The Zen of Innovative Success
Published October 28, 2011 | 
So what is it that makes us innovatively creative?
Are you innovative and creative?
Let’s face it, that if you know anyone known for being quite creative, then they are most likely also seen in addition to being very creative, having more fun, able to create more buzz, and with more laughter in their life.
Looking at the trait from a physiological viewpoint, scientists define creative innovation as the regions of the brain communicating that under normal traits conditions, are not ordinarily connected. A crucial component or ingredient in the recipe of creativity and innovativeness is the essential ability to consider and develop alternative solutions, and this skill is known as ‘divergent thinking,’ which typically occurs in a spontaneous, free-flowing manner, such that many ideas are generated and can be explored in a relatively short amount of time.
So, naturally the next question is just how does this type of thinking work? Let’s examine at how the idea of this post about creativity and innovation first suggested itself to me.
I was visiting with a client at their martial arts business and watching some sparring practice and forms being executed with power and grace.
The client has proven quite successful at combining innovation, martial arts and business. During our conversation the client told me that they enjoy reading my blog and how multi-faceted business and the success it enjoys can be. Of course, the idea of a post about innovation and creativity instantly made itself known in my brain. You can see in this example how my brain connected different facts and actions: ‘martial artist’, ‘a great topic for a post’, ‘innovation and creativity,’ and business.
Innovation and creativity is a natural state of mind
Innovation and creativity isn’t something that either you have it or you don’t, but having it can greatly enhance your chances of being successful. Children don’t realize it but they are being creative when they ‘play.’ And most will agree that all children are pretty good at doing that! The next time you have a chance to observe children playing, whether your own kids or someone you know, notice how they make and change rules as the game or fantasy role playing progresses. It becomes a challenge to keep up with the level of creativity and innovation that flows during such activities.
As a result, we can say that being creative then is not something far, far away and difficult to achieve. It is in reality something natural that we need to re-discover within ourselves.
Suspend your judgment to be most innovative
Most people tend to suppress their creativity as they get older, because they don’t understand how to shut up or silence their thought-chatter. That is what the voice in your head tells when you attempt creativity and innovation, including things like, “That’s stupid!” or “This really is bad!” or “You’re just wasting your time!”
You’ve heard that voice before, right?
Stimulate your creativity
One of the easiest, and yet most powerful creativity strategies you can make use of in the comfort of your home or in the office is simply this – Look for the second right answer.
When most people have a problem, they unknowingly stop with the first right answer they discover. Now understand that approach is sufficient and acceptable for certain problems types of problems including mathematical ones that first comes to mind. But as is the case for the majority of problems, they have a range of answers, and if you stop searching after you find the first answer, then of course, all the great alternative answers will go completely undiscovered. So remember, if you look for the second, third, and even fifth right answer, you are more than likely to come across some really good creative choices for the answer.
Finally, here’s an example to help you understand: Pick up a pen and ask yourself, “What is it?” The first right answer might be a writing device. But now ask yourself, “What are the other right answers?” Don’t stop at the second one: It’s a pointer, a coffee stirrer, a telephone dialer, a weapon, a hole-punch, an emergency tracheotomy tool, and an advertising medium.
Now it’s your turn!
The Zen of Spacious Life – Mindfulness
Published October 27, 2011 | 
To consider it in the simplest way, mindfulness means to stop thinking and start to be aware, to live in the present (here and now) of your life experiences instead of the past and future of your experiences and thoughts. Awareness or mindfulness stretches time in exactly the same way that new experience does, and since we devote more focused attention to our experience, we take in more information from it.
In other words, each of us to some extent can actually control time, although many do it unknowingly. But, the fact remains that time doesn’t have to speed up as we get older. Some of us try to extend our lives in traditional ways like keeping fit and eating healthy food, which is completely sensible and highly recommendable. Yet, it’s also possible for each one of us to expand time from the inside. How? By changing the very way we experience moments, the moment to moment reality that is our lives. Just imagine we can live for much longer, not just in terms of chronological years, but also in terms of our perception… and our spacious life.
Understand that Mindfulness is simply, your focused awareness of the present moment. The focused awareness of mindfulness allows us to be entirely conscious of any simple sensation like the warmth of sunlight, the cold of snowflakes or with the right focused awareness, the complex relationship and interaction occurring between our inner thoughts and feelings.
By tuning into our mental processes with the same focused mindfulness, we are capable of recognizing that our thoughts are actually just thoughts, and they don’t necessarily have to represent reality. With that focused recognition, we can observe our very thoughts, rather than being subject to them.
An amazing trait of mindfulness is that the clear and focused awareness allows us to absorb the tapestry-like richness of the moment, rather than going through life with half of our attention on the past or future or consumed by our own mental thought-chatter. The self-actualized knowledge that directly results from mindfulness permits us to be more intentional in choosing priorities and actions that fit our life mission or our entrepreneurial endeavors with greater success.
Senses of Mindfulness
Body – Being mindful of your breathing, even to the level of individual breath and this is your perception of the breath. Try it with different breath durations, long breath, short breath, deep breaths and shallow.
Feeling – From pleasant to painful and feeling along the spectrum.
Thoughts – Thoughts and intentions.
Mental – This is as much about the mechanism of how the six senses function, and is the very source or origin of all thoughts, feelings and perceptions. Everything starts somewhere and this is it. It is known in many beliefs as “the all.”
Therefore mindfulness should be defined as a technique in which a person becomes intentionally and skillfully aware of his or her perceptions, feelings, and thoughts in the present moment.
Finally, studies have found the following benefits for people who have developed their personal focused awareness and mindfulness with regular practice:
- Self-trust, self-acceptance, and increased self-awareness
- Enhanced and insightful appreciation of life
- Face difficulties with genuine serenity
- Accepting of life and its challenges with greater attitude
- Effective coping strategies with fluid adaptation to change
- Lasting decrease in stress-related physical symptoms, including chronic pain
- Anxiety and depression decreased significantly
- Greater concentration and enhanced creativity
- Immune system functioning with highly-noticeable improvement
If you are doing mindfulness meditation, you are doing it with your ability to attend to the moment. – Daniel Goleman
Praying without ceasing is not ritualized, nor are there even words. It is a constant state of awareness of oneness ‘the All,’ with God. – Peace Pilgrim
The awareness of our own strength makes us modest. – Paul Cezanne
The key to growth is the introduction of higher dimensions of consciousness into our awareness. – Lao Tzu
To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are. – Eric Hoffer
To reach your highest level of awareness, you have to put an end to karma, nurture your awareness, and accept what life brings. – Anonymous
The Zen of Spacious Life – Slowing Time
Published October 26, 2011 | 
Believe it or not there is another way which we can use to perceptually slow down time, by making a very conscious, clear and focused effort to be completely aware or ‘mindful’ of each of our experiences.
Of course, there are some people who are ones that seem to be more affected by familiarity than others may be, and are able to view the world with something of the fresh, first-time vision of children throughout their lives. You may know people like this, as they are the kind of people that are sometimes seen and referred to as eccentric by those familiar with them, and they are known to often begin sentences using phrases like ‘Have you ever noticed…?’ or ‘Have you ever thought about…?’
This kind of child-like vision sometimes moves them to suddenly stop and gaze up at a beautiful scene of the sun breaking or setting, through clouds or a silver moon above the horizon; or they may stare intently at the beauty of a horizon across the ocean, at simple landscapes or at animals, just like they’re viewing them for the first time. 
Musicians and artists are often gifted with this kind of ‘child-like’ vision, a vision that in fact provides them with the inspiration for their work.
People that possess this kind of wonderment and sense of strangeness about things they encounter, which most of us naturally take for granted, and they feel a strong need to capture and frame some of their more intensely perceptive experiences. In general, people like this will be far less affected by the ‘first time law of psychological time’ than most others, although time may very well take on the characteristic of speeding up for them, but possibly not to the same degree. So in a sense, we can simply cultivate this same attitude by developing a conscious effort to increase strong awareness and be ‘mindful.’
Developing the ability to clearly focus our awareness rather than focusing our attention on the ‘thought-chatter’ swimming in our minds or on routine tasks or environmental distractions like TV or computer games, can take some practice. 
We should try to focus on the time at hand, and live in the present moments, to devote our personal attention to the experiences we’re having, and to our immediate surroundings.
Start simple, like when you’re starting the morning with a shower, consider rather than letting your mind’s thoughts chatter on and on about all the things you’ve got to accomplish today or looking back on the things you did the night before, attempt to bring the focus of your attention to the present moment of here and now, and have crystal-clear awareness of the subtly-unique sensation of the cleansing water splashing against and streaming down your body and the heightened-sense of warmth and cleanness you feel.
Finally, driving on your way home from work, or on the bus or train, consider instead of thinking about everything you had to deal with at work, planning tomorrows activities in your mind, or daydreaming about whatever you did last night, clearly focus all of your attention outside you, closely observing the sky, the houses and buildings you pass, and be aware of yourself in the moment, a part of everything you visualize. With practice, your awareness will increase tremendously, and your mindfulness of each moment you encounter will slow down time as you experience the world of your spacious life.
Every moment is a golden one for him who has the vision to recognize it as such. – Henry Miller
If you aren’t in the moment, you are either looking forward to uncertainty, or back to pain and regret. – Jim Carrey
I will thank God for the day and the moment I have. – Jim Valvano
Good or bad, everything we do is our best choice at that moment. – William Glasser
We should not fret for what is past, nor should we be anxious about the future; men of discernment deal only with the present moment. – Chanakya
In the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you. – Leo Tolstoy
You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each moment. – Henry David Thoreau
Breathe. Let go. And remind yourself that this very moment is the only one you know you have for sure. My philosophy is that not only are you responsible for your life, but doing the best at this moment puts you in the best place for the next moment. – Oprah Winfrey
The Zen of Spacious Life – Slow Time
Published October 25, 2011 | 
There is a link between time and information that can explain certain aspects of time. Let’s examine for instance, one of the rules or laws of psychological time that is time seems to slow whenever we are introduced to new experiences and environments.
The reason for this psychological phenomenon is due to the strangeness of fresh experiences allowing us to process much more information on the uptake. Another of the rules/laws is the certainty of time passing quickly during states of information absorption. This is attributable during states of absorption to the narrowing of our attention to one little point of focus and at the same time we naturally block out any peripheral information from our immediate surroundings. At the very same time all this is occurring, there is very little ‘cognitive information’ being processed in our minds, since the concentration and intense focus has quieted the normal and sometimes distracting ‘thought chatter’ of the mind.
Now on the other hand, time seems to slow in states of our perceived boredom and associated discomfort due to the fact that in these types of situations (i.e. waiting for something to do on the job etc.) 
our attention isn’t occupied and intensely focused, and as a result, an enormous amount of thought-chatter naturally flows through our minds, and with it a substantial amount of cognitive information.
The positive side to all this, is that if we understand exactly why time seemingly speeds up as we get older, then we most certainly aren’t helpless in our efforts to counter the effect. If we know that this is simply caused by a high-level of familiar experience, then we can increase efforts to immerse ourselves in as much newness as possible in our lives, and not limited to just new environments through the course of travel (even though travel is very important), but new challenges, situations and information, and ideas, hobbies and new skills.
Understand that as our perceived expansion of time, which we most often experience when we travel to foreign countries shows, freshness and novelty of the unfamiliar stretches time. So therefore, if we plan with regularity to treat ourselves to unfamiliar events and information, we can perceptually experience increased time in our lives, and so effectively live for ‘longer.’
The concept of time passing quickly means that if you were to experience spending all the years of your adult life doing the same ole job (like many in past generations), living in the same ole house in the same ole neighborhood, along with doing the same things with the same people in your free time, then it’s highly-predictable and inescapable that you will most certainly experience a incredibly-swift passage of time. But if you tend to routinely change jobs like most people do today, frequently travel to places you haven’t visited before, keep exploring new thoughts and ideas and periodically give yourself new fresh challenges, time will begin to pass more slowly to you. This is the way it’s possible for a person who dies prematurely before the age of 40, to live far ‘longer’ than a person who dies at the age of 80 or even 100.
I took some time out for life. – James L. Brooks
I want to go ahead of Father Time with a scythe of my own. – H.G. Wells
If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over? – John Wooden
It’s my feeling that Time ripens all things; with Time all things are revealed; Time is the father of truth. – Francois Rabelais
Know how to live the time that is given you. – Dario Fo
Let him who would enjoy a good future waste none of his present. – Roger Babson
Lose not yourself in a far off time, seize the moment that is thine. – Friedrich Schiller
Lost time is never found again. – Benjamin Franklin
Men talk of killing time, while time quietly kills them. – Dion Boucicault
Much may be done in those little shreds and patches of time which every day produces, and which most men throw away. – Charles Caleb Colton
The Zen of Spacious Life – Time
Published October 24, 2011 | 
I think if you’re like most people, time seems to pass by with faster momentum as you go through life, like it’s running down hill. And, depending on what’s happening at certain moments, time can seem to speed up and tick by us in a flash. On the other extreme, time can actually take on a boring characteristic, and the seconds turn into minutes, that turn into hours, in almost slow-motion that feels like it goes on and on forever. Especially when we’re waiting on an important moment in time, like an important decision, a significant event (i.e. graduation, wedding, turning 21 years old, etc.), or arriving at a travel destination.
You should look at your life, and especially at your work, and ask yourself, “Do I feel that I have to accomplish more and more in less and less time?” That happens daily in most workplaces, especially to entrepreneurs that regularly perform the tasks of three people to keep their business profitable.
Today, at the very moment you’re reading this, I want to suggest to you a different method of considering and thinking about time that makes for a more spacious life and fuller experience of time. 
Consider a technique or approach that brings us the realization of how precious and unique each moment of our life really is.
But before I discuss ways to consider for how you can slow down time, let’s take a look and examine how others have thought about time.
Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment. – Buddha
This day will not come again. Each moment is a priceless gem. – -Takuan
I do not want to foresee the future. I am concerned with taking care of the present. God has given me no control over the moment following. – Mohandas Gandhi
We praise a man who feels angry on the right grounds and against the right persons and also in the right manner at the right moment and for the right length of time. – Aristole
Every moment and every event of every man’s life on earth plants something in his soul. – Thomas Merton
There is never time in the future in which we will work out our salvation. The challenge is in the moment; the time is always now. – James A. Baldwin
What matters is to live in the present, live now, for every moment is now. It is your thoughts and acts of the moment that create your future. The outline of your future path already exists, for you created its pattern by your past. – Sai Baba