It's difficult to get your creative juices flowing if you're always being practical, following rules, afraid to make mistakes, not looking into outside areas, or under the influence of any of the other mental locks.

The hallmark of creative people is their mental flexibility... Sometimes they are open and probing, at others they're playful and off-the-wall. At still other times, they're critical and faultfinding. And finally they're doggedly persistent in striving to reach their goals.

Most people think of success and failure as opposites, but they both are products of the same process.

Most brilliance arises from ordinary people working together in extraordinary ways.

When everyone thinks alike, no one is doing very much thinking.

The worlds of thought and action overlap. What you think has a way of becoming true.

Take advantage of the ambiguity in the world. Look at something and think what else it might be.

Life is like a maze in which you try to avoid the exit.

Open your mind up to things that have no connection with the problem you're trying to solve: subscribe to an unusual magazine spend a morning at an elementary school go to work two hours early test drive an exotic car attend a city council meeting ...try an Indonesian recipe.

Most burning issues generate far more heat than light.

Going to a junkyard is a sobering experience. There you can see the ultimate destination of almost everything we desired.

It's easy to come up with new ideas the hard part is letting go of what worked for you two years ago, but will soon be out-of-date.

If you fall in love with an idea, you won't see the merits of alternative approaches-and will probably miss an opportunity or two. One of life's great pleasures is letting go of a previously cherished idea. Then you're free to look for new ones. What part of your idea are you in love with? What would happen if you kissed it goodbye?

Flexibility is a requirement for survival.

What excuses stand in your way? How can you eliminate them?

Knowledge is the stuff from which new ideas are made. Thus, the real key to being creative lies in what you do with your knowledge.