A Connective Mind Sparking Creativity

Creativity is about connecting unusual dots, the connective mind is in demand to sparking creativity and foster innovation.

Human minds are perhaps one of the most powerful but mysterious things in the universe, as they continue to imagine and invent things for changing the world. The fact is that the world now becomes more advanced, complex, hyperconnected, and dynamic than ever. Creativity is about connecting unusual dots, the connective mind is in demand to sparking creativity and foster innovation.


A connecting mind can spark creativity effortlessly: Perhaps an essential feature of the creative brain is its degree of connectivity--both inter-hemispheric and intra-hemispheric. The human brain function is far too complex to be so simplistic as “half-half.” We all have the right and left halves of our brain connected by a dense jungle of neurons called corpus callosum that enable both the halves of the brain to talk to each other and execute cognitive activities. Connectivity correlates or binds together functions of apparently structurally isolated domains on brain modules subserving different functions. Cognition is a faculty for processing of information, applying knowledge, and changing preferences. Cognition, or cognitive processes, can be natural or artificial, conscious or unconscious as well. These processes can assimilate all relevant information, analyzed from different perspectives within different contexts, and transform them into the unique insight which ignites creativity or fuels innovation.

A connective mind is in demand because its unusual capability and capacity to solve problems creatively: The individual’s “thinking box" is a mental construct made up of personal and environmental components that they operate within. Compared to the “old days,” with the scarcity of information and silo setting, most people have considerably smaller thinking box and follow conventional wisdom based on a very limited thinking box they shape quite a long time ago. A connective mind has bigger or expanded thinking box to connect wider dots for sparking creativity. It is felt that creative cognition is a self-rewarding process where divergent thinking would promote connectivity through the development of new synapses for solving problems creatively. The digital ecosystem is complex and volatile. For complex problem solving, understanding context is often the first and the important step in framing the right problem, create the relevant context to make a more lasting solution.

A connective mind can predict the trend and proactively co-create the future: On the navigation dimension, a connective mind has more antennae focused on the future and what’s going on in the world; what’re the rise trends, what'll it impact the next generation, and what group will have more diversity. Thus, they are able to co-design the future together. A connective mind is also open to seeing the commonality even at the seemly “polar opposite” viewpoint. Because a connective mind can capture the insight, see through things from the different angles, it is the mind with the thinking process that holds onto its nature connectivity while being prepared to connect the dots even in the opposite direction should they make sense. Thus, it can unify the world of diversification to sparking collective creativity.

In the hyper-connected digital age with an abundance of information and unprecedented technological advancement, to survive and thrive, people have to step outside that box to unfamiliar territory, seek additional knowledge and experience, so they can connect unusual dots, expand into a much bigger thinking box, let creative mind run free, and make imagination rolling into the reality.

Posted in: Connecting Dots,Creativity