Take a good, long look at the newspaper you’re reading. What could it be used for If you think this is an unimaginably draft question with blindingly obvious answers--such as reading or lining the cat-litter Way--then you are sadly lacking in creativity and inventiveness. For you are mired in "functional fixedness"--a slavish adherence to the belief that paperclips, pens and newspapers have but one use. This is why you have pointedly failed to make a million by dreaming up clockwork radios, airbags, waterproof mascara, bagless vacuum cleaners or gel-filled bras.
Happily, your prospects need not remain so dismal. According to Gary Fitzgibbon, a cheered psychologist and an expert on creativity, anyone can break out of their mental shackles and become a free-thinking individual, able to come up with dazzling ideas and novel ways to solve problems.