Supporting my Primitive Creativity
Don't think about why you question, simply don't stop questioning. Don't worry about what you can't answer, and don't try to explain what you can't know. Curiosity is it's own reason. Aren't you in awe when you contemplate the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure behind reality? And this is the miracle of the human mind - to use its constructions, concepts, and formulas as tools to explain what man sees, feels and touches. Try to comprehend a little more each day. Have holy curiosity. - Albert Einstein
Friends who know me, will remember that I am an avid reader of tech. Over the years and as the pace of technology innovation has continued to accelerate along the proverbial highway, I’ve been spending more and more time at TechCrunch (TC). For me, the site is my own personal melting pot of the latest and greatest tech industry movements, ventures, startups and innovation (especially the CrunchBase).
Recently, while going through some of their articles I was struck by just how much technology has enabled big thinkers to engage their minds’ primitive capabilities. No – I do not mean that they are primitive thinkers; quite the opposite in fact: they are using technology to enable to tap into the primitive processes of linguistic and spacial capabilities (read more here) and link the two together in advanced ways to become big thinkers.
Many of us, myself included, use technology to enable efficiencies in our dat to day activities: quick access to information, easy scheduling and even reminding us when to drink that next glass of water. But we also use technology to help us to express our thoughts in ways that words may fail us (emote much?). One challenge with words is that their formation through predictive constructs can inhibit the way we express new ideas and concepts (may not hold as true for the culturally inclined) - how do you verbalize an innovative idea that's a revolution rather than an evolution?
Technology can be a fantastic enabler, moving our ideas form mental flashes to images on our screen, 3D printers and new business ideas which we can then articulate with the verbosity of the most accomplished writer. Linking our primitive capabilities as if we were linking Johann von Goethe to Wolfgang Mozart to Leonardo da Vinci.
I am reminded of one of my great mentors, Grant, whose mind moves at a "mile-a-millisecond" when he has an idea, but it is never fully expressed until it is on a slide and we can see his vision. Now I realize that I may have the same challenge. So with a tip of the hat to Grant, I've crafted my technology enabled vision of how technology can help me to visualize my own idea formulation process bellow:
The end result of our idea formulation is often the converged expression of our diverging thoughts. Thank you TC for reminding of the great enabler that technology can be.
Check out www.techcrunch.com and www.creativesomething.net for some good reads.
