DID YOU KNOW THAT SOME WORDS SELF-DEFINE THEMSELVES?
Michael Michalko
International creative thinking expert and author of books about creative thinking techniques.
Discover how some words self-define themselves
Creativity, it could be said, consists largely of rearranging what we know in order to find out what we do not know. Rearrangement usually offers countless alternatives for ideas, goods, and services.
Take ordinary words and rearrange the letters to create new words that will surprise and startle you. For example, if life gives you limes, rearrange the letters of limes into smiles. Rearrange the letters of Santa into? (Ans. at bottom).
Other examples:
ASTRONOMER: When you rearrange the letters, it becomes:
MOON STARER
ELECTION RESULTS: When you rearrange the letters:
LIES – LET’S RECOUNT
SLOT MACHINES: When you rearrange the letters:
CASH LOST IN ME
ANIMOSITY: When you rearrange the letters:
IS NO AMITY
DORMITORY: When you rearrange the letters:
DIRTY ROOM
PRESBYTERIAN: When you rearrange the letters:
BEST IN PRAYER
THE EYES: When you rearrange the letters:
THEY SEE
THE MORSE CODE: When you rearrange the letters:
HERE COME DOTS
SNOOZE ALARMS: When you rearrange the letters.
ALAS! NO MORE Z ‘S
ELEVEN PLUS TWO: When you rearrange the letters:
TWELVE PLUS ONE
A DECIMAL POINT: When you rearrange the letters:
I’M A DOT IN PLACE
DESPERATION: When you rearrange the letters:
A ROPE ENDS IT
And finally, A BOOK THAT WILL TRANSFORM YOU INTO A CREATIVE THINKER becomes THINKERTOYS (A HANDBOOK OF CREATIVE THINKING TECHNIQUES).
Classical Systems Engineering and Innovation
6 年Thinkertoys is the first book I bought on innovation and creativity. It is a very thorough compilation of techniques to try and break psychological inertia, etc. The other approach I like is TRIZ, which supports it, viewing problems from the problem viewpoint.