Thinking Outside the Box

Whenever somebody says, "We need to think outside the box," they are trying to stimulate ideas from others, ideas that generate money, in most cases.  The usual interpretation is one of some novel or creative way of viewing the situation, although the truth is that nobody really likes new or creative things.  We like to have our habits, and our boxes, because we feel safe inside them without having to adapt to or reconsider what is happening around us.  Truly creative people, in spite of what we are told, are not lauded and applauded, rather they are shunned and considered crazy or tiresome.  This is true in the fields of science, art, and business, and in society and social mores as well.  While it may be exhilarating, thinking outside the box is a risk.

The True Philosopher and Source returned to form with a short article for us.  In it and in his in-meeting introduction, he questioned the reasons behind the existence of the box in the first place, and noted the feeling of comfort we have in our constructed and predictable spaces.  Not only do we have our individual boxes, but also larger boxes the smaller ones fit inside of.  Each one has a framework for guiding our habitual behavior in ways that have already been deemed proper.  Going outside the box should be motivational and exciting, since something new is out there, but for most people it is frightening.  Often we refuse to contemplate new perspectives because they require changes in our habits.  He mentioned the old saying, albeit in a reversed form: Invention is the child of Necessity.  When we reach a dead end in our projects, we are forced to consider new avenues, perhaps unconventional ones.  He also admitted the possible consequences to unconventional ideas, such as not receiving a deserved promotion or being thought crazy by others.

A New Face agreed that comfort is an important basis for building the box in the first place, but was more generous in her interpretation of the possibilities each of us has to get in touch with the necessary creativity and unconventionality to leave it.  In her opinion, it should be possible for anybody to think outside the box, but we have been carefully trained not to throughout our formal educations, an odd thing when we consider that we will have to be less conventional in real life.  She was especially sure that children were naturally creative and able to access the unenclosed space outside the social framework they are told to construct.  It requires a certain level of confidence, but as adults we should be sure of ourselves and be able to do unexpected things once in a while.  She also reminded us that the best way to learn is to try and fail - or succeed.  Without making and effort to improve, which requires us to leave behind our comfort zones every so often, we will never evolve as people.  I do not quite agree that children are more creative or consciously unconventional, but they are less inhibited than adults, due to the lifelong training we receive.  The Leader later mentioned that thinking is based on knowledge and experience, which children simply do not have, so their ideas are not necessarily creative so much as the pure fantasy of a mind building itself.  While it is true that those ideas can be workable, and unsaid by older people because of our learned fear of ridicule, for the most part children are not discovering new things in the world, only discovering the world to themselves the same way everyone else has.  Children are also fanatically conventional and almost bloodthirsty groupthinkers, as anyone who has attended school can attest.

The Leader had focused on the business environment the phrase is most at home in.  He also distinguished the unconventionality of thinking outside the box from pure creativity, which has been labeled "lateral thinking" at least in some areas.  The important thing to remember, he said, is that we start to think outside the box when we need a solution to a problem, that is when our habitual solutions have failed.  Thinking outside the box often means something is seriously wrong.  Still, the answers we find have to be relevant, which relates a bit to the uninhibited questions and responses children give us.  Creativity does not have to be relevant to the situation, but problem solving does.  We also need to be aware of possible and unintended consequences of the solutions we implement, which often puts a damper on our free thinking.  Still, according to the Leader, thinking is the only free thing we can do, the only thing left uncontrolled and unsupervised.  Unfortunately, when we put voice to our thoughts, our freedom can be seriously compromised.  We are also in danger of manipulation by business and authority, which try their best to promote certain lines of thinking which benefit them but not necessarily we the people.  Even the language we use to express ourselves is a risk, as words have connotations and meanings we may not be aware of, true many more times when foreign languages are involved.  Clear thoughts are not necessarily expressed clearly.  At the end of the day, he finished, people need to think more seriously about problems, which probably means fewer short-term solutions.

The Deep Thinker also held the opinion that children are less inhibited than adults, although they are conditioned from birth to think and behave in certain ways.  The box, he felt, was what one takes for granted and what can be challenged by stepping outside established boundaries.  Everything can be challenged, but first it must be understood.  We have boxes, established norms and scientific theories, as a way of saving time; the Leader also pointed out that we do not need to rediscover every natural law and substance to perform an experiment.  We start with certain assumptions about reality that exist for our convenience, and for the most part, they work for us and not against us.  The Deep Thinker revealed his more mystical side, however, as he went on to say that the ultimate escape from the box is finding the way to stop thinking altogether.  Being aware without thought is the basis of all true creativity.  As an example, he gave the seemingly magic problem solving of the subconscious.  When we cannot find a solution after much effort, the best thing to do is step away from the problem, put it out of the conscious mind.  The unconscious often continues gnawing away at it, and later on we have a flash of inspiration in a dream, in the shower, or while doing some other completely mundane and unrelated activity.  We are not following a conscious process, so this method of problem solving cannot be in the box.

The Educator was struck with very literal images of the box, and being inside and outside it.  Thoughts of a free life can preserve the sanity of a prisoner.  The danger of remaining inside the comfort zone, due to circumstances generally beyond our control, can force people to flee.  This is the case of refugees, whose risk analysis has led them to pick up stakes and try to find better lives far away from what they know.  On the other hand, our comfortable space can end up being a prison without our even realizing it.  As much as we dislike change, human beings need it sometimes.  We need the stimulation to remain mentally supple and prepared to survive.  Regarding children, she told us how impressed she was with her students, who could take a cardboard box and make it a house or a horse, depending on the situation.  The box literally is thought of outside itself in their games, a hallmark of childhood play, although perhaps exaggerated in our memories.

Finally, an Occasional Participant mused over the number of tools we try to use to solve our problems, conventionally or not.  From her perspective, simpler is better, and too many tools do not help, but muddle the process.  She also found it laughable to speak of rule-breakers as admirable rebels, when they have their own set of rules to follow.  Rules for rule-breaking!  A box of a different color, material, or shape is still a box.