Edward de Bono, author of many books on the mind and the thinking process, uses an analogy which perfectly described how the pattern recognition process works and how creative idea is born.

De Bono compares the mind to a dish of jelly which has settled so that its surface is perfectly flat.

When information enters the mind, it self organizes.  It is like pouring warm water on the dish of jelly with a teaspoon.

Imagine the warm water being poured on the jelly dish and then gently tipped so that it runs off.  After many repetitions of this process, the surface of the jelly would be full of ruts, indentations and grooves.

New water (information) would start to automatically flow into the the preformed grooves.  After a while, it would take only a little bit of information (water) to activate an entire channel. This is the pattern recognition and pattern completion process.

When information enters the mind it falls into a channel, a pattern. Even if much of the information is outside the channel, the pattern will be activated.

The mind automatically “corrects” and “completes” the information to select and activate a pattern.

Creativity occurs when we tilt the jelly dish and force some of the water (information) to flow into new channels and make new connections.

Are you ready to create some new patterns for your marketing  in the jello of your mind?

(credit for this blog is belong to “Mind Mapping” by Joyce Wycoff).