By Patrick Chan

Like it or not, think it or not, We are all born creative.

Just look at little children. When they are little, they play around with whatever they can their hands on. They explore, they experiment, they investigate, they feel - they actually learn what the world is really like.

And then they are sent to school. The moment they enter school, children are expected to conform to strict rules of behavior and to be socialized and to conduct themselves by doing things the "right" way. What's more, most learning in the classroom is obsessed also with finding the "right" answer.

They are literally taught how not to be creative.

It was Neil Postman, an educator, who lamented, "Children enter schools as question marks and leave as periods."

Once we go out to work, we are again being bombarded with all kinds of rigid rules and regulations that go by the names of company policies, workflow procedures, job processes, and work systems.

All these are necessary but they have the inevitable consequence of stifling our innate creative spirit.

So what's the solution?

It's time you reversed these negative effects and take charge of your own life. The first essential step is to come to a realization that YOU are creative and that you can learn how to be more creative all over again! Research studies have shown that the main difference between people who are creative and those who are not is that the creative folks thought of themselves as creative and those who did not think so, remain uninnovative.

Two very powerful creative thinking techniques that you can adopt today are creative self-affirmation and visualization.

Self-Affirmation

Begin saying to yourself positive statments of affirmation. Affirm yourself by exclaiming, "I am creative. I am the most creative person at home! I am the most creative employee at the workplace! I can come up with brilliant ideas if I want to! I will be very successful in what I do!"

In fact, take time to write these affirmation of yourself down in big bold prints on a card, drawing paper or create a poster out of them. Put it in a place that you can view every day whether it's in your home or your office. Let the positive statments serve as a constant reminder of your creative nature.

And before you know it, you will be pleasantly surprised to discover that you are unleashing the creative genius inside you and setting it free to create new things and generating brilliant new ideas!

Picture Yourself Creative

Creative people are known for their ability to visualize and picture themselves creating all the time.
Spend time painting a picture of yourself being at your best and being creative in a situation. You could be seeing yourself presenting to an audience with confidence and finesse, playing your favorite sport with lots of fun and laughter, or undertaking a work or school project with such flair and control.

What is most important is that we are able to visualize yourself doing a task and experiencing the feelings and emotions associated with being creative and successful.

And once you are able to do this, you can call upon your memory to recall at will all the wonderful feelings related to being creative. You will then be able to repeat the same delightful creative outputs over and over again.

Start with yourself and embark on your journey to becoming a creative genius!

About the Author
Patrick Chan is a creativity trainer, a bestselling author, and a full-time puzzler. His unorthodox creative thinking techniques, icebreakers, and learning systems have since intrigued hundreds of audience including teachers and educators alike who attended his presentations and seminars. He continues to mesmerize hundreds of people from all over the world every day by his amazingly mind-boggling brain teasers and visual icebreakers via his web site at http://www.wordjuxtapoz.com.

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