The Creative Contrarian

Wise Fool Strategy # 4Seek Other Right Answers

“Nothing is more dangerous than an idea, when it's the only one you have.”

— Émile-Auguste Chartier, French Philosopher

Wise Fools believe that if you have only one idea (solution, answer, perspective) of how something should be done, then you have only one course of action open to you. This is certainly a risky proposition in a world where flexibility is a vital survival skill. They operate as though there is always more than one right answer for any given problem, and it's important to look for alternatives.

One of my favorite stories about this happened when I was a sophomore in high school. My English teacher drew a chalk dot on the blackboard. She then asked the class to look at it and tell her what it was. A few moments passed, and no one volunteered. Finally, someone blurted out, “A chalk dot on the blackboard.” After that, more silence. No one had anything to add.

“I'm astounded,” the teacher told us. “I did a similar exercise yesterday with a group of six-year-olds, and they thought of many different things it could be: a wheel, a bird's eye, a marble, food stain on a shirt, cross-section of a banana, a bindi, rabbit poop, and so on. They had their imaginations going at full blast!”

In the 10-year span between kindergarten and high school, not only had we learned how to find the right answer, we had also lost some of ...