What Makes People Unique

Well, to start things off with a little fact: Humans and dolphins are the only two animals that have sex for pleasure. This doesn’t mean that other animals don’t get pleasure from it; it just means they don’t start it for pleasure. It’s for reproduction. And to add to this newfound knowledge, no animal goes and does it after it has experienced it because it’s pleasurable. Just putting it out there.

I think that this one’s pretty obvious; it’s our brains. Put a man and a tiger in a cage together and surely the tiger would win through sheer force. But give a man a knife while he’s in a cage with that tiger and he might win that fight. Now give him a machete. A gun. A tank? You get the point.

Even our knowledge of using basic tools and simple machines is what puts a person at the top of a food chain. What we lack for in strength, speed, vigor, etc, we make up with our minds. Instead of running around chasing a rabbit for six hours a day to get our meal, we invented a car, which lets us go faster than any living creature. Instead of punching the same rabbit to death after all that running, we invented arrows and guns so we can simply shoot it and. And so on and so forth.

It doesn’t matter how far you trace human history back to, because we’ve all evolved the same way, regardless of where we may lie. Thousands of years ago, when continents had no contact with one another, each and every culture evolved some sort of weapon, armor, and trap. The Chinese invented gun powder and other things that went on from that. The Europeans invented the sword, which became the strength of leading armies across the globe. Even Native Americans invented bows.

A long time ago, many ideas became developed as tools to our advantage. Giving someone something for something else became known as trading, or bartering. Bird calls became signals for stealth and human evasion. There’re hundreds, if not thousands, of examples such as these. The possibilities are endless.

But although man may possess an infinite pool of creativity, he also comprises a head filled with negativity, and hands to put it into physical form. For the specifics of the topic- putting that into simpler words: For every weapon that exists, a defense is brought to the table to match, and vice versa. Swords to shields, gun to bulletproof glass/vests; even nuclear warfare has an opposite (nuclear bomb shelters).

The evolution of whatever we were before, to man is the worst thing that could’ve possibly happened to Mother Nature, ever. Why do I make such outlandish statements, you ask? Well, because it’s true. We’ve caused global warming, chopped down too much greenery, completely derailed the natural ecosystem, and worst of all, we were the ones who created nuclear arms. I hope now you see (maybe even a tiny bit) why I think humans are heinous.

To sum this article as a whole in a nutshell, “Man possesses good and bad qualities, but most of them are bad.” But who am I to argue, I’m sure as hell never going to live in the woods and get killed by bears because I believe in natural predatorism and think that the world should be about survival of the fittest. To be honest, I’m the complete opposite of that! But I did feel the need to dish the facts out, make others conscious of whom they may be. So just make sure you know that every day that you drive your car, every day that you work, and every day that you embrace the title of “Human,” you are destroying everything that this earth has and keeping it for yourself. But why would you care, you’re greedy from nature!

Expand Your Creativity. [volume 1]

Have you ever heard the term: “think outside the box”? Okay, do you know the origin of the phrase? Complete this puzzle:

Draw four straight, continuous lines that connect all 9 dots without lifting the pencil off the page (or in this case your finger off the screen):

Here is the solution: Click Here for Solution

If you couldn’t figure it out, you probably assumed you had to stay inside the box. If that’s the case, you know have the first major step in thinking outside the box. Eliminate your assumptions. The rules presented didn’t say you couldn’t draw outside the lines.

How do assumptions affect our ability to create success? Write down or type out your answer or answers, and think about what you came up with. This whole post can be applied to just about any area of your life, if you apply it properly.

This is a core element of the Blue Ocean Strategy. The Blue Ocean Strategy is geared towards business, and is spoken on and written into application towards business. But even if you’re simply drawing a design in a competition, or even just for fun, this will expand the creative processes your brain goes through. (refer to my past posts on the brain: Brain Train [part 1] and Brain Train [part 2])

Some DOs and DON’Ts are as follows:

Follow sequence in your plan – if you plot out steps, follow them step by step.

Focus on the big picture FIRST, focus on numbers SECOND. – If you have a time constraint, first take a look at what needs to be done, what your mission is, then think about the time, or the money involved, then tweak it.

Get into the field – see what other people are doing, and ask questions but listen when they answer.

Build enough time into the project – If you do have a time constraint, and you feel it’s a tight one, plan for it.

Approach field work as an anthropologist – Ask questions about the things they love and hate in the particular field you’re dealing with. If you’re drawing something for a contest, you may think of this as a no brainer, but ask what they look for, what “strikes their fancy” so to speak.

Do this work in a vacuum – Don’t do this work in an environment where the creativity is vacuumed out. If you’re drawing, like our examples are following, set yourself down in an inspiration environment.

Go too fast – Haste makes waste. Going in line with making a time plan, or some sort of schedule (preferably a time plan like a guideline rather than a strict schedule) so you aren’t rushing and lowering the quality of a specific part of the work.

Skip steps – If a baseball player skipped a step while running to home plate, the consequence to his action will be simple – he’ll trip and miss home plate. You’re going for a home run, run through all the bases without missing a step!

Too locked into current mindsets – Take time to think, without thinking about others in the field. If you’re drawing something, don’t think about other people’s drawings. Don’t think about any drawings. Just think about your own. Create a vision in your mind, visualize your completed drawing, and do it. However, you will eventually need to make some sort of comparison, but only to see what has been done, so you aren’t copying something else.

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This is all part of the Blue Ocean Strategy. I highly, highly recommend you research it, buy a book on it if you can find one, or watch some videos online. If the place or company you work for is having any seminars or speakers on Blue Ocean, GO TO IT. You will reap major benefits. It will not be like any seminar or lecture you have ever been to, and it will be fun – guaranteed!

The book “Blue Ocean Strategy” is published by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne and you can find it at any bookseller.

Another great post I stumbled across is here: http://techiteasy.org/2006/12/05/nintendos-wii-the-blue-ocean-strategy/

Please comment with feedback on your experiences or anything you know about Blue Ocean Strategy as well!

[ Source: The Change Agent Group ( changeagentgroup.com ) ]

God speed, and Best wishes.

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