Gregg Fraley

I read with interest a recent article in the New  York Times about the resurgence of interest in hallucinogens. As a child of the 60’s and 70’s it was one of the most common creative myths of all back then — that to be truly creative you had to do drugs. In my social circle of the time, mostly budding artists or film makers, nearly everyone experimented. The myth started even before the 60’s though.  Musicians like Louie Armstrong were doing songs about marijuana as early as the 1920’s.  “Muggles” was recorded by Louie back in 1928 (It’s on iTunes and well worth a listen). Fats Waller recorded “The Reefer Song.” The myth of the link between drugs and creativity

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The UK Foreign Office is currently bending over backwards to apologize like mad to the Pope. It’s an interesting turn of events given the long and twisted history of anti-Catholicism in the UK. The short version of the story: the Pope is coming to the UK soon for the first official state visit by the Vatican since 1982. In a lower level planning meeting at the Foreign Office, a half dozen people brainstormed ideas regarding how to handle the visit. Some of the ideas were clearly Jokes, and should never have been made public. Some of  the ideas were serious as well, which indicates that the purpose of the brainstorm was not to embarass the goverment. There was a sincere attempt

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The illustrious Post-it note is turning 30 this month. You’ve got to hand it to 3M, what an amazing and long-lived innovative product. I celebrate their success! Post-it notes have a special place in the hearts of innovation facilitators. Offloading the on-going charting of ideas that are coming out fast and furious in brainstorm sessions frees facilitators do do other stimulating things.  I remember standing at a flip chart and trying to keep up with a dynamic group and it is very challenging.  Post-it notes allow for a freer flow of ideation, not bottle-necked through a slow-writing facilitator.  Post-it note Brainstorming was, and is, a huge improvement over facilitator-writing-on-flip-chart Brainstorming. It’s time to turn a new page however, creative facilitators

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I posted recently on creativity conferences, (Creativity Conferences, Valuable or Boondoggle?) and somewhat controversially. I appreciate the feedback I’ve gotten, and thank everyone for their thoughts both online and offline. My basic critique is that most creativity conferences, including CPSI, are more about personal development than professional results. CPSI is the annual Creative Problem Solving Institute, it’s the longest running creativity conference in the world. This post is part of a blog tour/party leading up to the CPSI conference (June 21-25 in Buffalo, NY). At the bottom of this post visit the other very interesting and cool bloggers who will share insight on how to make CPSI effective.  And read Jon Vehar’s blog as well, for the smart ass point

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I’m doing a lot of writing these days — working fast and furious on a new book. It’s going well at the moment, but it wasn’t until recently.  What got me back into high gear? Tracking progress every day — whether I make any or not. I created a spread sheet, and started counting words written, chapters edited, ideas explored, stuff like that.  I did that about a month ago and I’ve improved my writing results every week.  The first week was a grind, the second week just a little better, then I hit a groove.  Its incredibly satisfying to see an upward trend, even if it started from a very lousy place.  What is it about human nature that

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I’m missing the CREA conference this week, literally and figuratively. What I miss is the “creativity community”  — that wacky group of people interested in the subject.  Some of the most interesting people on the planet are in Italy, right now. Raise a glass and have a dance for me, and more importantly — learn something you can really use. I made a decision not to offer a session this year. I’ve gone back and forth on this and thought it might be of value to share my thinking about the “why” or “why not” of creativity conferences. I’ve written about CREA, and positively, in this blog before (see my old post here). I stand by my words of the

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I got an email just the other day from Emma Taylor.  I have no idea who she is, but she found my blog and sent me a nice note requesting that I mention an article — 25 Talks to Ignite & Unleash Your Creativity. I have no idea who wrote/composed the list, but it’s a darn good list of creativity talks. The article launches from the Accredited Online Colleges website (Kaplan, DeVry, et al).  The list is a bit heavy handedly arts-centric if I can be a bit critical. The idea that creativity springs solely from the arts is a myth, and a pervasive one. Yes, it does spring from the arts, AND, lots of other things.  The list includes

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It’s here. The iPad is already another Apple phenomena. I’m not surprised at the hype, the hoopla, the press — the attention — that’s being paid to it. Apple has already established its reputation for inventing cool new gadgets, and why should the iPad be any exception. We’ve had some wonderful arguments at our dinner table about iPad. My step-son Arthur is 14 and he’s not impressed. He predicts that it will ultimately be only a curiosity. He doesn’t see how it will replace laptops, and thinks it’s too big to be handy for music and even video. I argue that it will be used differently and that we don’t even know yet the needs it will fill. He doesn’t

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I’ve been aware of Summer Stars Camp for the Performing Arts for several years. It’s an amazing two week immersive experience for economically disadvantaged children. I’ve seen video clips (there was a featured piece on MTV some time ago) and it’s incredible what children can accomplish if they are inspired. Two colleagues from the Creative Problem Solving Institute are involved, Donna Luther is the founder of the camp, and Siri Lynn is an active board member. When it comes to inspiring kids, these two are the original “pros from Dover.” I’m writing this post for two reasons.  One is to encourage those of you who have the means to support the camp financially.  Please donate, they need funds to make it happen.  In

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Riding the train you get a peek into the lives of other people. It’s one of my favorite places to observe, draw, and reflect. Yes, most have their game faces on already, but sometimes you get an intuition of what’s under the mask. I saw this woman a couple weeks ago riding the train into London. She was a domestic of some kind and she had a lovely open face (when you draw people everybody’s face looks more interesting, beautiful really).  Massive bag in her lap, practical brown shoes, tidy looking overall. A name came to me, Agnes. Agnes was a bit tired looking, in spite of a hurried, dab-on make-up job. Agnes relaxed for the ride and zoned out,

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