How School Trained You to Be Broke

Bob Dylan says the purpose of art is to stop time. Couldn’t agree more. That’s why you can sit through a three-hour opera and it seems like moments. When I’m in the zone writing, all of a sudden seven hours have gone by and I haven’t eaten.

When I go two days without shaving, hunched over the keyboard, and have all my meals delivered – I know I’m working on some really Epic Shit!
There are a lot of parallels in creativity…

Let’s connect the dots further. Loved everyone’s comments in yesterday’s post on the Creativity Test. But here’s the next level of all that, and why I mentioned the problems of schools subjugating creativity out of children.

Because schools today instead of teaching our kids how to think – are training them how to be broke.

Attending the public school system today is like getting assimilated by the Borg. And for critics who would say I’m not qualified to make these judgments because I was expelled in high school – I would suggest that’s exactly why I can and should make them. After spending the last 20 years of my life studying success and prosperity, here is something I can state conclusively:

There is a very strong link between your level of creativity and your chances for success and wealth.
Thus, my interest in the subject. The focus of my work for those two decades has been to discover why people sabotage their own opportunities for success. What are the limiting beliefs that cause them to do this? And how do they replace those beliefs with empowering ones?
So let me say right now, I won’t get into the creativity stimulators I promised for this post. The topic we’re exploring is so deep and so compelling, I’m thinking at this point it have been better to make it my next book! So this will extend out to some more posts to do the topic justice.

First, let’s look at some myths about creativity and wealth…
Most people would say all creative people are artists – musicians, painters, dancers, etc, and we all know the meme about starving artists.
Most people would also see successful entrepreneurs and business people as not creative people. They see them as logical number crunchers.
Wrong on both counts…

Creative geniuses like Madonna, U2, and Lady Gaga have P&L statements that would make an oil company blush. And savvy creative successes like them have also shown a strong genius in the more “scientific” pursuits like the mathematics involved in finance and business management.
I would also argue that the real titans of business, such as Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Richard Branson owe a great deal of their success to their creative genius.

Creativity fosters innovation, lateral thinking and problem solving skills. It causes you to think differently. And this kind of thinking is exactly what you need to succeed in business and create wealth. And this kind of thinking is exactly what schools are beating out of kids today. Instead of teaching kids how to think – they tell them what to think. (Or simply give them facts to memorize.)
The U.S. and most other education systems are churning out simpletons suitable for manual labor, while very few other countries with more foresight are teaching people how to think.

Most people who attempt new things are going to face a challenge. So they stop and say something like, “I tried but it didn’t work because _______.” And that is the end of it.
Creative people break away from habitual thinking, and look for a different perspective. They ask, “How else can I do this?” “What if . . .?” and “If it was possible, how would it work?”

Creative people don’t focus on challenges, they look for possibilities. Which is a good way to accomplish things, get wealthy, and have success in just about everything.
Once you develop your creativity and let it loose, it serves you for life. Much like your physical muscles, as long as you keep using it, it gets stronger.

Another of the myths about creativity is that only people with a high IQ have it. Most people think it’s rare, mysterious, or locked away in their right brain. These things are simply not true. In actuality, everyone has creativity. Or at least they are born with it. Not all keep it.

So what do you think?

Yesterday you got your score, which I’ll admit is quite subjective, but gives us someplace to start from. If you scored high, why do you think that is? If you scored low, why do you think that is? Do you see the link between creativity and success? How do you feel when I say that the education system is training kids to be broke?

Please share your thoughts with the community. And next post we’ll pick up on tapping into your creative genius…

SOURCE: PROSPERITY BLOG