Ask yourself impossible questions – that’s the answer
Questions are the search engine of the brain but we usually know the answers. To stimulate creative thinking, we need questions we can't answer.
That was the message from Valerie Pierce, author of Quick Thinking on Your Feet. Asking questions we can already answer is part of the learner's paradox, she explained. "I call it the me-know problem and if me thinks me knows before we start, we're in deep trouble."
The phrasing of questions is all-important, she said. For example, instead of asking, "How can I improve my performance?" it would be better to ask, "How do I maximise my potential?"
She...