Idea Generating Questions

Asking questions to stimulate curiosity and creativity has proven helpful for all kinds of endeavours, whether problem solving, product development, inventing, or communication. A written list of mind-stimulating questions is useful because it reminds us of approaches and possibilities that we otherwise would not have in mind. Yes, it is sometimes possible to be creative in a thorough and even orderly way.

The Journalistic Six

These are the six key questions that journalism students are taught to answer somewhere in their news articles to make sure that they have covered the whole story. For creative thinkers, these questions stimulate thinking about the idea in question and allow approaches to it from various angles.

1. Who? (Actor or Agent) Who is involved? What are the people aspects of the problem? Who did it, will do it? Who uses it, wants it? Who will benefit, will be injured, will be included, will be excluded?
2. What? (Act) What should happen? What is it? What was done, ought to be done, was not done? What will be done if X happens? What went or could go wrong? What resulted in success?
3. When? (Time or Timing) When will, did, should this occur or be performed? Can it be hurried or delayed? Is a sooner or later time be preferable? When should the time be if X happens?
4. Where? (Scene or Source) Where did, will, should this occur or be performed? Where else is a possibility? Where else did the same thing happen, should the same thing happen? Are other places affected, endangered, protected, aided by this location? Effect of this location on actors, actions?
5. Why? (Purpose) Why was or is this done, avoided, permitted? Why should it be done, avoided, permitted? Why did or should actor do it? Different for another actor, act, time, place? Why that particular action, rule, idea, solution, problem, disaster, and not another? Why that actor, time, location, and not another?
6. How? (Agency or Method) How was it, could it be, should it be done, prevented, destroyed, made, improved, altered? How can it be described, understood? How did beginning lead to conclusion?

What-Iffing. A major block to creativity for many of us is the mind's fierce grasp on reality. This very factor that keeps us sane also keeps us from thinking beyond what we know to be true. What-iffing is a tool for releasing the mind, for delivering us from being blocked by reality.
In its simplest form, what-iffing involves describing an imagined action or solution and then examining the probable associated facts, consequences, or events. Instead of quickly saying, "That sounds dumb," or "That would never work," and leaving our criticism vague, we trace as exactly as our reasonable minds can generate the specific implications or consequences of the newly imagined fact.

On another level, what-iffing allows us to create a completely new reality, to establish a new chain of being or relationships, to change the unchangeable in hope of generating a new perspective on a problem or a new idea.

For example: What if we could see odours? You'd know the source of the bad smell in the kitchen--a plant, garbage disposal, wastebasket, old food in the refrigerator. You could see the perfume as it wafted off the girl wearing it--a visible "come on." Since we can see farther than we can smell, you could see who had an orange or banana or Limburger cheese sandwich in his lunch bag from across the room. Visible odours could be socially embarrassing in ways not necessary to detail.

Whether or not the "seeing odours" thought suggests the invention of an odour detecting device, a super sniffer like the ones used by the U.S. military to sniff out enemy soldiers, a main benefit of practicing what-iffing is to train the mind to explore unreality or imagined reality, to think about, for a few minutes, the necessary, logical consequences or facts needed to support such a change in real things. Too often when someone gets a new idea, little attempt is made to think about its logical consequences for a few minutes.
Too often we simply stop thinking altogether when something contrary to fact comes across our minds or else we think about it in the most illogical and impractical way. When we ask, "What if the sky were green?" the response we tend to get, either from others or from ourselves, is, "Well, the sky isn't green, so why think about it?" But if nothing else, thinking about it is good practice at logical thinking.

In more practical terms, though, thinking about what does not exist is about the only way we have of eventually making it exist. In other words, the first step to implementing a new reality is to imagine it.

Notice when you mention a "what if" to your friends, their reaction will probably be to laugh and change the subject, or to laugh and suggest one funny consequence. There is little attempt to trace probable consequences thoroughly, to outline a full set of associated realities. By not doing so, we are in danger of cutting off many new ideas.