When was the last time you turned the world upside down and changed your perspective?
Most people go about their day with a set routine. You work to get through it just so you can go home and do the same thing the next day, all the while hoping the weekend comes quickly. Before you know it, you wonder where all the years have gone.
It’s time to shake things up. Now. Your mission today, and every day, is to ask yourself, “What can I turn on its head today? How can I look at something ordinary and make it extraordinary?”
In Tina Seelig’s book What I Wish I Knew When I was 20, she uses the example of the circus — Take everything you know and expect from the “big top” – awful music, simultaneous performances, a loud ringmaster, huge tent, etc.
˙ʇı dılɟ uǝɥʇ˙˙˙
Imagine an orchestrated soundtrack for an individual performer in an intimate theater setting.
In 1984, a group of 20 street performers challenged expectations and soon created what we know today as the Cirque Du Soleil, an incredible experience for all the senses that continues to sell out venues with each one of their themed tours.
They took what was known, flipped it, and built something new that took the world by storm.
We all tend to fall into routines because they’re safe, convenient, and require minimal effort. It’s what we know. But routines eventually turn into ruts. It creates a personal prison that keeps you from enjoying more in life. It’s time for a jailbreak.
Take a different route to work, eat at a new restaurant, or get into a situation that makes you uncomfortable. Look at your surroundings as if you were visiting from outside of the country. Find an obstacle that you simply haven’t adapted to and find a way to conquer it, not simply divert. Instead of driving around that pothole in the road, how can you fill it? When you look at things in new ways you’ll begin to find new life in places you never expected.
Additional Resources
• 10 Ways to Evict Creative Block from Your Head
• Changing Perspective: A New Look At Old Problems
• A Creative Challenge to Change Your Perspective
• 18 Creativity Exercises To Improve Creative Thinking at Work
• 7 Fun Exercises to Quickly Improve Creative Thinking
• Inspire Your Students With 28 Creative Thinking Activities