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Creativity and lateral thinking have exactly the same basis as humour.

Edward de Bono

We may have a perfectly adequate way of doing something, but that does not mean there cannot be a better way. So we set out to find an alternative way. This is the basis of any improvement that is not fault correction or problem solving.
EDWARD DE BONO

Better Improvement Perfection Problem Solve Way
Everyone has the right to doubt everything as often as he pleases and the duty to do it at least once. No way of looking at things is too sacred to be reconsidered. No way of doing things is beyond improvement.
EDWARD DE BONO

Beyond Doubt Improvement Right Sacred Way
I think there is a danger with young people of being dependent in the sense that they don’t acquire any identity or self-image of themselves as thinkers.
EDWARD DE BONO

Dangerous Identity Image People Thinking Young
My thinking was taught to tribes in South Africa like the Zulus and Xhosas. At the time there were about 210 fights breaking out among them every month, but after they listened to my lessons, this fell to just four.
EDWARD DE BONO

Fight Lesson Listening Teaching Thinking Time
Most executives, many scientists, and almost all business school graduates believe that if you analyze data, this will give you new ideas. Unfortunately, this belief is totally wrong. The mind can only see what it is prepared to see.
EDWARD DE BONO

Analysis Believe Business Data Executive Ideas Mindset Perspective Science Wrong
Possibilities play a much bigger role in thinking than most people believe. Without possibilities you cannot make progress.
EDWARD DE BONO

Play Possible Progress Thinking
The winner is the chef who takes the same ingredients as everyone else and produces the best results.
EDWARD DE BONO

Best Chef Ingredient Result Win
Unhappiness is best defined as the difference between our talents and our expectations.
EDWARD DE BONO

Best Definition Expectation Happiness Ourselves Talent
There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all. Without creativity, there would be no progress, and we would be forever repeating the same patterns.
EDWARD DE BONO

Creativity Doubt Forever Human Important Progress Repeat Resource
Complexity creates confusion, simplicity focus.
EDWARD DE BONO

Complex Creation Creativity Focus Simplicity
Simplicity before understanding is simplistic; simplicity after understanding is simple.
EDWARD DE BONO

Simplicity Understand
Mock the devil, and he will flee from thee.
EDWARD DE BONO

Devil Run
It’s always amazed me how little attention philosophers, psychologists, or anyone else actually has paid to humor.
EDWARD DE BONO

Amazing Attention Humor Pay
Humor is by far the most significant activity of the human brain.
EDWARD DE BONO

Activity Brain Human Humor
On trade, our hypocrisy is at its most appalling. Trade reform isn’t about charity, it’s about justice, and this campaign, Trade Justice is an unstoppable idea.
EDWARD DE BONO

Charity Hypocrisy Idea Justice Stop Trade
I do a great deal of work with young children, and if you give a child a problem, he may come up with a highly original solution, because he doesn’t have the established route to it.
EDWARD DE BONO

Children Deal Establishment Greatness Route Work Young
Western traditions of education have emphasized knowledge analysis, description and debate. They all have a part to play, but today there is a whole vast aspect of doing that has just been left out. Operacy is what keeps society going.
EDWARD DE BONO

Analysis Debate Description Education Society Tradition
You can analyse the past, but you have to design the future.
EDWARD DE BONO

Analysis Design Future Past Yourself
The simple process of focusing on things that are normally taken for granted is a powerful source of creativity.
EDWARD DE BONO

Creativity Focus Powerful Process Simplicity Source
Language is the biggest barrier to human progress because language is an encyclopedia of ignorance. Old perceptions are frozen into language and force us to look at the world in an old fashioned way.
EDWARD DE BONO

Fashion Human Language Progress Way
In the future, instead of striving to be right at a high cost, it will be more appropriate to be flexible and plural at a lower cost. If you cannot accurately predict the future then you must flexibly be prepared to deal with various possible futures.
EDWARD DE BONO

Future Possible Preparation Strive
It’s not enough to rage against the lie.. you’ve got to replace it with the truth.
EDWARD DE BONO

Enough Lying Replacement Truth
The awful thing is that you can never be aware of what you are not aware of.
EDWARD DE BONO

Aware Awful Yourself
What is urgent will always take precedence over what is important.
EDWARD DE BONO

Important Urgent
I’m a very loyal and unreliable friend.
EDWARD DE BONO

Friendship Loyalty Myself
To deal with future we have to deal with possibilities. Analysis will only tell us what is.
EDWARD DE BONO

Analysis Deal Future Possible
One very important aspect of motivation is the willingness to stop and to look at things that no one else has bothered to look at. This simple process of focusing on things that are normally taken for granted is a powerful source of creativity.
EDWARD DE BONO

Aspect Creativity Important Motivational Powerful Source Willing

Creativity and lateral thinking have exactly the same basis as humour.

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Creativity and lateral thinking have exactly the same basis as humour.

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