decline in our late 20s. Mind power exercises designed to stall or reverse the mental aging process and declining memory may need to start much earlier, he said.

His seven-year study of 2,000 healthy people aged 18-60 is published in the journal Neurobiology of Aging.

To test mental agility, the study participants had to solve puzzles, recall words and story details and spot patterns in letters and symbols.  In nine out of 12 tests the average age at which the top performance was achieved was 22. The first age at which there was any marked declining memory was at 27 in tests of memory, speed of thought, reasoning and visual puzzle-solving ability.

But the good news is that  abilities based on accumulated knowledge, such as performance on tests of vocabulary or general information increased until the age of 60 among those who continued to exercise their brain.

 

Who do you BELIEVE You Are?

If I asked you to describe yourself, what self-image would you paint? Another way to put it is this: Who do you believe you are?

Your self-image is exactly what the term says – a mosaic of ideas you hold about your own self. In short – how you view your own personality, capabilities, skills, body, mind and personal potential.

But while most agree it’s important to have a good self-image, very few people seem to know how to acquire one – or even how they got the self-image they now have.

The History of Your Self Image
You began to form your self image and sense of  worth as a very young child. The important people in your life sent you constant messages about yourself. Over the years these messages were collected in your impressionable subconscious mind – and have creating today’s self image.

Then over the years belief moved in and set those messages into mental cement. The result is that today you BELIEVE you actually ARE your subconscious collection of other people’s impressions of you. This process has continues to this day and tends to reinforce what you already believe about your self.

Think About That for a Moment
And the really interesting thing about beliefs is this: They are usually NOT open to question or reason. We just believe them to be so.

So if you believe you lack self-confidence, are a poor public speaker, do not know how to lead others, will never be successful, cannot create a good relationship, and so on – guess what. You will defend that belief, even to yourself.

This occurs because intense emotions always come along with beliefs. And this emotional “cement” causes your brain to resist any attempt to question your beliefs with reason.

Plus in the meantime your subconscious mind, which has a photographic memory of every event of your life, will make SURE your actions reflect your beliefs.

How to Overhaul Your Self-Image
Your self image determines what you will (and will not) achieve in your life.

Are you who you want to be? Are you living the life you want to live? If the answer is no – it’s time for a complete overhaul of your self image. Anything else will just be a band-aid that will simply create more of the same.

After over 35 years in the field of psychology, there is one thing I can absolutely guarantee to you. That one this is this: YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY *NOT* WHO YOU THINK YOU ARE. Your self image does not mirror who you really are today.

You are NOT that collection of painful or limiting memories.

You are not your past history. So stop believing that old stuff and stop acting as though it were true. Here’s a reminder of what you REALLY are:

1. You are Totally Unique
There is literally no one else like you. No one else thinks like you, has your ideas, or does things the way you do things. No one else has your unique set of talents and abilities. Your brain is as unique as your fingerprints. No one has your mind and memories. No one. You are NOT ordinary. Actually no one is.

Stand up and carry yourself with dignity, because this IS your life. You and only you live in your and it is your unique right to decide how to best do that.

2. Your Limits are Not Real
It is today an accepted truth that we really create our own reality You have a choice to simply react to what is happening to and around you or you can choose to respond. There is a huge difference between reacting and responding. Reacting is an automatic knee-jerk response to life  while responding involves making a conscious choice.

3. You Have Unlimited Personal Power
Here’s something else I can guarantee: Most of those old limiting beliefs about your self will NOT hold up under conscious examination. And once you begin to challenge this old stuff, you will discover that what you thought were your limits do not actually exist.

The greatest personal power you have is the power to choose your own thoughts.

The late Earl Nightingale said: You become what you think. The truth of this is so powerful it is almost overwhelming. You and you alone decide what you will think — and what you will believe your limits and potentials are. And you and you alone will decide what to do with this awesome power.

 

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