Is gathering the dots just as important as connecting them?

Sorensen Grundy

We've all heard the phrase "connecting the dots" -- It even has it's own wikipedia entry.

But, what about the stage before connecting...

Gathering.  

If we don't have enough dots, they won't ever connect into anything interesting or different.

In Anna Rascouet-Paz's creative mornings talk, she argues that it takes curiosity to collect the dots.  

As a general rule, I'd say I'm pretty curious.  I've travelled around the world, love to read and was even on a child-leash as a kid because I ran away so much (maybe a precursor to my adult life).  

Regardless, I can still get into a thinking rut.  Here's some of her tips on staying curious.

1. Aim for breadth over depth
Where did the Renaissance man go?  How about the polymaths?  For some reason, we've started honoring the specialist -- the person with focused knowledge.  While that may be good for your dentist, it doesn't really produce creative thinkers.  As Roman Krznaric suggests, maybe we should start seeking after breadth of knowledge vs depth.

"The bag's not for what I take, Colson -- it's for what I find along the way."  

- Macgyver

2. Curiosity is like a muscle.  It needs to be exercised
It's not enough to be curious every once in awhile or on one particular topic.  You need to apply it as a way of life -- why?  what?  how? should be the foundations of your vocabulary.  

One tip that I like is to "take a different path home" from work.  Our minds tend to "chunk" things together to speed up our processing power; therefore, we often miss the things our brains have become accustomed to seeing everyday.  A new route means that you notice new things, like the man that works in the corner store or the flowers that bloom in your neighbor's windowsill.

3. It's okay to change your mind
I've been told that I've "changed so much since college," usually with a hint of criticism.  

As my favorite philosopher says:

"Anyone who isn't embarrassed of who they were last year probably isn't learning enough."  

- Alain de Botton

4. Get out of your bubble
We tend to befriend people similar to us.  In fact, one of the greatest predictors of who you will marry or become friends with is proximity (see this study from the University of Leipzig).  If you work at the same place, live in the same neighborhood or sit next to each other at school, you likely have a lot of base commonalities and routine interactions, even if your interests or senses of humor may be different.

Likewise, social psychology proves that we are strongly attracted to look-a-likes.  According to Byrne's "Law of Attraction," attraction towards a person is positively related to the proportion of similar traits associated with that person.  On the other hand, cognitive dissonance is the discomfort experienced when holding two conflicting beliefs, which makes it difficult for people to befriend others that have very different attitudes and beliefs.

What does this mean?
The people you follow on twitter and interact with on Facebook are probably pretty similar to you.  Find people that challenge you.  That will debate with you.  That can broaden your world view.

5. Travel
It's the easiest way to see the world through fresh eyes.

“Journeys are the midwives of thought. Few places are more conducive to internal conversations than a moving plane, ship or train. There is an almost quaint correlation between what is in front of our eyes and the thoughts we are able to have in our heads: large thoughts at times requiring large views, new thoughts new places. Introspective reflections which are liable to stall are helped along by the flow of the landscape. The mind may be reluctant to think properly when thinking is all it is supposed to do." 

- Alain de Botton, The Art of Travel