The Science of Success Podcast

View Original

You Can Become More Creative With This Unique Strategy Used By American Spies with Beth Comstock

Lace Gilger
See this content in the original post

In this episode we discuss how our guest helped the secret agents become more creative. We look at specific strategies to navigate personal change while empowering and using your imagination. How do you become more imaginative? What are the keys to sparking imagination and creativity? How do you use creativity to get through challenging setbacks? We discuss all of this and much more with our guest Beth Comstock. 

Beth Comstock is a business executive and author with a deep history of leading large companies to success through innovation and new opportunities. Beth is currently a director at Nike, the trustee of The National Geographic Society and former board president of the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian National Design Museum. She is the author of the best-selling book Imagine it Forward - Courage, Creativity, and the Power of Change. She has worked in top leadership roles at GE, NBC, CBS, and her work has been featured across the globe.

  • What is the imagination gap?

  • How does our quest for certainty end up killing possibility?

  • We often fail to use our imagination to move ourselves, and the world, forward

  • What did a chance meeting with the CIA have to do with navigating personal change and using your imagination?

  • We want a risk free world, a risk free life - but it doesn’t exist

  • Risk is the will to act on imagination 

  • The 5 key elements of sparking imagination

  • Give yourself permission to try new things in new ways

    1. Challenge your perspective

    2. Beat your ideas up

    3. Power of Story

    4. Create a new operating system - create accountability 

  • In today’s world - we have to “Get good at change"

  • How to handle change and the disruptive pace of change in todays world 

  • Do you have your own process or practice of adaptation?

  • What does it mean to have a practice or process of adaptation?

  • Have a growth mindset

    1. Seek out beliefs that challenge yourself

    2. Build connections and see patterns

  • “Going on threes” - after you see something a third time, use that as a trigger to follow up and learn more about it

  • Take back 10% of your time for these contemplative routines 

  • Pick up a magazine you would NEVER read and read it on a plane - expose yourself to radically new ideas 

  • The future is here, its just not even distributed yet

  • You have to put yourself out there to discover new ideas - “mushroom hunting” 

  • "Get outside the Jar” - getting outside creates a whole new perspective 

  • In a world where we often choose our filters based on what we already believe - its even more important to expose yourself to new and different idea

  • What is social courage and how can you create it for yourself?

  • The power of small challenges and change to help build your skills

  • What do we do when gatekeepers limit us from what we want?

  • Most of the time people give up on an idea when they hear No one time

  • The power and magic of “No is not yet” - no is an invitation to come back in a new way 

  • Building up resilience and persistence when we really care about our ideas 

  • How do you build bridges instead of walls? 

  • Your critics can become your best advocates if you treat them the right way

  • “I’m gonna work to do better, but I need your help”

  • What problem are we trying to solve? Are you aligned with the people you work with on solving the same problem?

  • Often times we try to protect ourselves, our ideas - even our own egos - by trying to hide from negative feedback - but it’s often essential to fueling creativity and getting to the best ideas and solutions

  • It’s so easy to delude ourselves, to think things are they way we want them to be, or they should be, instead of the way they are - acknowledging reality is a vital step towards creating results 

  • Constraints are very powerful for fostering creativity 

  • Homework: Ask yourself what’s one thing you want to move forward on? Ask yourself what’s holding you back and write a permission slip to yourself “I give myself permission to do this."

Thank you so much for listening!

Please SUBSCRIBE and LEAVE US A REVIEW on iTunes! (Click here for instructions on how to do that).

We’re proud to announce that this week’s episode of The Science of Success is brought to you by our partners at Athletic Greens!

Athletic Greens is offering our listeners 20 FREE TRAVEL PACKS, a $79 value, with your first purchase when you go to www.athleticgreens.com/success.

Start this year off with a new incredibly impactful and easy to maintain healthy habit with Athletic Greens. The fact is, the perfect diet doesn't exist, and ultimately falls short due to a busy lifestyle, travel schedule or restrictive diets. That's why Athletic Greens packs in 75 whole food sourced ingredients and covers you in 5 key areas of health, making it one of the most comprehensive supplements on the market.

Show Notes, Links, & Research

Episode Transcript

See this content in the original post