How to go beyond standard thinking. We develop innovative thinking in children and adults

Theoretical part

Comfort zone

Everyone has an area of ​​living space within which they feel safe - this is our comfort zone. The comfort zone is limited by habitual patterns of thinking and behavior: what we get used to is what is comfortable for us. And when we are faced with situations in which we need to do something new, unusual, fear of the unknown prevents us from acting.

Solving any creative problem involves going beyond your comfort zone.

The framework that limits us

The fears, programs and attitudes of your ancestors (parents, educators, teachers, etc.) live inside you. You inherited them and often are not even aware of them. Once upon a time, these programs and settings may have been necessary, but the world around you is changing every second and it is likely that the settings and programs imposed on you in childhood are no longer needed and only limit you. That's why consciously push the boundaries of your capabilities and leave your comfort zone.

Usually people get used to the lifestyle that has developed over the years and do not want to change anything. This also applies to the methods by which they solve problems. Creative people, on the other hand, take a different approach to problem solving. They constantly ask questions:

Why?

Why not?

Why exactly this way and not otherwise?

Why not try something different?

What will happen if...?

Do not become attached to any one solution or idea once found - this will slow down your creative activity. Vice versa, constantly look for new and new ways to solve the problem that has arisen. Keep your mind flexible and open to new ideas, even if the solution you've already found seems great to everyone around you. Avoid the tendency to settle for a more or less acceptable solution until you have exhausted all your possibilities for finding new, more advanced and interesting solutions.

Fleas in a jar

Scientists took a jar and put a hundred fleas in it. At first, the fleas easily jumped out of the jar and then the scientists closed the jar with a lid. Several days passed, the scientists opened the lid and saw the following picture: the fleas could no longer jump out of the jar, although the lid no longer held them back. They simply believed that they could not jump out of the jar and no longer made the necessary effort. The most interesting thing is that all subsequent generations of these fleas also could no longer jump out of the jar, since they inherited this limitation from their ancestors.

Conclusion: push the boundaries and don’t limit yourself to imaginary barriers !

You can find videos of this experiment on the Internet if you type “fleas in a jar” or “fleas in a jar experiment” into a search engine.

Stepping outside your comfort zone

To move beyond the limiting boundaries of conventional thinking, the first step is to recognize that boundaries of thinking exist, and they limit our comfort zone. Recognizing that boundaries exist, it is necessary consciously take action to step outside your comfort zone!

There is a simple algorithm for this:

1. We set ourselves high goals and challenging tasks.

2. Formulate the desired result

3. We outline a plan and act according to the plan

4. We are exploring new territories

Let's say it limits us fear of new people. Our goal is to learn how to meet people and overcome the fear of being abandoned or unwanted. What result do we need? As a result, we should become confident, able to meet whoever we want, when we want and how we want. We outline a plan for how we can achieve this and begin to act according to the plan, gradually mastering more and more new territories: if yesterday you could only meet a random person at a party, today we strive to meet the person you like right on the street or in transport, and tomorrow we choose a person whom we were previously afraid to approach closer than 5 meters because of his dazzling beauty or untold wealth, and we make acquaintance with him.

Besides dating, help you get out of your comfort zone:

Changing your daily routine

A new book of an unusual genre for you

Unplanned trip

New voluntary work responsibilities

Changing physical activity (adding new exercises, increasing time to practice familiar exercises, etc.)

New culinary dishes you've never cooked before

New hobbies

If we talk exclusively about thinking, then any new and unusual methods (internal conversation with the sages, “six thinking hats,” the Disney method, etc.), as well as yoga and neurogymnastics, help you get out of your comfort zone.

Self-test questions

What is a comfort zone?

Where do bounding boxes come from?

What questions help you overcome limiting boundaries?

How to go beyond your comfort zone?

Practical part

Exercise 1. Non-standard actions

One of the best exercises to help you push the boundaries of your comfort zone is performing unusual actions. Act outside the box and in a way that is unusual for you. The more strange and incomprehensible your actions are to the people around you, the better the effect of performing the exercise will be.

Exercise 2: Take on new responsibilities at work

Take on a new long-term project at work or in business. Or take on additional responsibilities for old projects. If you are a manager, start showing a little more responsibility towards your subordinates than usual. If you are a subordinate, start doing more than usual (for example, start coming to work earlier than others and leaving later than others).

Exercise 3. Yoga

Do yoga and neurogymnastics. These are the best methods to not only get out of your comfort zone, but also to keep your body and mind in good shape.

You can sign up for individual training, get more exercises and a detailed explanation of each point of the theoretical part, as well as get a personal consultation by contacting the author. For those who practice yoga according to the program of the author's closed yoga school "Insight", all services are free, for others - by agreement.

My Skype: seahappiness

VKontakte page.

Students at Stanford University were given a task: earn $600 in 2 hours. Each of the 14 teams received an envelope containing $5 of “starting capital” and 2 hours of time. Upon completion of the task, each team had 3 minutes to present their solution.

There were proposals to open a makeshift car wash or a stand selling soft drinks - in these cases, $5 would be used to purchase materials and products to get started. Quite decent options for those who would like to earn a little money in a few hours.

However, most students eventually found a way to go beyond the standards. They questioned a huge number of traditional solutions and were able to realize a lot of opportunities to create maximum value in given conditions. However, the winning teams were able to earn up to $600, and the average return on a $5 investment was 4000%! How did they do this?

Here's a hint: the teams that made the most money didn't use the starting $5 at all. They realized that this amount, in essence, would not help them in any way, and decided to look at the problem more broadly: “What if we start from complete scratch?”

One group noticed a problem common on many college towns - long lines outside popular restaurants on a Saturday night - and decided to help people who didn't want to wait. Team members made multiple reservations at restaurants. When the appointed hour arrived, they sold the right to enter the restaurant for $20 to those who wanted to get there immediately.

The other team did it even simpler. They set up a special stand in front of the student union building and began measuring the pressure in bicycle tires for free. After serving their first few customers, the team realized that cyclists were incredibly grateful.

Despite the possibility of free pumping and the simplicity of this operation, the new service seemed convenient and valuable to customers. In fact, within an hour of starting the job, the team stopped charging a flat fee and instead asked to pay whatever amount the client would deem appropriate. Profits immediately increased several times.

Each of these projects brought in several hundred dollars for the teams, and the others were pretty impressed. However, one team managed to earn as much as $650 by being able to look at the resources at their disposal from a completely different angle.

These students determined that their most valuable resource was not $5 or 2 hours of time, but 3 minutes of presentation on Monday, and decided to sell this time to a company that wanted to hire students. They created a three-minute commercial for the company and showed it to the students instead of talking about their activities the previous week. It was a great decision that no one else had even thought about.

My favorite sad thinker and great philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer once, in one phrase, revealed the whole essence of many internal human conflicts: “We perceive our own limitations as if they were the limitations of the world in which we live.”

In general, it is human nature to endow the world with its own characteristics. In psychology there is even a term - projection. Traditionally, it is considered one of the forms of psychological defense, when a person sees outside himself what is actually happening inside him, although he may not be aware of it at all.

We tend to notice anger in other people more clearly when we ourselves are filled with anger. At the same time, when we are happy, people and the world around us seem lighter and fresher. Whatever a person does, whatever he feels, whatever state he is in, he always transmits himself into the world around him and, peering into it in anticipation of an answer, he tends to see there only what he knows - himself. This does not mean at all that there is not something else there, it only means that it is very difficult to see and understand what you do not know.

And the world, of course, has nothing to do with it. It is not the world, but our ideas about the world and its laws that play a significant role in our sense of self. And ideas about the world are always equivalent to ideas about oneself. “What is inside is also outside”- my teachers once taught me. In literate words: “Intrapersonal conflict is always equal to interpersonal conflict”.

Let's take the example of a person who has been betrayed many times. Of course, it will be much more difficult for him to admit that there are relationships without betrayal. He is probably sure of the opposite, because in any relationship he is in a state of almost combat readiness. Always ready for betrayal from a partner. Willingness breeds action. What a person actually prepares himself for is what happens. Subconsciously, he provokes or even creates a situation for which he is preparing. It’s as if everything in a person requires balance. Prepared, prepared, got it.

Is there a chance for this man and the many others who are trapped in their beliefs to see the world a little more differently? Do we all have a chance to go beyond the boundaries firmly set by our life experiences? Is there such a miracle way for everyone to let their “hitherto unseen and unfelt” into their lives?

All recommendations for spiritual practices largely boil down to the slogans “Believe!”, “Open up to the world!”, “Let something new into yourself!” They carefully, between the lines, hint that if you believe, let in and open up, then everything will be guaranteed possible for you. “If you believe it, you will receive it,” “If you open up and let it in, it will come,” “If you visualize the energy of money, you will have money,” “If you remove the damage, you will be healthy,” “If you remove the celibacy dinner, you will meet your betrothed.” “If you bury the root of something on someone’s grave at midnight on a full moon, all enemies will die.” All these are peculiar forms of mythological consciousness that create the illusion of control and bring a little relief to a person that everything that is so important and necessary for him will happen and come true in his precious life.

The truth is that we cannot control the future, no matter how elaborate spiritual, psychological and material rituals we create and perform. The only way to control your future is to intentionally create it.

And you have to create your future exclusively from the material that already exists in the present, from this whole mixture of failures, pain, suffering, joy and dreams, hopes and disappointments. That’s why there are so few creators among us, that it’s far from easy to stop, stop running and defending yourself, but to come face to face with everything that you yourself have done and, perhaps even more absurdly, with your whole life and destiny.

It's no use running away from pain. It is important to understand and relieve it. Pain is limiting, but finding a way to relieve it is going beyond the limits set by pain.

There is no point in running from anxiety. It's important to calm her down. Anxiety is limiting, but finding a way to calm it is the way to go beyond the boundaries set by anxiety.

It is absolutely useless to save yourself from suffering. It is important to console yourself. Suffering limits, restricts and narrows life, but the consolation of suffering opens a way beyond the boundaries established by this suffering.

A person who has been betrayed many times is preparing for betrayal precisely because he is not yet ready for it, cannot cope with it, accept it, survive it and let it go. He has not yet been betrayed in a new relationship, but he is already building relationships in such a way that it is possible to protect himself or escape with minimal injuries. Maybe he will be betrayed, or maybe not, but the relationship will already be spoiled from the very beginning by this taste of expected pain. This expectation of death is similar. It forms a deep abscess in relationships, which is sure to break out a little at a time, or even all at once, at the most inopportune moment, and cover everyone around with its pus, and even those who had no intention of betraying.

Telling a person with such colossal pain and fear inside to “just trust” and “open up” is tantamount to the cruelest mockery. Somewhere in meditation, in absolutely safe conditions for himself, he can easily do this, but as soon as he finds himself in a situation of possible betrayal, the usual defense mechanisms work completely uncontrollably, like a reflex.

For the most part, people live like this - blindly and instinctively reacting to “apparent” stimuli.

In order to go beyond the limitations of his own ideas and begin to create a different reality, such a person will have to go through a number of difficult stages:

-1-

Sooner or later, everyone who gets tired of suffering will have to learn to distinguish appearances from reality and bring consciousness to their psychological instincts. Spiritual practitioners call this process mindfulness. In psychotherapy, this is the very first stage, where a person understands how “this” works for him, what the reflex is activated in the outside world, what behavior, thoughts and feelings it consists of.

Nothing happens in a person by chance or just like that. Everything is subordinated to a specific task. No matter how strange it may sound, even at the heart of our destructive behavior lies a positive goal for us. Another thing is that we are not always aware of it. This is where most of our difficulties come from. At this stage, a person learns to listen carefully to himself and understand what really motivates him.

-2-

When the whole picture stretches before your eyes, an understanding is born of what you can do with all this and in which direction to start moving in your life. This is an important decision-making stage. His task is to answer the question: “How can it be done differently?”

A person who has always been betrayed understands well how to live in a situation of betrayal, but is completely lost when he finds himself next to his faithful partner. You may be surprised, but living in the good when you are used to the bad can be quite difficult. And you will have to learn a lot so as not to turn good into habitual bad. On the other hand, it would be good to understand how to behave in case of betrayal in such a way as to maintain your dignity and respect. In other words, at this stage new decisions are made regarding old and future experiences.

-3-

However, what the mind can understand is not always accepted by the body. The truth of knowledge is verified by life experience. If it cannot be applied in life, it is just attractive and tempting idle talk, nothing more. I don’t know how this stage occurs in spiritual practices, but most often people retreat here. This is the most vulnerable point in the entire change process. This is where the journey of trial and error begins. And if a person expects from himself that everything will immediately begin to work out for him, there is a very high probability that he will return to the old tracks of his psychological reflexes.

More than ever, a person at this stage needs the support and competent help of others. In psychotherapy I call this stage “experiment”. We literally carefully experiment with ideas and solutions, testing them for usefulness and viability. An additional effect at this stage is training the ability to resist stress, when a person does not allow mistakes or troubles to stop his movement. The main question at this stage is: “I understand and accept the severity of what I am going through, but do I let it stop me?”

-4-

And the most difficult thing in all this is to endure that period when you are already very smart, but no changes occur. And all these expressions: “Everything has its time,” “Moscow was not built right away,” only irritate and increase despair, exacerbating general fatigue. This can happen: a long journey has been made, but its fruits are still not visible. This is a sure sign that the stage of conscious work is over. It's time to relax and allow yourself to relax, sometimes, in the literal sense of the word, go on vacation, treat yourself to goodies, pleasant or long-awaited purchases. Anything that gives you pleasure or can relax you will do.

Everything that has passed the test in the previous stages penetrates your subconscious as an integral part of you. Everything that was done with effort becomes simple and easy. Tension is transformed into tone or relaxation. Fear, excitement and anxiety - into calm and firm attention. And the most difficult thing here is not to rush things. We can no longer consciously control all these processes, but we can significantly slow them down. "Do not think! Just live” is the slogan of this stage in life. Self-confidence is the most important skill that inevitably needs to be trained.

My dear reader, the final decision is yours. There are two paths before you. One way is familiar and simple. Perhaps this is where all its attractiveness ends. The other is littered with difficulties, but there is a chance. His biggest challenge is that chance is not a guarantee. Are you worthy of a chance, just a chance? Because a chance is just an opportunity with which everything in this universe begins: from life on earth to great discoveries. And it seems that it’s up to you to decide whether to leave your inner universe in the mode of mechanical reactions to stimuli from the outside world, or whether to still give it a chance and resurrect it, revive it with your own meaning.

With love and respect, Nadezhda Reznikova.

GOES OUT OF THE FRAME what. OVERFLOW what. New Take on more importance; expand the scope of its functions. According to experts, the information requested by Scriabina, in its content, went far beyond the scope of the problems that the magazine deals with(L. Sergeev, A. Fedin. Strange “ecologies”). The significance of the decision of the plenum of the Supreme Court of the USSR goes far beyond the purely legal sphere. Through the means of law, it stimulates the civic activity of the individual... giving guarantees to the brave, decisive and noble(A. Vaksberg. Lunch on the sand).

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