Thursday, April 12, 2007

what's wrong with being curious?

It appears that the phrase ‘curiosity killed the cat was first penned by Samuel Johnson in 1598 in his play “A man and his humor” A year later, William Shakespeare used a similar sentence in the play “Much Ado About Nothing”. This idea has been in our collective consciousness for some time.
So what is it that scares people about being curious and why would anyone want to stifle it?

Thursday, April 5, 2007

rekindle your curiosity

"I am much more curious than I was 20 years ago, when I was mostly operating under the pressure of trying to look like I knew what I was doing. I know I probably should know by now, that it would be more impressive, that my books would be more definitive, my conference speeches would feel more actionable. But since I actually spend most of my time working on problems and ideas, curiousity is my best friend and the idea of being an “expert” in advance of properly doing that work is just a recipe for disaster (or a job with “executive head of” in the title!)”.
John Grant, The Brand Innovation Manifesto

Monday, April 2, 2007

intro


“Creative thinking begins with great questions, not answers. Great creative thinkers stay with the question instead of rushing to find an immediate solution. They ask more questions than the average person and are comfortable in the often uncomfortable situation of not immediately having the answer”, (Elaine Duton, The Seeds of Innovation: Cultivating the Synergy That Fosters New Ideas).

“Curiosity we are told, killed the cat. Of course, what nobody ever told us is that curiosity did no such thing. If anything killed the cat, it was not curiosity it was not being curious enough. How do you create something without asking questions? What if we did this? What if we tried that? And yet year after year, we get the creative daylights beaten out of us until one day we actually come to believe we don’t have a creative bone in our body. We have a creative bone alright. We have a lot of creative bones. Most of us just don’t know it.” (Ernie Schenck, The Houdini Solution).