This site is full of tips & ideas to help you improve your creative thinking. It's developed by Jim Connolly. Copyright © 2026
I spotted this in Gainsborough, Lincolnshire yesterday morning.
It caused me to stop and ponder it for a while. Shortly after, I noticed other people doing the same.
And on a personal note, given my own big bald head, I’m wondering now if yellow shades would suit me 🟡-🟡
If we want better answers, we need to ask better questions.
So, you’re not at your best. You don’t feel great. There’s something getting you down.
Focusing deeper and deeper on how you are, isn’t likely to help you feel better.
By changing the first word, in that 3 word sentence, we open up a different blend of potential answers.
We get to consider which of our personas we’ve currently adopted for ourselves. And if that version of ourselves is making us down, we can seek out a better persona.
Maybe a persona that likes us and values us. Perhaps one that is calmer. Or it could be a more positive, creative, reasonable, measured or inspired persona.
Is it worth a try?
Yes.
For relatively little effort, you could find yourself in a much better place.
The world is full of complicated people.
And if we pay close attention, we sometimes find that those people are THE SAME PERSON.
It just depends when we speak with them.
This brief post is for those who have a ‘different’ kind of brain than the general population.
When you’re different and looking for specific help, and you can’t find anything that addresses your particular problem, I see you.
When you’re frustrated and find it hard to talk about it with friends, because they can’t relate with what you’re thinking, I see you.
When you’re feeling a little too different, I see you.
When you have unanswered questions, and can’t find anything written or recorded about it, I see you.
Thats because…
It started in 2024. A chance meeting led to me being tested and diagnosed with dyslexia.
Then in 2025, I connected with a neuropsychologist. Here’s what happened. In short, I discovered that damage that had been caused to my brain as a teenager, forced my brain to rewire. Where most people’s brains follow natural, neural highways, mine has access to connections, pathways and shortcuts that don’t usually exist.
Ever since, I haven’t found a single research paper, a book, an article or anything that talks to my specific situation. I asked my neuropsychologist about it and was assured, I won’t find anything specific enough to answer my questions.
You and me will never fit perfectly in a box. At best, there are broad classifications for some of what makes us different.
Yes, every mind is different. People like us are more different, though.
We have gifts and challenges the vast majority of people do not have.
The flip side of my creativity and problem solving gifts, is that I have daily challenges. I can’t follow a sequence of instructions beyond the 2nd instruction. I have a tiny working memory, and need to write down or record ideas as soon as I get them, or risk losing them. I’m terrible with numbers. There’s other stuff, too.
My nature is to help others. I feel for those daily challenges you have. And that’s why one of my life missions now, is to do what I can with my gifts and my reach, to support people like us. And to make people more aware of the contributions we can make.
I hope you find this useful.
I published a post today over at Creative Thinking Hub. It includes what I’ve discovered to be the root cause of the decline of true, creative thinking. This post has become exceptionally popular in a very short time.
I gave the root of the problem a name: Anti-Creative. Here’s the definition.
Anti-Creative: The homogenization of original thought, caused by the pervasive distribution of simplified, prescriptive, and iterative ‘creativity advice’, resulting in a decrease of novel output across a population.
If you want to become more creative in this era of creative decline, I recommend you check out This Anti-Creative era. You’ll discover not only how to survive, but how to absolutely thrive.
Following on from a recent post I published about creatively-designed marketing nonsense, I wanted to share another example.
Black Friday sales.
Surveys show that on average, people save little, if anything at all, from buying a Black Friday ‘deal’. Sky News sited a survey by Which? that showed 8 out of 10 items in these sales are not at their lowest price. Which? found Amazon’s Black Friday deals were cheaper or the same price in 88% of cases before Black Friday.
It’s a fusion of creative marketing and either bending or breaking the rules. Creative marketing in this instance is simply another way of saying, intentionally misleading creativity.
What a waste of someone’s creativity.
Imagine them getting in from work and being asked, ‘What did you do at work today? Oh, I fooled people into overpaying for products, which the fools think they’re getting a deal on’.
There are so many better paying marketing gigs, than to intentionally mislead people to make bad decisions.
Someone asked me earlier about the role of creativity in marketing. In short, it’s creativity that crafts the message and image. And it has the power to convince intelligent people to do, or believe, some bizarre things.
How? By making them seem like logical and attractive decisions.
Here are 3 common examples, which may come in handy if you want to explain this to someone.
In recent years, it’s become fashionable to drink out of jars. Even though the rim of the jars is less comfortable and less secure to drink from, than a purpose-built, regular glass. Thanks to marketing on sites like Instagram and TikTok, it’s fashionable now. And fashion often outweighs common sense.
Long before marketing convinced millions of us to drink from jars, major oil companies managed to convince the public that THEIR chemically-identical fuel, is somehow superior. Despite it often coming from the same refineries.
Marketing has positioned ultra-processed, sugary breakfast cereal as a healthy way to start the day.
It’s all creatively-designed marketing nonsense. And it generates billions and billions in sales every year.
Lots of fellow creatives ask me how to get their work in front of more people, on social media. I think what they really mean, is how can they get their work noticed, remembered and bought, using social media.
Buckle down, because this is not what you’re expecting!
If you only want your posts to be in front of more people, you need to learn your way around the various algorithms. Or hire someone to do it for you. There are people who work as social media optimisers/managers, who show their clients how to make social media algorithms work for them. This means their clients are no longer free to express themselves in a fully natural way on social media.
It’s all measured, optimised, timed and the ‘content’ needs to be weighted and balanced to conform to the algorithm’s needs.
It’s a very different approach that can be especially powerful for creative professionals like us.
One of the very best ways to make an algorithm work for you, is to IGNORE the bastard.
Hear me out.
Yes, I am saying share what you want to share, say what you want to say, post when you want to post.
No, you will not show up as often in a social media feed, as you would if you danced to the algorithm’s tune.
But when you do appear, you’ll command more interest and form deeper connections with prospects, who become attracted to your refreshing, relatable, human, social media presence.
As a result, creatives who follow the algorithm’s rules, find they lose people’s attention. Why? Because part of that creative individual’s personality is being stripped from their content.
How come?
Here’s the thing: there’s a price to pay for using carefully balanced combinations of words, hashtags, images, videos, threaded posts, etc. It’s the price we all pay, if we choose to be too similar to our competitors.
When we’re beige, we become part of the background. While LOTS of people will see us, few, if any, will notice us.
Eh?
Imagine you’re in a massive sporting arena. There are 30,000 people opposite you, dressed from head to foot in red. Then, someone dressed head to foot in yellow walks in and stands amongst them. That’s the person who stands out. The 30,000 people become a background for that person in yellow.
In that analogy, the person in yellow is the creative soul, who understands the difference between vanity metrics and human-to-human connection. There may be just one of them, but once they catch your eye, they’re the person your focus is on.
Is there a way to optimise for social media that does a bit of both?
No. At least, not so you get to be your true, creative self.
Using AI or a social media manager to automate and optimize your social media, is neither one thing or the other. It’s a trade-off. A trade-off that could be robbing you and your work of the visibility and connection you need right now.
Photo by Taton Moïse on Unsplash
Mention Marie Curie to most people today and they’ll know her name. Many will also know of her pioneering work on radioactivity. This, despite her passing away in 1934.
Mention the names of those who wrote and spoke appallingly about her, no one remembers them.
Einstein saw what was happening to Marie Curie and was impelled to write to her.
I am impelled to tell you how much I have come to admire your intellect, your drive, and your honesty[…] If the rabble continues to occupy itself with you, then simply don’t read that hogwash, but rather leave it to the reptile for whom it has been fabricated.
Einstein to Marie Curie.
Einstein made a similar point in a letter of March 1940. He told the professor of philosophy at the City College of New York. ‘Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds‘.
Outstanding people, creating outstanding art, will obviously stand out.
Their thinking, vision and output is rare.
So rare, that the mediocre minded rabble can’t understand it. However, that same mediocre mind feels forced to loudly express its uninformed opinion. Empty vessels, and all that.
Never allow the rabble to derail your creativity.
Yes, by all means get informed feedback from trusted, proven experts. But if you believe in what you’re doing, and it’s for the greater good, do it.
Because my brain is weird, the first time I think of an answer, is often when I hear myself answering someone. It comes out of my mouth and that’s the first I know about it.
It happened moments ago. And it gave me a creative spark to share with you. Here’s what happened.
A friend told me that he’s struggling with his creativity. Both in quality and quantity. He then asked me how to improve his creative output.
I then heard myself say, ‘To improve your creative output, improve your creative inputs’.
Fresh feedback from interesting, people, surroundings, conversations, observations and such, are food for the brain. AKA bread for the head. If we make it a habit to regularly connect with different inputs, our minds get to create new points of focus. We’re then better equipped to make the connections that fuel the creative sparks we need.
The next time you’re waiting a little too long for the muse to show up, give it a try.
