Inspiration Archives: Dr. Ellen Weber, Ph.D.

Innovating your intelligence adds successful opportunities, one brain cell at a time, regardless of what happened or failed to happen at school.

Trying to figure out how people get smarter led me to ask, "What do geniuses do differently?" Traditional questions about IQ, I found, often lead to misconceptions that you are not smart. Geniuses may get kicked out of school, as Einstein did, but they rarely trip over false notions of fixed intelligence.

Fact is, intelligent people rewire daily for updated mental tools and so can you. To act like a genius is to develop mental tools that master change, contribute gems to innovative circles, and lower speed bumps on life's coolest highways.

Regardless of age, position or education, geniuses and most ordinary people can find success in spite of barriers. A genius tends to replace common misconceptions with mind-bending facts that optimize more brainpower.

At the heart of the idea of mental reinvention are some newly discovered facts: IQ is not fixed and brains can rewire completely overnight. Moreover, brainpower comes to those who ask "What if...?" kinds of questions. Ask, for instance, what if I could rewire mentally today to risk a life-changing inspiration? What does one do next?

Start small. Question one event in your day, and you'll trigger new ways of seeing angles that eluded you in past. Bored? Then drive to work a new way. Too many rigid routines? Read the morning news from back to front.

Use mental tactics that switch it up, help you act from a new premise, and break with traditions to embrace change. Brain gurus say this is how you "generate new neuron pathways to achieve more of what you want." Whatever you call this mental reboot, it takes less effort and adds more dividends than most people think.

Target one visible improvement in your day and the brain begins to create conscious impressions for you to improve other parts. Do you see challenges at work or in relationships?

Let's say you are part of a team where one person dominates. Brainstorm one solution with peers over lunch, such as mutual collaboration on a project together, and you'll recharge the collective brainpower for positive neuron pathways toward doable solutions. Expect insights to crack other related problems as well, once you begin to look at problems with solutions in mind.

Reflect on your personal strengths as mental tools, and soon you'll begin to accomplish things never before accomplished by using parts of your brain never before used. It changes that little voice inside that limits ideas about your unique brand of brainpower. The same challenges that stop some people, tend to launch others who take time to reflect and act as masterminds do. That leads to genius IQ.