Insight

BBC Documentary - Horizon

The Creative Brain How Insight Works

An insight moment comes when you have a momentary realization that the assumption you had were false and sudden idea or progress appears. Being intelligent and being creative are two different things. Intelligence requires rational thinking whereas creativity requires a rather irrational approach as it will allow the brain to associate with unrelated ideas. When our creative process is at its slowest there is when the creativity breakthrough. For example, when I have a topic to think about it never appears at that second but maybe a few minutes or hours later all of a sudden there will be a lightbulb. Research tells us that if we were to break our usual practices or routines we will have more access to our creativity. By struggling to solve a problem, then leaving it for a while and then attempting it again can help in finding other ways to solve it as repetition can trick the brain. Our brain helps us to adjust our behavior according to the situation, this also called as the self-monitoring activity. This activity can be a bad thing as well. This is because as much as it warns us on how we should behavior it does not help us in creativity, which also prevents us from expressing. For example, in my case, I don’t do anything that will surprise the people around, I practice it many time in my head but always don’t share it. I always blamed it on my timing but now I know what is causing this.

In conclusion, we separate ourselves from creativity as if it is an activity but we fail to understand that it is part of us. It important to practice insight thinking as you will never know when you will need it or when it will appear, its best if you embrace it.