Creativity enhancers we’re thankful for

Each year, around Thanksgiving, we here at Copel Communications like to devote an article to things we’re thankful for. We’ve written about the creative use of “stuffing,” about the camera obscura and other unsung heroes of creative inspiration, and creative “turkeys,” to name a few. 
 
This year, we’d like to talk about things that help keep the creative juices flowing. You know what we’re talking about if you, like us, toil in the ideation trenches: You’re constantly under pressure to invent wholly new things, and thus any little tricks or tips or devices you can find that lubricate the process are more than welcome. 
 
Well, here’s our little cornucopia. How many of these are you using now? How many are you under-utilizing? How many are, ideally, new to you? 

• Good ol’ fashioned caffeine. This very sentence was composed under the influence of caffeine. It’s a pretty good sentence, isn’t it? But it wouldn’t have been as good (would we have neglected the italics?), nor would it have flowed as effortlessly, if its author hadn’t been sufficiently caffeinated at the time. 
  
  We’re not saying you should binge. Or that you should ever think that caffeine will actually make you creative. It simply “steals” a little boost of energy from a reserve which your body would otherwise have sipped slowly, so it feels like you’re more energetic and creative. 
  
  In case you care, we ditched coffee decades ago. We’re Twinings tea nerds here at Copel Communications, and work hard to limit our indulgence and thus avoid building resistance to the caffeine. So a little goes a long way. 
  
  Caffeine has also been shown to improve mood. And what could possibly be more important—or more to be thankful for—than that, especially when you’re tasked with an especially thorny creative challenge? 

 

• Noise-cancelling headphones. Sometimes it’s hard to imagine life before these things—kind of like life before mobile phones, the internet, or the microwave oven. Sure, they’re great on Zoom calls, but we’ve found that even the tiniest distraction can knock us out of the zone when we’re trying to solve a creative challenge. 
  
  We like to combine the noise-cancelling feature with—counter-intuitiveness alert--noise. Yes, white noise. In fact, we’re listening to a recording of ocean sounds, right now, as we write this... atop the noise-cancelling feature of the ‘phones themselves. 

 

• Even more noise. Our recording of the ocean noises sits right on our computer. But boy are there tons of alternatives awaiting you on YouTube. Search on topics such as "relaxing sounds," and find everything from howling snowstorms to train rides to tropical rainforests to the sleeping quarters on a sci-fi starship. These things are great—and often the files will run for eight or ten hours, so you’re never plagued with “range anxiety” while you work.  

 

• Computer-based dictation. This is a feature that has been around for a while, but which we’ve only recently rediscovered. That’s because of two things: First, the hardware and the software have improved. Generally, but not always, the systems are now reasonably responsive and accurate. And they are ubiquitous: you can find them in everything from email to Microsoft Word. One of the big advantages of this technology is that it’s simply less fatiguing: you can dictate a ton of copy, knowing that it’s all spelled perfectly, without your fingers ever getting tired.
  
  The second reason we’re thankful for this, and use it more than we used to: the noise-canceling headphones we'd mentioned above. Nowadays, these typically include beam-forming microphones, which are infinitely more accurate and sensitive; therefore, the output is that much better. 
  
  Incidentally, from the practice-what-we-preach department, we dictated this entire section about dictation using our noise-canceling headphones. The system got most of it right; however, it mistook “copy” for “coffee”; perhaps it was inspired by our paragraphs above! 

 

• Good old-fashioned shower notes. If our clients only knew how many of the best ideas we’ve submitted were created for them, well, underwater! We’re thankful for our little plastic diver’s slate. It’s paid for itself a billion times over. 

 
Have any creative-lubrication tricks or gadgets you’re thankful for? Let us know about them!
 
Meantime, here’s wishing you a happy and healthy Thanksgiving.

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