What If Questions: How to Use Them
Systematically asking good "what if" questions is
actually a fun activity, whether you do it alone or as a game
with others. It provides some good mental exercise as well. Plus,
it can lead to some great theories and invention. Let's look
at a few examples of how you can do this as a way to give your
brain a workout and for generating creative new ideas.
The process can be as simple as this: Start the questions, anywhere
and anytime. Turn on the television, for example, and watch the
news while asking what if questions. When a report on
unemployment comes on, you might ask, "What if there was
no unemployment?" "What if unemployment was a good
thing?" "What if everyone was unemployed?"
Each of these suggests different ideas:
Could there be no unemployment? Perhaps companies located
in all the major cities could guarantee jobs for anyone the government
sent their way. Why would they do this? In exchange for being
allowed to pay a lower minimum wage and a lower tax rate.
Could unemployment be good? It might provide the time necessary
to take an intense training course that prepares one for a better
job in the future. Or it could be an opportunity to start a business
that requires more time than capital.
Why would everyone be unemployed? Technically there would
be no jobs if we all were in the business of selling our
labor. If we were paid as business owners--even for typical work--it
could change our thinking, possibly making us all more productive
and independent.
By the way, as I have mentioned in the newsletter more than
once, I really do use these techniques, and they have paid me
well. An e-book I wrote wasn't selling well, and I asked "What
if I gave it away?" I won't get into the details of what
I did next, but I did start giving it away and soon was making
three times as much money with it as when I was selling it.
What happens when you ask "what if," is that your
subconscious mind gets to work find a way to make sense of what
you are asking. So if you ask, for example, "what if I could
make money by talking to people," your mind is immediately
looking for ways that could be true. Even if you consciously
move on to other matters, you'll sometimes later have an idea
pop up related to that question. There is a lot going on underneath
the surface of our conscious mind, and good questions are a way
to stimulate and direct creative thinking and problem solving
at a less-than-conscious level.
If you ask these kinds of "what if" questions enough,
and everyday over a period of weeks, the process should become
habitual. Of course, most of the ideas this question suggests
will be silly or worthless, but that's just the nature of many
creative ways of thinking, and it isn't a problem. In the end
you can simply produce a lot of ideas and then pick through for
the good ones.
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