Does a high IQ (intelligence quotient) mean better grades in school? Does it mean a better life? Is your IQ score even a valid measurement of your intelligence? Let’s take a look at these questions one-by-one.

High IQ – Intelligence

There is almost certainly a correlation between a high IQ score and being more intelligent. These tests are imperfect, though, and you can find examples of cultural biases on many of them. Also, there are specific skills that have been proven to raise scores on many tests, including IQ tests.

The last point makes sense, doesn’t it? When you know how to efficiently “work” a test, you are likely to score higher. For that matter, even a cup of coffee may boost your score. Even the fact that your score can vary from test to test shows there are factors which can be manipulated to raise your score. There may be a general correlation between IQ score and intelligence, but certainly it’s an imperfect one.

High IQ – Better Life

What evidence is there that people with higher intelligence have better lives or are happier? None that I am aware of, and how do you scientifically measure “better life?” How about a negative correlation? Many with a high IQ have committed suicide, such as Virginia Woolf, Ernest Hemingway, and Sylvia Plath, but this is just anecdotal. Various studies have shown that people with a high IQ AND a low IQ are slightly more likely to commit suicide, but even if these studies prove true, this doesn’t prove causation, only correlation.

High IQ – Academic Performance

A study reported in the journal ‘Psychological Science’ found that IQ level correlated with academic performance, but there was a much stronger correlation with self discipline. Students with high self-discipline have better grades than high-IQ students. They found no correlation between IQ and discipline, meaning they are traits that vary independently.

High IQ – What Does It Mean?

Intelligence is an important tool, but it is just one of the tools we have to shape our lives with. As are money or power or abilities, it is beneficial in the abstract, but it only becomes beneficial in reality if applied in ways that better our lives. Raw computing capacity doesn’t make a computer or a human more effective if they don’t have the other necessary components.

Consider what people of average intelligence, like Henry Ford, have accomplished, before you place too much emphasis on a high IQ.

Brain fog is that sensation you have when you just can’t think clearly. Perhaps you can’t concentrate, or even figure out what you need to be concentrating on. You might stare at the paper in front of you or at the job you need to do. There may be thoughts swirling in your head, but they aren’t organized or helpful. What can you do about this? Try the following quick tips, and then the powerful techniques that follow.

Create clear space to prevent brain fog. It’s rare that a person can work better in clutter. At the very least, an organized home or office means you won’t have the thought “where is that…” distracting your mind.

Avoid sugars. To understand the concept of brain fog, eat sugary cake on an empty stomach, then try to do math problems twenty minutes later. I think you’ll get the point. This is called the “sugar blues.”

Try walking. I’m convinced the research will eventually show this to be one of the best things you can do to improve the quality of your thinking, but don’t wait for the proof. Walking has enough other health benefits anyhow.

Try more or better quality sleep. People’s sleep requirements vary, but the bare minimum for most is somewhere around five hours, and many of us suffer if we sleep less than eight. Some research indicates that after a minimum quantity (say, four hours), the quality of sleep is more important than the quantity for normal brain function.

Avoid getting bored. When it is difficult to concentrate because you are bored with what you are working on, you need to stop and consider why it is important (if it is). When you see the benefits clearly it is usually easier to concentrate.

Powerful Techniques For Dispelling Brain Fog

Thinking problems are often due to stress and worry, so take care of these in order to start thinking more efficiently. First try a simple stress reliever. Close your eyes and take several deep breaths through your nose. Allow the tension to run out of your muscles as you do this, and try to pay attention to your breath, so any other thoughts can slip away.

When this doesn’t get rid of your brain fog, try a more involved mindfulness exercise. It will take just a few minutes, and will work better the more you use it. You basically just stop what you are doing and watch your own thoughts and feelings. With practice you’ll start to identify the thoughts that are busy sapping your concentration just below consciousness.

As you identify these energy-wasters, you need to do something about them. If it’s a worry about a loved one, for example, call him to see if things are okay, or just make a note on your calendar to visit him. The idea here is that by either directly resolving the issue or “categorizing” it, you’ll be able to drop it. This can work even if all you do is tell yourself “I can’t do anything about this until Tuesday.” Saying so gives your mind permission to drop the thought for now.

You see, concentration is automatic once you focus your attention – until you are distracted by your surroundings or your own thoughts. This may be every few seconds for some of us, but by using the tips above and the simple exercises, you can learn to remove the distractions, and control your wandering mind. In other words, you can clear out the brain fog.

What are the metaphors we live by? Is life a journey, a game, a dream, or a movie we are watching? How do these metaphorical perspectives affect our lives? Let’s take a look at a few of them.

Life Is Purgatory

Some people see life as a sort of purgatory to be suffered through. In fact, many religions explicitly use this metaphor. Life is suffering, they claim, and by suffering virtuously, you get to go to some wonderful place afterwards. This idea shows up in other ways as well. Some people think it is normal to work at a job or jobs that they hate for most of their lives, in order to get the “reward” of retirement.

Life Is A Party

Now this is a more enjoyable metaphor. At least for a while. People who live by this metaphor, though, often end up bitter later in life. Partying to excess has its consequences, and a party has to be paid for by someone. Having no money for food and drink takes a lot of the fun out of a party.

Life Is A Movie

This is one of those metaphors we live by both consciously and unconsciously. People will sometimes say things like, “This is my big scene,” or “Is this the part where…” followed by some movie reference. More often, people just unconsciously take the role of movie-goer in their own lives, feeling like they are watching a story directed by someone else.

In one sense, this perspective provides a more objective view that may keep a person from suffering too much. The next scene is on its way, after all, and there are always unexpected plot twists that can be good or bad. On the other hand, this perspective creates a sense of passivity. Maybe it would be a more useful metaphor for life if a person also saw himself as the writer, director and producer of the movie.

The Best Metaphors We Live By

What are the best metaphors for life? Many have their useful aspects. A “journey,” “quest,” or “path,” would keep you looking for the better way in life, and perhaps motivate you to overcome any obstacles. A “story,” might give your life meaning. The metaphor “adventure” could make you see life problems and challenges as interesting and exciting.

However, all metaphors are limiting too. For example, life my be more fun as a “game,” but a game has winners and losers, and competition is the rule. This isn’t always true in life, and a person would miss out on a lot if this was her ruling metaphor. Even “quests,” or “journeys,” have their problems. They don’t allow much for the idea sitting still and enjoying just “being.”

The metaphors we live by, then, should probably change continually, to get the best out of each, without being limited by it. See your life as a movie, for example, when times are tough, and consider the later scenes in which your problems are resolved. Then see your life as a game to be played when you need to make strategic life decisions. When it is time to learn life lessons and develop your spirituality, let your life be an “awakening.”

After working in a casino for years, I found myself using that as a metaphor for life. There were players who put the odds in their favor and so won, just as in life. Those who played when the odds were against them (most players) lost money, and their occasional “wins” were just bait to keep them losing. This seemed to parallel life in general too. Of course the “house” or casino owners always won. There were certainly lessons here, as there often are in the metaphors we live by.

The two creativity tips that follow suggest two of the dozens of basic questions you can ask to increase the creativeness of your thinking. Ask these as you work on something, and you can see more creative results today.

1. A Question Of Purpose

Asking certain questions can lead to more creative ideas. These questions don’t include “How is everyone else doing this?” or “What is the usual approach to this problem?” Here is a better one: “What is the important goal here, and how could that be accomplished differently?”

The idea is to look past the form to the function, and find new ways to achieve that. For example, when you consider your job, the most creative approach is not to ask where you can find a better one, but to ask why you have one, and what alternatives there are. Is the purpose to make money, pay the bills, or work up to a better job?

Consider how you might accomplish each of these in other ways. Can you make a business of what you do? Can you write a book about the characters you work with? Can you get someone else to pay the bills (manage an apartment complex in exchange for rent and utilities?)? Can you design the position you want and then convince an employer that they need to create it just for you?

2. The Basic “What If” Question

This is a fun way to have more creative ideas. Just start asking crazy “what if” questions, and then find a way to make them not so crazy. Eventually you’ll refine a few of your ideas into something useful.

For example, if you run a college and want to develop more creative ways to educate people and increase enrollment, you could start by asking, “What if we made a drive-though window for students, instead of another classroom?” That seems crazy enough, so you start looking for ways to make sense of it – to create something useful from it.

The first thing that pops into your head is a drive through window for the bookstore – that seems like something which might work. Taking classes at such a window just seems too crazy, though, until you consider the window as just the place the student gets his or her assignments. What kind of assignments? That’s when you have your “breakthrough idea.”

The name “audio college” enters your mind, and you imagine classes on CDs. People spend so many hours in there cars, so why not use that time? A student could listen to class lectures while traveling or just driving to work or to the store. This isn’t appropriate for all classes, and on-site testing might be necessary, but perhaps as much as a third of the students credits could be accomplished in this form, and at a lower cost. Enrollment might go up with a system like this.

The key is to ask any “what if” question that comes to mind and play with it for a few minutes without criticizing any ideas that come to mind. Critical analysis should be done after this “brainstorming” session, so you don’t discourage your creativity. Many bad ideas will lead to good ones if they are allowed to develop and change.

The two creativity tips here cover just a couple of many dozens of creative thinking techniques, but they are powerful enough to get you thinking in new ways. Why not try them out today?

“Thinking games” are games and exercises that help develop thinking skills and so boost your brainpower. While some brain games exercise memory, or test knowledge (usually trivia), the following require analysis, creativity and imagination.

They can all be played alone in theory, but try to get a friend or two to participate. Two or more minds interacting helps you generate more ideas and gets you thinking in new directions. By the way, these produce no clear “winners,” so they’re not truly competitive games, but they are fun – and good for the brain.

The Survival Scenario Game

You can do this simple exercise in imagination anywhere. Invents a survival situation, like a plane crash in the mountains or a boat lost in the ocean. Make up some details like time of year, weather, and maybe specify no rescue for a month. Player then consider only what they are wearing or carrying at the moment, and try to think of ways to use each item in that survival situation (along with whatever things can be reasonably assumed to be part of the scenario).

Try for the most original and plausible ideas. For example, a paper clip could be a fish hook, or a needle for sewing together warm clothing from airplane seat material. A hat could be used for cooking by filling it with water and dropping heated stones into it until it boils. A straw for drinking from coconuts could be made from a pen.

For an alternate version, you can choose just one object at a time from any in the room. Then everyone can try to think of uses for it in the given survival scenario. Either way, this is a real exercise of one’s imagination and creativity.

The New Perspective Game

For this one, you and a friend start with something about which you disagree. It could be in the area of politics, philosophy, law, economics, or about any issue that is complex enough for reasonable people to have differing positions. Then you each try to make the best case you can for the other person’s position, and see who has the best argument. Another way to play this is to find any issue that you agree on, and both take the opposing view, to see what kind of ideas you each have.

This little debating game can change how you think about an issue. Once you effectively argue for anything, it’s very easy to start believing some of what you say. It demonstrates how powerful your mind is. When it adopts a given perspective, it can usually make sense of it quickly and defend it easily. That makes this exercise a warning as well. It suggests we can convince ourselves of almost anything, so perhaps our current thinking isn’t as rational as we like to think.

The Make-A-Joke Game

Trying to invent jokes can really get you thinking, and possibly laughing, but it can also be very frustrating. For this game, have someone choose any object in the room (or car, if you are driving). Players then try to come up with a joke or two about the object or involving it in some way. A reasonable time limit is perhaps five minutes. See who can create the funniest joke in that time.

Trying to create something funny is more difficult than it might seem. It will really exercise your lateral thinking abilities above all. I just chose the calendar on my wall as my random object, to give an example. A few minutes later, this is all I could come up with:

Bob, my friend, was tired of winter, so he tore January out of the calendar and pasted July in its place. The next week I asked him how this was working out for him. He sighed and told me “I just can’t get a break it seems. I mean, who would have thought it would snow on the fourth of July!” (My other one was about a guy who fell in love with the girl on the calendar because he could always get a date with her.)

Creating truly funny jokes is tough, but it will get you thinking, perhaps even  more than the other games here. For an alternative you could start with ideas or issues instead of objects, or you could specify that players have to create a funny riddle. And by the way, if you learn a few humor “algorithms,” this process gets easier.

What is real genius, and how do we cultivate it in ourselves? A common dictionary definition is, “Extraordinary intellectual power especially as manifested in creative activity.” Some definitions refer to a high IQ as well, but that doesn’t seem to be an important component. Both intellectual power and creativity can certainly exist without a high level of intelligence, as I will explain.

Real genius, then, whether in the sciences, arts, or business, is about finding new, creative and effective ways to do things. How high a man or woman scores on some test of intelligence is not so relevant. How productive he or she is in producing new ideas is the most defining factor.

Genius Is In The Software

If we look at the brain and mind as a computer, we can see that the physical part, made up of neurons and such, is the hardware. This is the computer before we install the operating system and various programs. If it is potentially more powerful, that’s great. But it isn’t enough. In order to realize that power, to use it, we need the programs. What would the computer on your desk be worth without any software? The same is true of our brains.

The software, then, consists of our ways of thinking. These are developed starting in childhood, but they are not static. We can continue to add new “programs” throughout life, and the right ones can dramatically increase one’s creativity. This is why a less intelligent man can be a genius at something, while a man with a much higher IQ may add little in the way of new ideas, thinking or products to the world. It is all about the software.

What about these “programs?” What are they, where do you get them and how do you install them? The bad news is that they do not install as easily as programs do on your desktop computer. You have to work with them for at least several weeks to make these new ways of thinking habitual. The good news is that once they do become a habit, they work for you almost effortlessly.

A “program” might be as simple as “the exploration of creative alternatives by looking at purposes.” This is something anyone can do, but few do it systematically or habitually. Work with this enough consciously, though, and it becomes a regular part of your thinking. You look at a textbook from a school, for example, and your mind asks “What are the purposes, and what does that suggest for alternatives?”

You see that a textbook is supposed to impart knowledge to the student. The questions that naturally arise include, “Does it do that well?” and “What else might suit this purpose?” The question of effectiveness makes you wonder what you would find if ten different textbooks on the same subject matter were used to teach students, and then we tested the students to see which group learned more. That leads you to the idea for a textbook testing service (currently, textbooks are often chosen according to the preferences educators, rather than by effectiveness). The “what else” part could get you thinking about making educational material into video games.

Other creative ideas will start to come to mind as you look at the matter, at least if that is the way your brain is programmed to work. And the “program” above is just one example of many techniques for creative thinking which you can “install” in yourself. A higher IQ could be helpful, and raising yours may be possible, but that is not nearly as important to developing real genius as changing the ways in which you think.