How To Solve A Problem: Part 4 - Mindful Forgetfulness

Confession…I’m a geek who listens to the director / actor commentaries on DVDs. A while back, on a commentary about the movie “Number 23,” I listened to the always delightful Virginia Madsen discuss her “Theory of Cupcakes”. Apparently she started thinking about cupcakes a lot, dwelling on and even celebrating the cupcake. (She never explained the reason for this weird obsession.)

Here’s the interesting thing: Madsen suddenly started seeing cupcakes everywhere! Looking out of cab window, she noticed a cupcake shop! On a plane, she watched an episode of a sitcom where the lead actor was eating a cupcake! And, during her first day on the set of the "Number 23" movie, a crewmember was wearing a T-shirt with a cupcake on it!

Had Madsen really entered a cupcake enriched universe? No, of course not, she simply started to notice them because they were on her mind. This well recognized psychological phenomenon—called priming—is the secret used by those executives who leave the office with a problem and return the next day with several killer solutions…and looking rested!

To prime your own mental channels to effortlessly spot the Outside Insights to amazing solutions (without breaking sweat or stressing out) you need to become mindfully forgetful. First “mindful,” and then systematically “forgetful” of your problem. Let’s look at mindfulness first…

Problem Solving And Mindfulness

This concept—introduced by Harvard psychologist Ellen J. Langer—is an awareness of and sensitivity to different perspectives and mental categories.

If you’ve implemented the Perspective Power^TM strategies on the last few pages (clarify your problem, reframe it from different viewpoints and seek multiple solutions) then you are now “mindful” of your problem.

In addition, during the “mindful” stage of problem solving, saturate your brain with all the applicable information you can track down and soak up. Immerse yourself in the issues. Do your research, explore your resources and cast a wide net.

(Those of you who’ve attended my motivational breakout sessions and workshops will recall Perspective Power^TM strategies designed to ensure you’re making the best use of all the information at your disposal.)

When you’re mindful of your problem, you prime your unconscious mind to spot imaginative solutions. Fact is, your brain is already scanning continuously. Priming simply adjusts this subconscious scanning process and, with a little time, brings humdinger ideas into conscious view.

So once you've primed your brain (this is the cool part)…go play!

Problem Solving And Forgetfulness

That’s right, mentally disconnect from your problem…let it go! (I know this goes against the common wisdom of working diligently towards a solution.) Trust me, after studying your problem so thoroughly, you won’t completely forget it…but neither should you keep it top of mind.

Relax

Don’t fret over your problem. And don’t force it. Rest in the automatic simplicity of the process. Psychological explanations of priming emphasize the importance of rest, adopting a playful mindset and letting go of your assumptions around the problem. Have confidence that your primed brain is working behind the scenes to uncover humdinger answers to your dilemma.

Embrace Wild Curiosity

Then, in the same way as you immersed yourself in your problem, saturate your brain with fresh experiences. Embrace wild curiosity and invite your unconscious mind to go shopping for Outside Insights. Concentrate on giving your brain a ton of novel raw material to work with. See a foreign film, visit a museum or attend a lecture. Watch PBS...It doesn’t only stand for Poor British Sitcoms.

When you prime your brain with relevant information, unexpected ideas start popping into view at unexpected times. So, expect the unexpected…

Expect The Unexpected

Don’t limit yourself by only accepting a solution if it looks exactly the way you expected. By nature, we tend to constrain ourselves to the expected and the familiar…and ignore or dismiss everything else. Resist this and instead be attentive for (and pay attention to) information that doesn’t fit your current presumptions.

The unexpected products of a primed brain can – if noticed and explored – provide new avenues to success. So ask yourself questions about, and explore the ramifications of, these unusual connections, surprising metaphors, rogue results and seemingly irrelevant observations that your primed unconscious mind deems worthy of attention.

In his book – ‘How To Run A Thriving Business’ – Ralph M. Warner recounts the success story of Karen Twigg, Sales Director at a Holiday Inn and shining example of a person hawk-eyed for the unexpected.

Twigg had a huge problem...her hotel backed onto a railroad track. The staff bent over backwards to accommodate guests in rooms located at the front of the building. But, when the hotel was at capacity, people complained loudly. (Even louder than the persistent chugging and screeching of the trains.)

One day a man called Twigg and asked her a bizarre question…How much more expensive it would be to reserve a room overlooking the train tracks? What would your response have been to this peculiar question? Twigg could have quickly answered the inquiry and continued with her busy day. Instead – she paid attention to the unexpected – and asked why he wanted such a room. He turned out to be a train enthusiast.

The result of paying attention to this unexpected question was a profitable “Make Tracks To Stay With Us” marketing campaign which specifically targeted train enthusiasts, a group of people who revel in the idea of dozens of locomotives passing underneath their hotel window…go figure!

FYI: Don’t forget to record the unexpected ideas that come to you when your brain is primed. They’re unexpected, not part of your regular thinking patterns and so very easily forgotten.

Actually, this is the final – and really crucial – point…

Making Decisions And Spotting Opportunities

I’ve just taught you the Perspective Power^TM approach to solving a problem. Four embarrassingly simple steps that you can begin using immediately.

Here’s the thing: You can use exactly the same strategic approach to make better decisions and spot opportunities. In fact—from a Perspective Power^TM point of view—problems, opportunities and decisions are closely related challenges. Problems and opportunities sit along a ‘line of satisfaction’:

Dissatisfaction ------X---------------Y-------- Satisfaction

If your goal is to move from feeling dissatisfied to satisfied then you’ll consider your challenge to be a problem (X). However, if you want to slide from feeling satisfied to even more smugly satisfied then you’re looking for an opportunity (Y). And to actually solve a problem or seize an opportunity—i.e. move rightward along the satisfaction line—you must decide to take action.

For example, joining a gym and hitting the aerobics classes may solve the problem of being unfit or enable you to seize the opportunity to be even fitter. And, in both cases, a choice has to be made; the decision to go for it.

And that’s the rock-solid, ridiculously simple Perspective Power^TM approach to solving your toughest problems…practical and time efficient.