Have you ever wanted to be a fly on the wall in the room with a great thinker? Participate in one man's journey to greatness and hear big ah-ha moments we can all learn from.

This master class with Tony Buzan, inventor of Mind Maps and author of over 98 books was recorded in Melbourne earlier this year as part of the BLI Accreditation process. Featuring three hours of stories, anecdotes and lessons Tony shares insights into creativity, learning, memory and mental literacy.

Many practitioners in the creativity field believe individuals can develop skills that open them up to thinking more creatively.  Edward de Bono is one of the more well recognised of these, but the teaching of creative thinking goes back much further to people like Alex Osborn (Brainstorming), Sid Parnes, Paul Torrance and many others.  Read more

In recent days I have been following a fascinating discussion between colleagues in the creativity and innovation field around whether or not being creative is a skill that can be learnt and developed, and how long it takes to become a proficient creative thinker.  As you might imagine, there were many viewpoints that followed different paths.  Read more

How much time to you spend on the road? At airports? On planes? How can you best utilise the time to be more innovative?

There are some real opportunities while sitting on a plane. Take it from me — this month I travelled to Abu Dhabi, Dubai, South Africa, Bahrain and am currently in New Zealand running workshops. This non-stop travel has brought to mind some great ways to make use of all that transit time: Read more

Feeling the effects of the recent global financial crisis? Want to find a cave and hide until things get back to normal? It is natural to want to revert back to the safe, tried and true methods in times of crises.  Cut down on expenses, consolidate your portfolio, put off projects, ride out the storm. Read more

Creativity really is simple as 1,2,3 (and 4,5,6). It is a common misperception that you have to be born creative or a real maverick in order to think creatively.  Creativity is a process and rule followers are generally more successful in creativity sessions.
 

Marketing guru, Alex Osborn, who coined the term ‘Brainstorming’, and Dr Sid Parnes, developed THE creative problem solving model.

6 Steps/Stages to cre8ive problem solving

Stage 1: Objective Finding (or Mess Finding): Sensitise yourself for issues that need to be tackled. Read more

In tough economic times, should you innovate?  Yes!! was the
unanimous message from the speakers at the Australian innovation
conference, InnoFuture 2008.

Key messages from Day 1 Read more

Dear Friends & Colleagues,

Grenville Payne, my coordinator and BLI candidate in South Africa, has unearthed the attached, wonderfully supportive research from the Loyola University.

The floodgates are opened!

Distribute and use as you wish.

Floreant Dendritae

Tony Buzan

I have just downloaded a copy of the next iteration in Mind Mapping Applications which installed on my Mac without issue and after playing for a while, I must say that I am impressed.

For the first beta release it has been a surprising time that it has run so well with only a few very minor bits that are still being tweaked.

Modes: Read more

 Just want to share something interesting to you guys. Been working on an insurance company locally in Malaysia. !st session was done last year to the company top management staff. After 8 months of follow up with the client and they have decided to implement Mind Maps into their customers. How??

  Read more

In one of my recent Masters classes, one of my students presented some information on Swarm Creativity, which I had not previously heard of by that name.  While the class worked on a team projects I was able to power browse the book, and later did a bit of research on the web.

The book Swarm Creativity: Competitive Advantage through Collaborative Innovation Networks by Peter A. Gloor is an interesting look at group creativity.  A quick Google search takes you to www.swarmcreativity.net which opens with the following: Read more

Read more

http://www.fuzz2buzz.com/academy/sample

watch this video to get a feel on how to use MindGenius and get your To do list organised

Want to know how PhotoReading is done?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51JDgFGKknY&feature=related

Derren Brown's Trick or Treat Show last Friday in the UK helped a guy remember vast amounts of information so he could enter a quiz competition.

Also, how did Derren remember which of the 1,300 coffee beans was the right one?

Peter Russell, author of the Brain Book and long time collaborator
with Tony Buzan, has created a cool Life Expectancy Calculator. 
http://www.peterrussell.com/Odds/VirtualAge.php

My Biological age is 44 (though I prefer 40+gst)

The good news is that my virtual age is 31 and my life expectancy is 88 (I'm halfway there).

The calculator gives you real clues on what impacts on life expectancy and how to Age-proof your brain and body.

Once you have mastered the basic peg system of Number Rhyme for your short term memory lists. 1 = bun, 2 = shoe, you can easily extend the number of items remembered by associating an element with the images.
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1-9 as normal
10-19 same imagery but everything is in Ice (i.e. one = bun, in a block of ice)
20-29 – same imagery where everything is blue (2-blue) (i.e. one = a blue bun)
30-31 – same imagery with everything as velvet. (i.e. one = a bun resting in velvet)
Etc

Last Friday I spent another terrific day with NSW Rural and Regional Accountants at their Annual conference "A Country Practice".
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This year I spoke to them about Building Business Talent - a radiant thinking look at the development of Multiple Intelligences in people.
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Today's leaders are faced with challenges not seen before, advancing technologies, an ageing workforce, staff attraction and retention, as well as managing Gen Yers.
. Read more

Everyone wants a better memory, but more importantly, every Speaker wants to be more memorable.
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This was the focus for my presentation at the National Speakers of Australia Association's Conference on the weekend.
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In the fun and fast-paced session we looked at how to enhance thier memory, using the same principles applied by Memory Olympians. On the flip side, we explored how to develop the quality or state of being memorable.
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As we get older, it's vitally important to keep the mind active and fit. In this film, brain guru Tony Buzan talks about the common problems and misconceptions of aging, as well as the secrets behind having a healthy mind at any age.

http://www.videojug.com/film/how-to-age-proof-your-brain

Just back from running a one day Rapid and Range reading workshop in a State Government group. It was interesting to hear their main reasons for taking a day out to attend this type of workshop
- General Help with reading
- Building on existing knowledge and learn how to link information together
- Be more efficient with reading - particularly for University Studies
- Be well read - read all the classics
- Get through the large volume of texts, reports and documents.
- Read more in order to enjoy overseas travel.

Nearly covers it all - anything you could add to this list? Read more