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Sometimes the situation is only a problem because it is looked at in a certain way. Looked at in another way, the right course of action may be so obvious that the problem no longer exists.

Edward de Bono

The purpose of science is not to analyze or describe but to make useful models of the world. A model is useful if it allows us to get use out of it.
EDWARD DE BONO

Allow Analysis Description Purpose Science
Some people drift along like a cork on a river, feeling that they cannot do anything except drift, moment to moment. This is an attitude of mind. Everyone can be constructive even in tiny ways.
EDWARD DE BONO

Attitude Construction Exception Moments People
Removing the faults in a stage-coach may produce a perfect stage-coach, but it is unlikely to produce the first motor car.
EDWARD DE BONO

Car Mistake Production Remove
The awful thing is that you can never be aware of what you are not aware of.
EDWARD DE BONO

Aware Awful Yourself
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
Happiness is for those who don’t really need it. So I can live without happiness.
EDWARD DE BONO

Happiness Live Myself Need
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
An expert is someone who has succeeded in making decisions and judgements simpler through knowing what to pay attention to and what to ignore.
EDWARD DE BONO

Attention Expert Ignorance Judgement Pay Success
Only the human brain can deliberately change perceptions, change patterns, invent concepts and tolerate ambiguity.
EDWARD DE BONO

Brain Change Concept Human Pattern Perception Tolerate
Do we have the will to make poverty history?
EDWARD DE BONO

History Poverty Willing Yourself
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
Asking a question is the simplest way of focusing thinking asking the right question may be the most important part of thinking.
EDWARD DE BONO

Focus Important Question Simplicity Way
I know it aches, how your heart it breaks. You can only take so much. Walk on.
EDWARD DE BONO

Heart Hurt Known Myself Pain Walk
Dealing with complexity is an inefficient and unnecessary waste of time, attention and mental energy. There is never any justification for things being complex when they could be simple.
EDWARD DE BONO

Attention Deal Mental Energy Necessary Simplicity Time
What is urgent will always take precedence over what is important.
EDWARD DE BONO

Important Urgent
As competition intensifies, the need for creative thinking increases. It is no longer enough to do the same thing better . . . no longer enough to be efficient and solve problems.
EDWARD DE BONO

Better Competition Creativity Intense Need Problem Solve
Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way.
EDWARD DE BONO

Creativity Different Establishment Order Pattern Way
You cannot dig a hole in a different place by digging the same hole deeper.
EDWARD DE BONO

Different Hole Place Yourself
An idea that is developed and put into action is more important than an idea that exists only as an idea.
EDWARD DE BONO

Development Existence Ideas
The quality of our thinking will determine the quality of our future.
EDWARD DE BONO

Determination Future Ourselves Quality Thinking
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
The vertical thinker says: ‘I know what I am looking for.’ The lateral thinker says: ‘I am looking but I won’t know what I am looking for until I have found it.’
EDWARD DE BONO

Finding Philosophy Thinking
Although feelings are not supposed to intrude on business discussions, they do anyway – we just disguise them as logic.
EDWARD DE BONO

Business Discussion Feeling Logic
It has always surprised me how little attention philosophers have paid to humor, since it is a more significant process of mind than reason. Reason can only sort out perceptions, but the humor process is involved in changing them.
EDWARD DE BONO

Attention Change Humor Mindset Paid Philosophy Reason Surprise
A good design is not a democratic consensus.
EDWARD DE BONO

Democracy Goodness One Liner
Logic will never change emotion or perception.
EDWARD DE BONO

Change Emotion Logic Perception
Intelligence is something we are born with. Thinking is a skill that must be learned.
EDWARD DE BONO

Born Intelligence Learning Skill Thinking

Sometimes the situation is only a problem because it is looked at in a certain way. Looked at in another way, the right course of action may be so obvious that the problem no longer exists.

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Sometimes the situation is only a problem because it is looked at in a certain way. Looked at in another way, the right course of action may be so obvious that the problem no longer exists.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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