Change your thinking, change your life (2)

If you’re surrounded by negativity, look for a better environment. Charlie Brower said, “A new idea is delicate. It can be killed by a sneer or a yawn; it can be stabbed to death by a quip and worried to death by a frown on the right man’s brow.” Negative environments kill great ideas every minute. A creative environment, on the other hand, becomes like a greenhouse where ideas are seeded, then sprout and thrive. In order to grow, you must seek out people who are committed to personal growth. Such people: (1) Encourage creativity. David Hills said, “Studies of creativity suggest that the biggest single variable of whether or not employees will be creative is whether they perceive they have permission.” When innovation and good thinking are openly encouraged and rewarded, people see they have permission to be creative. (2) Are willing to risk failure. Even when you have studied and prepared yourself thoroughly, you will have to try several times before you succeed. So you need to be in an environment where mistakes are viewed as part of the creative process. (3) Believe in the potential of a dream. A creative environment encourages the use of a blank sheet of paper and the question, “If you could draw a picture of what you want to accomplish, what would it look like?” A creative environment allowed Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to speak with passion and declare, “I have a dream,” not “I have a goal.” Goals may give focus, but dreams have power. Dreams expand your world. And God is the giver of dreams and visions (see Joel 2:28).