Guest post by AmyK Hutchens
Need another excuse for a little R&R? Boost your creativity by getting away from it all. The most creative, innovative executives take leisure travel on purpose. And that purpose is not just for R&R, it’s for I&R – innovation and re-creation! They know that travel can induce brain activity in the form of theta waves. OK, they may not know much about “theta waves,” but they do know that whatever the wave, so many of their most excellent ideas ride them. These waves enable connections between formerly disparate ideas. In a theta state, brain cells never before connected find each other for the first time, and voilá, or Eureka! A new idea is born…no surfing required.
Long ago Gutenberg was quite pleased printing with the moveable tin type he had invented. Whenfaced with a request to print an inordinate amount of Bibles in a truncatedamount of time…he traveled. He took a trip into town to the local wine festival. While sipping the local Riesling he pondered the wine press across the street. Eureka! From the wine press to the printing press, the famous Gutenberg Bible was the innovative result.
Traveling is a natural way to induce Theta waves in your brain, but you must step outside of your normal day-to-day experiences. If you work in the sports industry it's not about attending another game in a different state. Slightly different, but too familiar, does not help you shift your perspective and make new neural connections. You can keep sports on your travel agenda, but the goal is to step outside your day-to-day, experience new stimuli and get sparked into your own Eureka! Zip-line through a forest, hike or bike through a foreign country, play a curious new game the locals teach you. If you are in the food industry, instead of traveling for just the culinary delights on the white linen table before you, visit the markets behind the scenes; take an expedition out to sea to the origins of your fish dish du jour; visit the shop that weaves your linens, the winery that produces your port or the chocolatier who produces your pièce de résistance. Better yet, if you're in the sports industry, experience the food excursion; if in the food industry, dive into an outdoor adventure.
Stop, look around and ask yourself: What came together to create this picture? What ideas found each other to spark what I'm experiencing? How does what I'm seeing parallel, reflect, extend or re-invent my world? What best practices in these different arenas can create a unique and novel best practice in my arena?
While you want to have your reticular activation system telling your right anterior superior gyrus to go work on that problem, don't forget to have something handy to actually capture those "a-ha!" moments of supposed serendipity. Otherwise, you're going to find yourself stopped in the middle of the trail, plowing through your brain, trying to remember just exactly what that moment of insight was.
Posted by: Jason Hull | July 20, 2012 at 03:10 PM
Great post Amy. We couldn't agree more. Speaking from a place harried execs getaway to, we're always eager to help our stressed out guests get their creative juices flowing. Thanks.
Cheers,
AJB-Innkeeper
The White Rabbit Inn B&B
Lakeside, MI
Posted by: A.J. Boggio | July 12, 2012 at 10:22 AM