#Fresh Perspective

Turning the Familiar Strange, Finding Fresh Insight

Make the practice small and habitual. On your commute, list five things you have never noticed and write why your past attention skipped them. Recast an email as a haiku, then restore its prose while keeping the distilled intent. Ask at every task: what is assumed, who is missing, and what would a novice misread? [...]

Thinking Newly About What Everyone Sees

Ultimately, Schopenhauer’s challenge becomes a habit. Keep a commonplace book like Leonardo’s notebooks—collect observations, then regularly ask, “What assumption makes this seem obvious?” Practice “slow looking” (Tishman, Slow Looking, 2017) by spending sustained time with a single object or chart. Rotate perspectives: user, maintainer, outsider, adversary. Finally, schedule inversion and “Five Whys” sessions for persistent problems. Over time, these rituals fuse attention with imagination. The world does not change; your interpretations do. And in that subtle shift—from what everyone sees to what no one has yet thought—new options quietly appear. [...]

Creative Imagination: The Catalyst for New Perspectives

Finally, Einstein’s insights apply beyond the realms of science and invention. In everyday problems—from navigating personal conflicts to devising business strategies—creative imagination empowers individuals to transcend habitual responses. By cultivating this faculty, we nurture the capacity for growth and continuous renewal across all facets of life. [...]

To Think Creatively, We Must Look Afresh at What We Normally Take for Granted - George Kneller

George Kneller, an educator and philosopher, emphasizes how human creativity is linked to the ability to question and rethink. His perspective suggests that growth and innovation come from questioning our assumptions about the world. [...]