
Ask HN: Does being practical act as a hinderance to one’s imagination? - itsmefaz
I&#x27;m asking this from the context of ideas &amp; solutions, I&#x27;m facing this sort of struggle that I&#x27;m unable to find solution that is completely outrageous. I feel that my level-headedness could be one of the factors for my failure to come up with some out-of-the-box thinking.<p>HN, am I valid in this assumption or completely stupid?
======
nybblesio
What you're looking for is something called "Lateral Thinking" [1]. Using
one's prefrontal cortex "silences" their inner genius and prevents "Ah ha!"
moments. This is why people get breakthrough ideas in the shower, going to the
bathroom, or driving. The "step-by-step" executive planning part of the brain
is not engaged in these moments.

John Cleese has given talks throughout the years about how to be creative, and
they're very good. [2]

The Programmer's Stone is also a good source of information about this topic.
Instead of "lateral thinking", the authors refer to "mapping" and "packing".
Packing is when you're in "step-by-step" mode. When programmers refer to
"being in the flow", they're probably referring to the state of mapping or
lateral thinking. [3]

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lateral_thinking](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lateral_thinking)

[2]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y70nbDJI5Uk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y70nbDJI5Uk)

[3] [http://programmersstone.com/](http://programmersstone.com/)

~~~
saltcured
I agree this is probably what was meant by "imaginative" in the original
question. But, it doesn't directly address the core question of causality:
does practicality limit imagination and lateral thinking? I think the answer
is, "no". Practicality is largely in the domain of decisions and behavior. In
contrast, imagination is in the domain of thought and speculation.

To not allow your imagination to run ahead of or independently of your
behavior, to not allow yourself any mental play, is to be unimaginative.
That's tautological. If you truly find yourself unable to imagine any
outrageous ideas, you have to look elsewhere than pragmatism if seeking a
cure. You need to rediscover how to play. In your head. Pragmatism is a filter
to decide when to put some of your play ideas into practice, not a filter for
thought itself.

There are different challenges someone else might face, requiring different
analysis. What if you are able to come up with outrageous and lateral ideas,
but are afraid to voice them? Or you are unable to ground the ideas in any
kind of reality, i.e. pure fantasy rather than plausible-if-ridiculous? Or do
you find challenges in the social environment of getting any air time for your
ideas among your peers...?

------
crazygringo
_Great_ question.

In my experience, I actually think it can -- but you can overcome it, too.

I grew up programming and always excelling at concrete, black-and-white,
logic-based types of things (math, physics, etc.).

Later I wanted to pursue more artistic things, and discovered I simply _didn
't know how to think imaginatively, instead of analytically_.

After a while, I learned how to "let go" of my analytical brain so that my
artistic/subconscious brain could be free to "make connections" between things
that had no logical connection on the surface.

And now I have no problem with it -- so it's never "too late" \-- but they're
definitely two "modes" of my brain I have to consciously switch between. And
they're largely "separate" modes that both have to be developed/strengthened
through practice.

If you want to work on imagination, I highly recommend things like writing
classes, improv classes, acting classes, painting classes, all that stuff. I
think classes with other people in this context are really important, because
the instructor and other students' work will give you a lot of examples of
creativity to inspire you and build you up. If you stick solo (as I did at
first) you may find yourself just applying the same "analytical" solutions
you're familiar with, and not being forced to expand your
imagination/creativity.

------
wenc
I'm not able to speak authoritatively on this subject (after who the heck am
I? I'm creative in spurts but have no deep insight on the process), but as an
observer of human nature, engineers do seem especially weak at divergent
thinking -- they can't help obsessing over how something might fail _almost as
soon as as they hear an idea_.

This is a blocker. One of the ways to unblock this, I'm told, is the "improv"
mantra of _" yes, and"_ \-- meaning, if someone states an idea, instead of
saying "yes, but", you say "yes, and" and build upon it. For instance, someone
says "I'm a unicorn fireman", you say, "yes, and your horn is a nozzle for a
high-pressure hose". And you keep building.

For years I could never quite figure out how this applied to engineering
problems so I thought "yes, and" was mostly stupid and unworkable (except in
the arts) -- because what if the other person's wrong? How do I "yes, and"
someone who says "the earth is flat"?

But one of Paul Graham's tweets helped me reframe this in a way that is
palatable to even engineer-types. He says (paraphrased):

"Problem solving is _2 phase_ approach: (1) idea generation / mistake making,
and then (2) aggressively fixing those mistakes / editing. We often shortcut
the process by editing too soon."

In other words: engineers are only good at "yes, but" (convergent thinking
phase) and prematurely shut down the "yes, and" (divergent thinking phase). So
how about we treat thinking as a two-phase problem and give divergent thinking
some room? We can still apply pragmatism/practicality ... but later, after
we've "yes, and"ed.

Alls we're saying is, give "yes, and" a chance.

~~~
JoshuaDavid
> In other words: engineers are only good at "yes, but" (convergent thinking
> phase) and prematurely shut down the "yes, and" (divergent thinking phase).

I do this sometimes. In many cases, I feel like "yes, and" would be an
endorsement of the original idea. If I say "yes, and" and then there are
delays or problems in implementation because of things that would have been
obvious to "no, but", the question becomes "why wasn't this brought up earlier
on before people sunk so much time in." In the reverse case, saying "no, but"
in a case where the problem is easily surmountable just makes the questioner
look like a good planner. So in that sense the reason devs tend to "no, but"
is matter of them responding to incentives; it's not that they _can 't_ think
divergently, it's that they're putting themselves at risk for little reward
for doing so.

> So how about we treat thinking as a two-phase problem and give divergent
> thinking some room?

Yes, I think separating these two phases (and thus separating "throwing an
idea out there" from "endorsing an idea as definitely workable with no
foreseeable complications") would be very helpful.

~~~
sopooneo
I am a fan of cultivating "yes and" culture _when appropriate_ , but I 100%
agree with your concern. Management must _earn_ the trust of engineers before
they can expect them to hold off on the "yes, but" interjections. Most
management does not earn that trust for exactly the reason you note.

------
michaelscott
"Outrageous" or "out-of-the-box" solutions are just very lateral solutions to
a problem, and in an engineering context you can do this by questioning the
assumptions of the problem until you've reframed it enough to allow these
solutions to seem more "obvious".

Here's a very silly and simple example: you have an engineering task to search
for an ID in a tree data structure. You may know several standard methods off
the top of your head or you may look up the best performing algorithm online.
Either way, the solution is the expected one.

But let's abstract the problem: Why do you need to search for an ID in a tree
data structure? Do you need a tree in order to keep track of the path and the
IDs you pass? If not, then why not scrap the tree completely and go with a
hash map of key/value pairs? That solution is both faster and easier to
implement, but it only occurs if you think about the goal of the problem
instead of the problem itself. You can abstract it even further and ask
whether IDs are required at all, and if they aren't what other solutions could
be used to accomplish the same goal. This is a very, very simple example but
the idea can be applied to varying degrees in any problem, and kind of comes
to the idea of finding first principles in physics.

~~~
Invictus0
Agree with this approach. I had a manager tell me once that managers think
differently than engineers and I asked him to explain. He gave the example of
asking an engineer how to turn on a light bulb. The engineer (me) would/did
say to flip the light switch. He said that manager would ask why do you need
to turn on the light bulb? What is it in the room that needs to be
illuminated? Maybe your real purpose is to figure out if there is a certain
item in the room, and there is a better way to figure that out than turning on
the switch.

As an engineer, I am aware that my mind often plots the shortest path from
problem to solution, without ever stopping to question the problem definition.
Sometimes reframing the problem is the best way to get to a more creative
solution.

~~~
Swizec
As an engineer, the thing I always prided myself on was always asking my
customers/stakeholders _”Ok but what’s the problem you’re solving? Why do you
need this?”_ before jumping to a solution to their initial ask.

Often they ask for a solution to the 3rd step in their process where they got
stuck and it turns out the underlying problem is easier/faster to solve

------
toxicFork
The creativity process comes from exploration and exploitation. The more
experienced you get, the more you move towards exploitation and away from
exploration. So you will need to revert back a bit.

Think like a child, or like someone who would not have much idea about your
subject. Allow yourself to make wild guesses, allow yourself to make shortcuts
and unexplained decisions, in your mind, wander aimlessly. Move from one
potential outrageous solution to another, without judging. Try to have fun
with it. Don't note anything down. You think something is bad? Doesn't matter.
You think something is good? Doesn't matter. Keep exploring.

After you are tired of this, stop. Try to write down what you remember. Then
sleep on it, without looking at what you wrote before, write down what you
remember again. Now you can look at what you wrote in both times.

Say you find a solution that is completely outrageous. How can you adjust a
part of it to make it a bit less outrageous? Divide it to chunks. There will
be parts you understand and parts you don't. There will be parts that are
wrong and parts that are not. Divide and conquer.

------
readme
I don't think so. I have worked on problems where most of the team had their
head in the clouds, dreaming up wild solutions, and then we end up going with
a team member's solution who suggests something very easy, requiring almost no
technical skill, that should have been obvious, but all of us missed.

Practical is good. What will actually kill your creativity is self-doubt. Stop
doubting yourself and be happy with the way you are.

~~~
1auralynn
I think that maybe it's the difference between simply "imaginative" and
"creative" \- creative implies that you're involved in the act of creation.
Things can't be created in impossible contexts, so part of being creative is
understanding and accounting for the constraints you're working under.

------
Nihilartikel
This is something that I've thought about quite a bit over the years. My
current resolution is that practicality and unbridled imagination are both
attributes of a person's mental makeup - and that we probably grow up with an
affinity in one direction or the other... But that it's a false dichotomy to
say that one must necessarily inhibit the other. It's just that to find a
synergistic balance between the two implies deliberate introspection,
practice, and cultivation to achieve the most beneficial balance. In my case,
I arrived from the more laterally minded side - fancied I might be a sculptor
before differentiating professionally into an engineer. Dreaming big was easy,
but the self-work to be done was to fortify the practical strengths needed to
synthesize the dreams with what is practically achievable. Not saying its
easy, but I am saying that it's not impossible.

So, if you want to start to even out your levelheadedness then there are a lot
of fun avenues to pursue. Creative writing, read some surrealist literature,
talk with people who have experimented with psychedelics and witnessed the
preposterous cognitive edifices of modern culture fall to shimmering disjoint
pieces before their eyes, etc etc. Then work on reconciling the cognitive
dissonances along the way.

------
_bxg1
Yes, but I don't see it as a fundamental personality trait so much as a state
of mind.

The pragmatic mindset naturally simplifies, reduces, focuses, makes early
judgement calls about what trains of thought are unlikely to yield results.
The opposite of that is to be open and curious, to let thoughts expand and
meander without any clear destination or utility and to see where those take
you without assuming you know what is or isn't possible. That's where
divergent imagination really gets going.

Each mindset serves a purpose; it's beneficial to learn how to shift between
them as needed.

------
sopooneo
I would love to say "No! This is not the case at all! One can act in either
mode just fine. We're not prisoners of our tendencies!"

But from my experience with myself and friends, I think, sadly, this is
typically not the case. People can act in either mode, but tend to have a
proclivity, whether born or cultivated, for one over the other. You can do the
other, but it will require extra effort for lesser results.

There are unicorns that can do both brilliantly. But much fewer and farther
between than those who _claim_ they can do both.

I've always been strongly on the engineery side myself, but have tended to
fall in with artistic types socially. In my experience, artsies often fall
short of being able to _articulate_ ideas concretely, and thus can't easily
interface with people that need a delineated plan. Which makes us engineeries
tend to think they're soft brained. But in fact, they can often _execute_ even
highly complex systematic projects well. They just can't tell you how they did
it.

------
muzani
Not really. Ideas are just patterns. Apply a pattern from something else to
something else. A lot of what I do comes from sports or military.

If you're not getting enough ideas, think laterally, learn about other fields.
See how chess players think, martial artists, football players, soldiers, food
franchising, theology. Every field has its own 'common practice' which seems
really obvious to the people in the field, but strange and new in a different
field.

~~~
tsumnia
Agreed. My PhD research is inspired by the simple fact that we drill in
martial arts, so can we apply similar 'common practices' in CS education.

~~~
klyrs
Neat dissertation topic! I've used code golf for this very thing. It really
forces you to learn the weird nooks and crannies of a language, and try lots
of different strategies.

~~~
tsumnia
There is work by Frank Vahid (founder of ZyBooks) on many small programs and
how students performed comparable to other traditional styles.

However, in the vein of this thread, I think that is only playing one note to
learning CS. When I compare CS to martial arts (MA), I consider the
traditional programming exercise akin to sparring. It is real world situated,
but with the number of new variables it is difficult to successfully
demonstrate or refine your understanding. MA, like CS, has a high attrition
rate to start, and for reasons I consider isomorphic - a false sense of what
CS/MA is and the demoralizing effect of "losing" constantly (sparring or
debugging).

So, in MA, there are attempts to make sparring less intimidating. You can pair
equal experienced partners or against an understanding senior, but you also
focus on drills. If we consider sparring as a combination of problem solving
and applying technique in the moment, then drilling removes the problem
solving aspect to allow for technique refinement.

So, in combination with traditional programming exercises, my current work is
looking at novel practice activities separate from tradition - for example,
error finding, output prediction, and even typing exercises (which I have
published on).

~~~
muzani
That's very interesting. I considering doing this but it seemed like an awful
lot of work needed to start. There was a boom of 'learn to code' sites
recently but looks like nobody really tackled it from that angle.

------
themodelplumber
It may help to adapt some tools. For example, in the tabletop RPG world, a lot
of random tables are used to develop new concepts for stories, characters,
interactions, missions, and so on. You roll the dice a few times and suddenly
you have a very unique and imaginative idea indeed. You can draw up your own
random tables and tweak them over time, like creating software.

There are also sensory cues: You might choose a new location to do your
gaming, play some appropriate mood music, etc. On one of my first ever
"software guy does graphic design" projects, I asked the client what music
they liked, and then listened to that for about 3 days straight. It really
helped me get into the correct problem-solving lens where more appropriate
colors, shapes, fonts, and textures were concerned.

On top of that you may find there are supplements that help you out.
Personally if I'm running on 8+ hours of sleep and take about 100mg caffeine,
I feel like I can solve just about any problem and new ideas are more likely
to seem fun. ;-)

In the past I wrote some randomization software to help me solve problems. One
of my favorites simply picks random words out of a dictionary. Each word is
treated as a metaphor. I remember once a client said, "I thought I knew
exactly what you'd say, but that is an idea that never would have occurred to
me." This was my goal.

IMO there's a lot of space to grow in this area even if you feel like a potato
where your imagination is concerned, and the process can be really enjoyable.
Good luck to you.

------
kaolti
I'm sure you have a lot of good advice in the comments, thought I'd throw in
how I like to think about this.

Being practical means things that are doable. So it makes sense to limit
whatever you do to that, otherwise you'll be in the domain of unrealistic /
never gonna work.

The problem is, what is doable is not an absolute. What's practical is
different for everyone. You'll define it based on what you experienced / heard
about. Fact is you only hear what resonates with you, aka you're not even
going to consider things that seem ridiculous, based on your experience.

There's two sides to every story and it seems you're missing one. In my view,
being practical is a way of talking yourself out of ideas that you don't want
to do.

Look at this way, if you stick to being practical you'll only every do things
that have a close to 100% chance of working (in your view). This would only
work if you knew everything. Absolute knowledge.

You have no idea what is possible, so do your best (keep trying) and don't
overanalyze.

I've heard somewhere you can turn this mentality around by forcing yourself to
come up with reasons this could work, rather than why it couldn't. Make a
list.

------
furyofantares
As a personality trait? No. As a mode of thought? Yes.

You can learn a new mode of thought. You have to be open, and not dismiss
things early, which means allowing yourself to follow ideas which have obvious
flaws or which totally impractical. It helps to have confidence that you'll
use your practical, analytical, and more closed mode of thought later. But
first you've gotta jump out of the local maxima and try to find something new.
Generate ideas as if you're high; highdeas are usually bad and that's ok, your
sober self will be around to check it out later. Maybe the idea will be thrown
away then, and maybe it won't.

There's a great John Cleese talk on open vs closed thinking that you could
look up on YouTube. A good book on the subject is A Whack On The Side Of The
Head.

Edit: That said, there's also something to working with another person, and
each focusing on one of these roles more than the other. Like author and
editor. Lots of things follow this pattern of splitting these roles up among
people.

~~~
andrewksl
Very well put! I'll add that dismissing things early tends to act as a
roadblock to further creative pathways. It's almost exactly why you don't
shoot down ideas while brainstorming; it kills the environment of creativity
the exercise is intended to foster.

------
drenvuk
If you have access to friends or family with children the next time you're
hanging out you should try asking the kids a simplified kid friendly form of
the problem you're trying to solve. They'll usually give you a completely
correct answer that interprets the question in a way you never would. It's
both interesting and enlightening.

Since they haven't internalized the exact definitions of the words they're
using or hearing, or even how the world works from a physical or logical
perspective you literally can't replicate it with your adult brain. You know
too much. It's kinda cool.

~~~
mistermann
A half decent article on the subject: [https://effectiviology.com/curse-of-
knowledge/](https://effectiviology.com/curse-of-knowledge/)

I constantly perceive that this is a major problem in modern UI designs,
whereas in the past people thought really hard about usability, because they
didn't grow up using computers, everything was new.

------
daenz
I don't think being practical acts as a hindrance to one's imagination. It's
critical to actually accomplishing creative ideas. Each skill just needs to be
engaged when they're most useful. If you're trying to be creative, then you
should be actively trying to pause thinking practically. Then, once you think
you've "got something", start looking at the idea practically to see if it's
even possible. Repeat until you have a creative solution that might just work.
Being imaginative let's you fly, being practical helps you land.

------
bluedino
Somewhat related - how my brain kept me from founding YouTube

[https://prog21.dadgum.com/39.html](https://prog21.dadgum.com/39.html)

------
x3haloed
Practicality is a choice whereas creativity is a poorly-understood synthesis
process. If you're very level headed, it just means that you are quick to
discard ideas that sounds risky, difficult, or improbable. If you are looking
for more creative solutions, try allowing yourself to day-dream a little more
or to work on some ideas that you immediately feel are impractical. It will
take time to create a pattern of habit where you can suspend your critical
side long enough to explore imaginative ideas. The fastest route to this is
chemical. But. You know. That's not for everyone.

Oh! Also try allowing your brain some breathing room. Walk away from the
problem and do something else. Your brain will work on it in the background.
The more you dwell on it in your conscious mind, the more you will focus your
existing solutions down.

Edit: You must learn to trust your subconscious to help you with keeping an
active eye on it. Just as you must trust employees to do their work without
micromanaging them and breathing down their necks the whole time.

[https://youtu.be/iHcxkmwBOJY](https://youtu.be/iHcxkmwBOJY)

~~~
x3haloed
You must learn to trust your subconscious to help you with keeping an active
eye on it. Just as you must trust employees to do their work without
micromanaging them and breathing down their necks the whole time.

------
spc476
One technique I learned in 5th grade is called "brainstorming." It's a simple
concept---you get a group together (or you can do this alone---you just skip
one step). You establish a clear problem statement. Then for 10 or 15 minutes,
everybody writes down ideas to solve the problem. Nothing detailed, just a few
words per idea. And no judgement at this time. Just ideas, no matter how silly
("feed mayonnaise to tuna fish" for example) until time is out.

Then one person starts reading their list, and everybody checks their lists
for that idea and cross it out. Then the next person goes, reading any
remaining ideas and so on until all you have left are unique ideas (and it
doesn't matter if all your ideas are crossed out---remember, no judgements
yet). If you are alone, you can skip this step.

Then, and only then, do you go through the final list of ideas and discuss
them. Here, you judge the ideas, reject some, combine others, mix, match, and
puree until you get something that works.

------
ergest
No it doesn’t. Pragmatic thinking is just another mental algorithm. You just
haven’t learn any good out-of-the-box thinking algorithms. May I suggest
Inside the Box? [https://www.amazon.com/Inside-Box-Creativity-Breakthrough-
Re...](https://www.amazon.com/Inside-Box-Creativity-Breakthrough-
Results/dp/1451659296)

------
starky
From the perspective of mechanical design (but definitely extends to things
like art and I would assume coding), I don't really agree, but it is a learned
skill. In essence, being creative is a loop between coming up with ideas, and
then looking at them through a practical lens. Being practical comes easy to
most technical people, so they need to deliberately let that go to properly
iterate through the cycle.

Truly innovative solutions to problems are few and far between. Nearly
everything is a combination or extension of solutions that have come before.
Being good at coming up with ideas is mostly having a good database of
knowledge to draw from, and taking the extension or combination process a
couple steps too far before tossing out impractical ideas. This is why
brainstorming can be effective, if you are working with someone where you feed
off each other's ideas, the process can be a lot more natural rather than
deliberate.

------
Baeocystin
I can't say I've noticed much of a difference in my professional life. As I've
gotten older and gained more experience, my mental toolbox has increased in
size and refined in quality. This leads to more solutions being clear from the
get-go than when I was younger.

But when nothing comes to mind up front? If anything, I feel that my ability
to sort the 'hey, that just might work!' wheat from the fanciful chaff is
sharper than before.

That doesn't mean I can force it, and I think this point is important enough
to emphasize- if I hit a block on an obvious next step, I stop and go for a
walk. Listen to music, hang out with my dogs. Maybe play with a recipe in the
kitchen, or create a new belt hell-world in Factorio. Let your 'default mode'
network ruminate and digest. Nine times out of ten by the next day I've
discovered a new approach to work with.

------
jelliclesfarm
I don’t have an answer at the moment.

But a suggestion: try doing mundane actions like brushing teeth or writing on
your lesser dominant side. Example: if you are right handed, try brushing your
teeth with your left hand etc. try with various tasks. do this for maybe a
week and let us know if you notice a difference re how you think.

------
nestorD
I don't think being practical hinders one's imagination (I would consider
myself both imaginativ and very practical).

I know of two school of thought regarding the origin of original ideas :

\- Original ideas stem from ignorance of the existing idea and being an
outsider in the domain. I don't think this is sustainable as, at some point,
you have to become familiar with the domain to which you want to contribute.

\- Original ideas comme from a deep knowlege of the domain and its history
which lets you understand how new concepts you meet might fit in the overall
puzzle.

Overall, if you have problems coming out with outrageous new ideas, I would
recommend practice : whenever you enconter a problem, try to design a solution
for it (it doesn't matter if you never implement it) and only then research
what kind of solution is used to solve this problem. With time you should
become familiar with your own creativ process.

------
LeifCarrotson
Yes, pragmatic and practical are directly opposed to clever or creative
thinking. The trick is to know when to apply each one, and to apply enough of
the former to have time for the latter.

In every application or machine I write code for, there is typically one,
sometimes two, really interesting problems. But there are innumerable bits of
boring business logic to implement along the way. You sometimes need to be
willing to have a method copy-pasted with trivial changes in three places
(which bothers me sometimes, thinking it would be better to have one method
with a parameter to select between the variations) in order to have time to
develop an extensible, adjustable, clever solution somewhere else.

------
gdubs
Constraints can actually breed creativity, though you might be asking a
slightly different question.

Check out the writing of David Kelly and his brother (of IDEO) — they’ve
probably done more than anyone else in the field to try and crack the formula
of creative thinking.

------
mobjack
Most of my creativity comes from finding practical solutions to complex
problems.

If something seems to complex or hard, I figure their must be an easier way to
solve it.

A lot of it is stepping back and questioning the original problem you are
trying to solve.

------
decasteve
Yes. (But no, you're not completely stupid). In general, your question/comment
reminded me of this:

"The man who has no tincture of philosophy goes through life imprisoned in the
prejudices derived from common sense, from the habitual beliefs of his age or
his nation, and from convictions which have grown up in his mind without the
co-operation or consent of his deliberate reason. To such a man the world
tends to become definite, finite, obvious; common objects rouse no questions,
and unfamiliar possibilities are contemptuously rejected."

\-- Bertrand Russell

------
Havoc
>my level-headedness could be one of the factors for my failure to come up
with some out-of-the-box thinking.

You need to be able to turn this off during brainstorming. i.e. Suspend
disbelief for a bit. Like watching a Marvel movie - live in the moment.

Broadly - quite the opposite.

The stuff my cash constrained cousins living in Namibia come up with blows my
mind. Both practical and imaginative.

e.g. Building large RC planes from scratch (electronics excl). And here I
thought my paper planes were grand.

e.g.

One of them got told there is no cash for uni, if he wants to go he needs to
make it happen on his own. Guess who is now the proud owner of a bee keeping
operation.

------
arandr0x
So, I grew up drawing, writing, doing acting/improv, and work as a programmer
(but mostly have worked on R&D teams). do you want to trade
convergent/divergent thinking tips? My programming colleagues are always
telling me how to streamline code, remove unused bits, make better class
names... and I'm all... but I keep inventing algorithms is that not enough?

Anyway totally willing to be part of a imaginative/practical HNers coaching
group!

------
moralestapia
Not at all.

A few months ago I started being extremely pragmatic in everyday life (even
against my will which is usually not like that). Things like, say no if you
want to say no, answer emails immediately with a sentence at most, find the
fastest way to get something done etc...

Now I have a lot of time on my hands to do whatever I want, that includes
spending the day studying or pondering things which I believe greatly
increased the potential of my imagination.

Find things that you like and do them, weed out everything else. If you can't
shake some of those away, find the most practical way to get rid of them.

------
ChefboyOG
I think this is a major reason you often see such a stark personality split
between cofounders—one being more freewheeling when generating ideas, and the
other being deeply pragmatic.

------
loxs
I used to be the opposite. For a good part of my first 10 years as a
programmer, I used to always go for the wildest and coolest solution,
architecture, language, etc. Coupled with me being a good salesman (able to
sell to management) it continuously led to a huge amount of frustration and
struggle.

Once I learned being practical first and creative only when needed, now I feel
quite happy and productive. Seems like the satisfaction of my customers is
much better than the tech itself.

------
cellularmitosis
There is a saying from Zen Buddhism: "In the beginner's mind, there are many
possibilities. In the expert's mind, there are few".

Granted, the beginner is also going to go down a lot of dead-ends, but
sometimes the expert won't get started on something which they have mistakenly
ruled out as impossible.

The question is, what (mental) exercises could you do to get into the
practicality equivalent of "beginner's mind"?

~~~
WiseWeasel
1\. Devalue all your knowledge.

------
sharma_pradeep
Over the years of mindfully watching myself,

having endless debates on what's important for creativity : being flexible or
being organized,

having read the book on this topic called "making ideas happen",

I got to understand what we all know already

To do the best of our work, it requires

 __Balance __

\- Balance between creativity and organization

\- Balance between being practical and being a mad scientist

\- Working in routine and breaking that routine

\- Having a laser focus on problem and staying away from the problem

------
mlthoughts2018
I think constraints and pragmatism are requires aspects of creativity and
imagination. You can’t have one without the other.

------
reubens
Peter Carey’s early novel Illywhacker [1] has a central character that is both
practical and imaginative, and is a brilliant description of these two
coexisting. Well worth a read.

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illywhacker](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illywhacker)

------
DamonHD
Maybe I'm missing what you mean. Sometimes a flight of fancy is fine, eg while
brainstorming or creating fiction!

But the world values grounded workable solutions to real problems too. Being
practical is good for these.

I find myself exasperated when, given a practical and an impractical solution,
some people turn their nose up at the former as uninteresting.

------
aplacelikethis
Maybe your vocabulary of archetypes is just limited? Do you read non-technical
books regularly?

------
orev
I think a lot of creativity (or lack of) can come down to routine. If you
follow the same routine every day, doing the same things, you get in a rut.
Breaking your routine can help to get your mind into a different frame which
can unlock some creativity.

------
paulsutter
Practicality is key to successful creativity, look at Elon Musk or Steve Jobs.
Many have dreamed of going to mars but only a very practical person like Elon
can make it happen.

Solving problems within actual constraints may be the greatest creativity of
all.

------
davalapar
Yo if you can't solve a problem for now, then temporarily focus on other
things. Even Einstein (or whoever that person be) once said that you can't
solve problems in the same headspace you've came up with them.

------
samstave
In my experience working with and having relationships with many
practical/pragmatic/realist people, i would say yes - but...

Im too much of a dreamer/imaginary-driven, and i need these types to keep me
focused.

------
palerdot
One can be a level headed person and can be completely outrageous when coming
up with ideas. I think both of them are not interwined, but it could be if you
think it is, like a paradox.

One immediate example that springs to my mind is Albert Einstein. You could
say that his ideas are outrageous that space and time are same and they are
bent etc. Even people (like the Nazis) publicly called it outrageous and
blasphemy. But if you think about his ideas, he clearly followed through with
a rigourous mathematical proof which I think might be indicative of height of
level headedness. In fact, if you skim through his process of explaining
relativity to general public through his book [0], you cannot distinguish when
he is being level headed and when he suddenly jumps into a bizarre thought
experiment.

[0] -
[https://archive.org/details/cu31924011804774/page/n10](https://archive.org/details/cu31924011804774/page/n10)

------
viburnum
Lots of great advice here. Just wanted to add that, for me at least, I’m way
more creative when I’m on a team than I am by myself. So maybe think about
what contexts you thrive in.

------
georgeecollins
In my experience probably yes. But keep in mind everybody things they are
creative. And a lot of smart people effectively create things by borrowing
ideas in a team setting.

------
bryanmgreen
Yes, _if the logic goes unchecked_.

I am, by and large, extremely, almost obsessively, practical and rational.
Decisions pretty much always happen in a conditionally-formatted spreadsheet.
It is my default.

That being said, my imagination can be very vivid and therapeutic.

Abstract painting, making music, writing ideas for potential tv shows,
designing furniture, and my goofy sense of humor all result in some completely
crazy ideas. Over time, I've learned to give myself more space to be creative.
It's actually enabled me to be more practical because all that linear thinking
now has a pressure-release outlet.

------
beamatronic
I think it makes sense. If you are a practical person, pair up with a creative
person, your skills will complement each other.

------
resters
I recommend daydreaming as if your goal is a good sci fi treatment of the
idea.

------
navigatr
I believe that constraints breed creative solutions.

------
mitchtbaum
Smoke a joint!

[https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=pIIUphFlRDQ&feature=share](https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=pIIUphFlRDQ&feature=share)

~

PS Life's short

I love you

~~~
klyrs
... or drop acid! Just mind your set and setting.

And whatever you do, don't share ideas with colleagues until you've sobered
up.

------
greenyouse
Nobody's stupid because they're not sure about something. It's totally cool to
ask for help or opinions when you're thinking through a hard problem.

To answer your question you should understand what creativity and practicality
mean in your context. I would generally think that being practical and
creative aren't at odds with each other.

When working through a problem for work I tend to err on the side of
practicality. We could be coming up with a new way to do data transformations,
building out distributed tracing tools, or trying a new way of scaffolding our
projects. Each of those solve a real problem and have practical implications.
They also require creative thinking to imagine and design new tools and
workflows.

These projects are practical in the sense that they need to solve an actual
problem (e.g. deliver a net benefit to customer UX or development velocity).
Contrary to how they sound, they often aren't obvious projects to take on or
straight-forward solutions. It usually required days or weeks of lateral
thinking to cook up one of these. In this context, creative thinking
complimented practical thinking and produced a better result than one of those
modes taken in isolation.

Sometimes it's helpful to circle around the problem you think you want to
solve to better understand what your actual problem is.

Be careful reading other's ideas since it will affect the way in which you see
the problem. Your view of the problem may be skewed after reading other
information. OTOH, it's common that you can piggyback on existing ideas (see
taco bell/duct tape programming).

There are lots of good resources on this subject: John Cleese talk linked
elsewhere -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y70nbDJI5Uk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y70nbDJI5Uk)

Rich Hickey Hammock Driven Development is a more direct application to
software development.-
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f84n5oFoZBc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f84n5oFoZBc)

Another good Alan Kay talk from YC -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=id1WShzzMCQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=id1WShzzMCQ)

A Mind for Numbers

How to Solve It

Psychology of Intelligence Analysis is interesting too but less applicable
(eschewing the Einstellung effect) - [https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-
the-study-of-intellig...](https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-
intelligence/csi-publications/books-and-monographs/psychology-of-intelligence-
analysis/art9.html)

------
lsrijal
how to upgrade KARMA ?

