Can we think outside the box?

The Nine dot puzzle and one of its solutions

I wonder if its possible for any of us to think "outside the box" . Have you wondered how sometimes we are all so different and yet so similar. We all want the same thing and more often just because the other person thinks its important.Its very natural for us to use some one as a role model in our lives. When we were kids it was probably a parent,uncle or aunt or perhaps even one of our friends or even a rock/movie star. But we get more practical as we grow up and start setting some realistic goals.

As adults we don't realise that we lose the creativity we enjoyed as kids. We made a house out a cardboard box , made hand puppets from socks and made a TV out of a shoe box.As a kid I used anything around the house to make my saturday afternoons interesting. I collected the comic strips from the saturday paper and made my very own comic book.As adults do we allow our kids to think outside the box and explore themselves. Especially Indian parents are more or less obsessed with being making their child have a successful career. Why not let them explore and realise what they are good at and let them think outside the box.

Creativity is lost now with the Playstation and hand held video games.Kids do not want to explore.They prefer to sit down and use the computer or the tv for their entertainment.

The origin for the phrase is very obscure. In today's world its used most by management consultants and executive coaches in the business environment. This phrase was claimed to be introduced by John Adair in 1969 . The management consultants used the nine dot in the 1960s till the 1980s to challenge their clients. The challenge was to connect the nine dots by four straight,continuous lines without lifting the pencil from the paper. This demanded that the person use his creativity or lateral thinking. Now how many people encourage this generation to use lateral thinking. I think we would be able to create a whole generation of smart thinkers by just encouraging our kids to be more creative in their problem solving.
Now try to see if you can think outside the box and get another solution for the nine dot puzzle.Its a lot of fun.