The art of problem solving. What a generous advice that is!! Thanks for the wonderful post. While on the other hand I use a very impractical method of problem solving. I have some of my favourite self help books always around me. Whenever I have a problem, I note it down precisely and believe that some answer will pop out of the books. Then I take up a random book, a random page and just read it out.

Answers appear out of nowhere! Try it and tell me what you think.

Hi Jaky,

You’re welcome, I’m happy to hear you enjoyed this advice!
I Have never tried your method but I can imagine it works, your mind can find words or phrases that can help you solve your problem IF you know what you need to solve. I will try this next time as an experiment.

Hey Diggy,

You have really hit the nail on the head here with this post. Something similar hit me a while back when someone close to me was dealing with severe depression and said that certain medication was allowing her to contain depressive outbursts however she felt it was all bottling up inside instead. She then bought a note pad and used it purely for writing down the feelings she had inside, even it they were just random outbursts like ‘AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH’

She found just releasing the feelings onto paper help her keep on top of everything. It’s the reason people are making professions out of ‘listening’ to problems.

Something also that can be great is ‘NLP’ which is worth investigating, and I will be posting on the subject this weekend.

Thanks for the insight
Andrew

Hey Diggy, I was worried when I saw “solve any problem in 20 minutes” that you might’ve forgotten the power of our unconscious minds. Luckily, you do include letting the problem sit for 24 hours. That to me is key. So often we try to think harder and harder about our problems (and it’s good to actively analyze them), but we forget that sometimes we need to WALK AWAY from the problem for a little bit until the best answer presents itself.

Thanks for sharing this method. It resonates well with other things I’ve read on problem-solving.

Hi Andrew,

Letting emotions build up inside you is never a good idea. It will lead to severe stress or even nervous breakdowns later.

Everyone should find a way to release emotions and frustrations on a regular basis, whether it be through physical activity (gym, running etc.) or meditation or even writing as I mentioned in this article.

NLP is really cool and the basics are not that hard to master. I really recommend a method called EFT (http://www.eftuniverse.com) which works wonders to overcome any negative emotion, doubt or frustration.

Thanks as always for you support and for saying hi:)

Hey Steven,
Yeah instant decisions are not always the best because they’re clouded by emotions, even though you are capable of producing the best answer right away.

I read of a study where they instructed the participants to sit down for 30 minutes in a room with no distractions with paper and a pen, and then to write down every possible word they could think of starting with the letter “C”. After the 30 minutes the exercise was over and they could continue their normal daily routines.

The interesting thing is that for up to 2 DAYS after the exercise, all participants reported back saying that their minds kept suggesting more and more words starting with the letter “C”. This shows indeed how powerful the subconscious mind is as you say.

Thanks for stopping by!

I love the part where you force yourself to write down all of the solutions to your problem.

Most of the time, depression or feelings of hopelessness set in when we feel like we’re trapped and that we have limited choices. When you use the first step and actually get yourself to a place where your mind is calm because you’ve fully vented, this second step can be awesomely powerful.

This step reinforces in your mind the fact that you do have options, this isn’t the end of the world, there are ways for you to solve your problem.

I believe the people who win are more resourceful than most people allow themselves to be and that’s why they enjoy the success they do! I thank you Diggy for contributing to myself and all your other raving fans here expanding who they are and what’s possible for them with the insights you share here.

Hey Lewis,
How are you doing man? Hope life is good!

Thanks for the fantastic comment as usual:)

Thanks Diggy, this sounds interesting. I’m going to try it out and will report back with the results!

Thanks Lucas, looking forward to seeing some feedback

Thank you Diggy for a clear and insightful article. I have used the same steps before, but you have outlined them just too perfect, so I had to re-blog.

Regards
Maryna.

Hi Maryna,
You’re welcome, happy to hear that you enjoyed the article:)
This is a method I’ve personally used many times when I’ve faced serious dilemma’s, and it’s helped me every time!

Thanks for stopping by,
have an awesome day!

Hi Diggy, I’ve done this exercise now and came back here to report the results.

In a nutshell: I’m blown away by how well this worked!

I’ve recently been experiencing increasing tendencies of procrastination and laziness without really being able to pinpoint where it was coming from.

So I did the excercise you recommended to solve this problem.

And it was just amazing! Even the first step of the process, just writing down my problems and feelings, was already helpful. While doing that, I realised for the first time consciously that I HAD certain problems.

The switch to the solution listing step then happened almost automatically. I did encounter some mental resistance initially but having just clearly defined the problems, the first solutions came to my mind naturally.

After a while, it seemed like I really got into a problem solving mindset and I couldn’t even write fast enough to keep up with all the solutions that came to my mind. This even continued after I had finished the exercise – the ideas just didn’t stop coming.

The key really was to realise that there had been some massive changes in my worklife that I hadn’t properly adapted to. (I won’t go into more detail in this comment to avoid it taking up several pages).

Also, I realised I hadn’t taken a proper vacation for quite a long time, and I’m just feeling a bit exhausted overall. So this sunday, my girlfriend and I will fly to the Chinese island paradise Hainan to spend a few nice days.

Diggy, thanks, and I’ll think of you while I’m jetskiing in the south chinese sea (isn’t that on your list of 100 things to do before you die too?)

Lucas

Hey Lucas,
Awesome buddy, I’m very happy to hear that!

Thank you so much for reporting back, your experience and confirmation of the method will be of great help to convince anyone who’s still skeptical.

It can be difficult to “see the forest through the trees”, i.e. to clearly see everything that’s going on in your head. Once you lay it all out on paper, it can be amazing how you suddenly see it differently.

I’m super jealous of your vacation! Enjoy it to the max!
It’s not on the list but definitely something I wanna do!

Diggy

P.S. One thing on my list is to bungee jump and I’m planning to go do the biggest bungee jump in the world this weekend. If you don’t see any more updates then you know something went wrong

Haha fantastic, have fun with that jump! It’s that jump off a bridge, isn’t it? A friend of mine has jumped off that one a couple of years ago.

I have a lot of respect for you – Personally, it already took all of my courage to bungee from a 50 meters crane in the harbour of Hamburg. I can’t even imagine what it must be like to look down that giant bridge!

Looking forward to hearing your report

uhhh dosen’t work to prove golbach’s conjecture or any of millinnium prize problems.

Haha, yeah you could be right about that!

i need some help from u diggy comment back when u r there…….

Hey, I’m here.
Send me an email at diggy@upgradereality.com

Cheers!