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The Net and the Butterfly: The Art and Practice of Breakthrough Thinking
In The Charisma Myth , Olivia Fox Cabane offered a groundbreaking approach to becoming more charismatic. Now she teams up with Judah Pollack to reveal how anyone can train their brain to have more eureka insights.
The creative mode in your brain is like a butterfly. It's beautiful and erratic, hard to catch and highly valued as a result. If you want to capture it, you need a net. Enter the executive mode, the task-oriented network in your brain that help you tie your shoes, run a meeting, or pitch a client. To succeed, you need both modes to work together--your inner butterfly to be active and free, but your inner net to be ready to spring at the right time and create that "aha!" moment. But is there any way to trigger these insights, beyond dumb luck?
Thanks to recent neuroscience discoveries, we can now explain these breakthrough moments--and also induce them through a series of specific practices. It turns out there's a hidden pattern to all these seemingly random breakthrough ideas. From Achimedes' iconic moment in the bathtub to designer Adam Cheyer's idea for Siri, accidental breakthroughs throughout history share a common origin story. In this book, you will learn to master the skills that will transform your brain into a consistent generator of insights.
Drawing on their extensive coaching and training practice with top Silicon Valley firms, Cabane and Pollack provide a step-by-step process for accessing the part of the brain that produces breakthroughs and systematically removing internal blocks. Their tactics range from simple to zany, such
· Imagine an alternate universe where gravity doesn’t exist, and the social and legal rules thatÌýgovern it.
· Map Disney’s Pocahontas story onto James Cameron’s Avatar .
· Rid yourself of imposter syndrome through mental exercises.
· Literally change your perspective by climbing a tree.
· Stimulate your butterfly mode by watching a foreign film without subtitles.
By trying the exercises in this book, readers will emerge with a powerful new capacity for breakthrough thinking.
The creative mode in your brain is like a butterfly. It's beautiful and erratic, hard to catch and highly valued as a result. If you want to capture it, you need a net. Enter the executive mode, the task-oriented network in your brain that help you tie your shoes, run a meeting, or pitch a client. To succeed, you need both modes to work together--your inner butterfly to be active and free, but your inner net to be ready to spring at the right time and create that "aha!" moment. But is there any way to trigger these insights, beyond dumb luck?
Thanks to recent neuroscience discoveries, we can now explain these breakthrough moments--and also induce them through a series of specific practices. It turns out there's a hidden pattern to all these seemingly random breakthrough ideas. From Achimedes' iconic moment in the bathtub to designer Adam Cheyer's idea for Siri, accidental breakthroughs throughout history share a common origin story. In this book, you will learn to master the skills that will transform your brain into a consistent generator of insights.
Drawing on their extensive coaching and training practice with top Silicon Valley firms, Cabane and Pollack provide a step-by-step process for accessing the part of the brain that produces breakthroughs and systematically removing internal blocks. Their tactics range from simple to zany, such
· Imagine an alternate universe where gravity doesn’t exist, and the social and legal rules thatÌýgovern it.
· Map Disney’s Pocahontas story onto James Cameron’s Avatar .
· Rid yourself of imposter syndrome through mental exercises.
· Literally change your perspective by climbing a tree.
· Stimulate your butterfly mode by watching a foreign film without subtitles.
By trying the exercises in this book, readers will emerge with a powerful new capacity for breakthrough thinking.
288 pages, Hardcover
Published February 7, 2017
146 people are currently reading
1,238 people want to read
About the author
Olivia Fox Cabane
5Ìýbooks197ÌýfollowersWhat if charisma could be taught?
For the first time, science and technology have taken charisma apart, figured it out and turned it into an applied science: In controlled laboratory experiments, researchers could raise or lower people's level of charisma as if they were turning a dial.
In The Charisma Myth, Cabane takes a hard scientific approach to a heretofore mystical topic, covering what charisma actually is, how it is learned, what its side effects are, and how to handle them. She breaks charisma down into its fundamental components.
Olivia Fox Cabane is the author of The Net And The Butterfly and The Charisma Myth, cofounder of The KindEarthTech Foundation and former Director of Innovative Leadership for Stanford's accelerator, StartX. Her books have been translated into 32 languages, including Mongolian.
Official website: .
Follow Olivia on LinkedIn:
For the first time, science and technology have taken charisma apart, figured it out and turned it into an applied science: In controlled laboratory experiments, researchers could raise or lower people's level of charisma as if they were turning a dial.
In The Charisma Myth, Cabane takes a hard scientific approach to a heretofore mystical topic, covering what charisma actually is, how it is learned, what its side effects are, and how to handle them. She breaks charisma down into its fundamental components.
Olivia Fox Cabane is the author of The Net And The Butterfly and The Charisma Myth, cofounder of The KindEarthTech Foundation and former Director of Innovative Leadership for Stanford's accelerator, StartX. Her books have been translated into 32 languages, including Mongolian.
Official website: .
Follow Olivia on LinkedIn:
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
June 15, 2017
There is no other way to rate this book other than 5 stars. It is packed with information, tips and techniques for training breakthrough thinking and creativity. It contains information from the latest research of many fields, such as brain science, neuroscience, psychology, sociology, etc. Everything is written in simple language that is very easy to understand. In addition, all tips and guidelines are very easy to try, follow and implement. Book also contains many interesting example stories to demonstrate the principles behind breakthrough thinking and creativity.
In a short, this book contains everything one could want to know about breakthrough thinking and creativity. This is not just a regular book. It is a manual for learning how to master breakthrough thinking and creativity. From brain and how it works to how to improve your environment and mindset to have breakthroughs (reducing fear of failure, viewing failure as a good thing, etc.). It is all there. I highly recommend this book to everyone!
P.S.: Don't be surprised if you found out that you need to re-read it a couple of times. There is just so much information to grasp on the first read. I already re-read and re-listened some chapters.
In a short, this book contains everything one could want to know about breakthrough thinking and creativity. This is not just a regular book. It is a manual for learning how to master breakthrough thinking and creativity. From brain and how it works to how to improve your environment and mindset to have breakthroughs (reducing fear of failure, viewing failure as a good thing, etc.). It is all there. I highly recommend this book to everyone!
P.S.: Don't be surprised if you found out that you need to re-read it a couple of times. There is just so much information to grasp on the first read. I already re-read and re-listened some chapters.
August 6, 2017
At first I was sceptical about this book (maybe it is one these new age bullshit books which mask crap behind cherry picked scientific studies). I was wrong. It is inspiring book about how to be more innovative and how to deal with emotions that come along (like fear and quilt). It is very practical book which comes with excercies which could be done mostly sitting in a chair. As I've got older I've experienced that for breakthroughs you need deep focused work and relaxation. And almost as important is working with your emotions (I think most of the barriers to our successes comes from there). It was very reassuring to read that our brains are plastic and with training we could be mentally fit for long time (if brain could rewire itself to see (if you become blind) via clip in a tounge, imagine what could you learn in every day). Read it and do the excercises!
May 13, 2020
Very insightful work from one of my favorite new non fiction authors.
November 7, 2019
Powerful book to gain new capacity of breakthrough thinking. Olivia Fox as the former director of innovative leadership for Stanford StartX and Judah Pollack as current lecturer at the University of California combine research and exercises of modern neuroscience. Authors identified four distinct styles of breakthroughs (eureka breakthroughs, metaphorical breakthroughs, intuitive breakthroughs, and paradigm breakthroughs). How the brain works: connected brain modes (switching between EN and DN) to produce fertile environments for breakthroughs. How to achieve brakthroughs: allowing our minds to wander (changing our physical, auditory, social, and psychological environments), making association between unrelated ideas or subjects, increasing our plasticity (by do new things), and evaluating the breakthroughs by Edward de Bono's Six Thinking Hats. The supertool within this book also help us to overcome the blockers or inhibitors of breakthroughs butterflies (the spiders of fear, the wasps of failure, and the icy cold of uncertainty.)
Read and re-read this briliant thoughts, my rating absolutely 5/5.
Read and re-read this briliant thoughts, my rating absolutely 5/5.
August 4, 2019
I enjoyed the first part of this book immensely then worked my way through it at a slower pace. The book gets technical at a certain point and it was here that my interest began to fade. Nevertheless, for anyone wishing to learn about breakthrough thinking, especially in regard to invention, marketing, or any other commercial venture, I think this book would be very useful.
My interest was perhaps more in the way the unconscious yields up ideas from the depths, how these ideas form and what causes certain things to converge into ideas in the first place. This is the stuff of speculation and individual experience, and i was probably expecting too much hoping that I would find answers here.
What the book taught me was that much research has gone into investigating how creative ideas can be "caught" as in a net, and that although the origination of ideas remains a mystery it is nevertheless possible to increase the number of ideas we capture and, thus, increase our potential for generating new and novel solutions to problems.
My interest was perhaps more in the way the unconscious yields up ideas from the depths, how these ideas form and what causes certain things to converge into ideas in the first place. This is the stuff of speculation and individual experience, and i was probably expecting too much hoping that I would find answers here.
What the book taught me was that much research has gone into investigating how creative ideas can be "caught" as in a net, and that although the origination of ideas remains a mystery it is nevertheless possible to increase the number of ideas we capture and, thus, increase our potential for generating new and novel solutions to problems.
July 23, 2017
This is the second work I've read by Ms Cabane. That may be the problem actually. A staggering amount of the information here about increasing creativity is also represented, sometimes completely verbatim from her first work on Charisma. While I recognize that mental discipline, agility, and the like will be similar I feel like it's a derivative work rather than a fresh science.
That gripe aside, I do think specifics in the book are well researched, unique, and practical. There are portions that really can help, even if they seem a bit ridiculous. I'd encourage anyone to have a read through it, simply for the applicable changes you can make to planning that have an effect.
That gripe aside, I do think specifics in the book are well researched, unique, and practical. There are portions that really can help, even if they seem a bit ridiculous. I'd encourage anyone to have a read through it, simply for the applicable changes you can make to planning that have an effect.
April 11, 2018
This is a varied collection of active thinking techniques some of which could even be labeled new age: meditation, etc. Be prepared for "loving kindness" and "mindfulness". Well, at the peak levels, it is all a head game and this motivating compendium of approaches reminds us of the activating effects of altruism, and the voice of genius that can be heard in zen-like tranquility. There are also useful approaches to corral brainstorming sessions in meetings, etc.
September 14, 2017
Useless psychobabble. Lots of platitudes. Little real substance.
August 1, 2018
Waste of time. Very little first party data. The second half of the book is especially unoriginal. The first half had a bit of intrigue.
January 6, 2019
I like that the authors have included different types of practices that can help you to achieve breakthrough thinking and the chapter summaries.
March 30, 2019
Her book Charisma Myth is a favorite of mine. This one was not at the same level and took me longer to finish, but I really enjoyed the main premise.
September 3, 2017
Any book proclaiming to offer, "The Art and Practice of Breakthrough Thinking" ought to be approached with great skepticism. And it's not that, of course. But hype aside, what it is is chock full of interesting ideas about creativity; the workings of the brain; obstacles to overcome; and tips and techniques for exploring, practicing, and challenging your own creative capacities. The examples are relevant and compellingly presented, the chapters are compact and full of ideas, and the tools and exercises are organized for maximize ease of use and ready reference. It's an enjoyable read, and a useful set of ideas to have so handily presented.
December 14, 2024
First off- I need Olivia Fox Cabane to write more books as both of hers are excellent (this and Charisma myth).
Secondly and more importantly- I thought this book was fantastic. While a bit heavy on the metaphors at times, it does an amazing job covering not just the main topic (how to be more creative and have break thru ideas) but also delves into how to think more clearly in general and live a more fulfilled life. Easily one of my favorite books this year!
Secondly and more importantly- I thought this book was fantastic. While a bit heavy on the metaphors at times, it does an amazing job covering not just the main topic (how to be more creative and have break thru ideas) but also delves into how to think more clearly in general and live a more fulfilled life. Easily one of my favorite books this year!
July 24, 2017
An inspiring and approachable guide to innovative thinking
I appreciate the collection of approachable frames and exercises for tackling creative and breakthrough thinking. Their fusion of art and science of the brain is very informative and valuable for leaders looking to spread creativity to their teams and customers. Enjoy!
I appreciate the collection of approachable frames and exercises for tackling creative and breakthrough thinking. Their fusion of art and science of the brain is very informative and valuable for leaders looking to spread creativity to their teams and customers. Enjoy!
January 31, 2018
A fantastic book for anyone interested in the psychology and neuroscience behind breakthrough and innovative thinking. Clear, with practical examples and exercises, this book is definitely one you can keep going back to, whatever you are facing in your personal or professional life.
February 5, 2018
The book provides useful insight on the periods between deep work that lead to breakthroughs. It includes concrete practices you that can be implemented in your workflow to bring about such mental states.
October 2, 2018
This is one of the best books I have read so far.
The book is properly designed to make you grasp all the important information it has within.
Many things to learn, be ready to scratch your mind.
I'd recommend doing the exercises found they are really helpful.
Breathtaking!
The book is properly designed to make you grasp all the important information it has within.
Many things to learn, be ready to scratch your mind.
I'd recommend doing the exercises found they are really helpful.
Breathtaking!
December 27, 2018
Fantastically practical, tons of techniques and exercises to cultivate creativity and creative problem solving. I particularly enjoyed the ones for leveraging the brain's default mode network (DMN.) One of my top favorite books!
February 28, 2020
Was reading this book on the plane and got more interested in watching my daughter's inane game on her Ipad. Even the in flight magazine was more interesting.
Sometimes, books just don't click for me and this is one of them.
Sometimes, books just don't click for me and this is one of them.
March 18, 2021
Wonderful book that describes how to utilize the different aspects of your brain to work together and solve problems in fresh ways. If you have experienced a great idea during a shower or other down time, you have experienced the techniques described in this book.
May 1, 2024
The second party of the book about how to handle failure is on point and was super interesting.
Loved this statement:
Breakthroughs do not come from people who stand in the certainty of their answers, but from those who have the courage to stand in the uncertainty of their questions.
Loved this statement:
Breakthroughs do not come from people who stand in the certainty of their answers, but from those who have the courage to stand in the uncertainty of their questions.
June 5, 2017
I loved this book though I believe it deserves more stopping and reflecting than I did the first time through. Will read again!
Great science & story if you like brain/psychology stuff.
Great science & story if you like brain/psychology stuff.
November 29, 2017
Fascinating, and, I believe more true than most believe this book makes you think through the cause and effect of many things in the complex adaptive system we call life.
May 27, 2019
Believe it or not, geniuses are living in your head. This book teaches you how to get the best of them and break through even the most irritating blocks in your thinking.
January 13, 2024
Very insightful work from one of my favorite new non fiction authors.
October 11, 2024
Some useful concepts here for sparking the inner genius.
July 15, 2022
A wonderful book for those who are involved in creative thinking.
April 19, 2021
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April 18, 2017
This book was rich with information, tips and techniques for breakthroughs...after 4 years of research the author has used information about brain science, neuroscience, etc. It's written so the layman can understand. I especially like the chapter on brain plasticity. I've already used some recommended techniques and have experienced some creative breakthroughs. I'll likely re-read it and portions of it several times.
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April 20, 2017Recommended by Favianna Rodriguez.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
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