"The larger lesson is that those sleepy students, like a brain-damaged patient, benefit from the inability to focus. Their minds are drowsy and disorganized, humming with associations that they’d normally ignore. When we need an insight, of course, those stray associations are the source of the answer."

"Solitude is out of fashion. Our companies, our schools and our culture are in thrall to an idea I call the New Groupthink, which holds that creativity and achievement come from an oddly gregarious place. Most of us now work in teams, in offices without walls, for managers who prize people skills above all. Lone geniuses are out. Collaboration is in." from NYT.

"In our personal lives we tend to optimize for one of two things: input or output. Reading or writing. Consuming or creating. The environment we live in – the prevailing culture – by default is optimized for consumption."

"The basic premise of construal level theory is that things that feel close get contemplated in concrete, literal terms while things that feel far away allow us to think in more abstract ways." from Wired.

"Embedded memories and conspiring brain regions, scientists now believe, are the true source of ad-hoc creativity." from Seed.

"Focus is about finding simplicity in this Age of Distraction."

"The problem with these closed environments is that they make it more difficult to explore the adjacent possible, because they reduce the overall network of minds that can potentially engage with a problem, and they reduce the unplanned collisions between ideas originating in different fields." by Steven Johnson in the Wall Street Journal.

"What you think you know about fostering creativity is wrong. A look at what really works." from Newsweek.

Welcome to 48 Hour Magazine, a raucous experiment in using new tools to erase media's old limits. As the name suggests, we're going to write, photograph, illustrate, design, edit, and ship a magazine in two days.

The Tinkering School offers an exploratory curriculum designed to help kids – ages 8 to 17 – learn how to build things. By providing a collaborative environment in which to explore basic and advanced building techniques and principles, we strive to create a school where we all learn by fooling around. All activities are hands-on, supervised, and at least partly improvisational.

Spontaneous, fluid, even riotous creativity is a natural part of the design of the mind.

When we repress our urge to confabulate we also repress the urge to create.

This site is dedicated to the thought that something as simple as fun is the easiest way to change people’s behaviour for the better. Be it for yourself, for the environment, or for something entirely different, the only thing that matters is that it’s change for the better.

from TED.com

Too often I notice designers and non-designers alike equating creativity with design. I find this assumption disturbing because it is one of the many fallacies that allow unskilled but creative pretenders to consider themselves capable design professionals when they’re nothing of the sort.

If you want to be great, or at least to be better, start by breathing, taking breaks, and working intensely when the mood is on.

everything is invented.

psychological distance and creativity. from scientific american.

For UX professionals—and creative professionals in general—our ability to both stimulate creative thinking and capture it when it happens is a key aspect of our work process.

by Getty Images.

creative web design and development training and workshops for web designers and developers.

inspiration and creativity are vital to success.

an experiment in using social technology for social change.

with the right tools, and developed in a structured environment, ideas can be realized to their full potential.

experts discuss tips and tricks. from scientific american.

the phenomenon of simultaneous discovery. by malcolm gladwell, from the new yorker.

from the new york times magazine.

your world in pictures.

Logical and precise, left-brain thinking gave us the Information Age. Now comes the Conceptual Age - ruled by artistry, empathy, and emotion.