Day 26 of Embracing the wonders of Life!

Day 26 of Embracing the wonders of life!

This is picture is from my home town in Utrecht. On a very iconic building called “The Inktpot” (the bottle of ink, you would put your pen in), a UFO landed in 1999. It was part of an art exhibition in Utrecht, where from the iconic Dom Tower, you would be able to see many different art objects. Most of the objects have already been removed, but since the people loved the UFO so much, it has remained a permanent part of the Utrecht skyline.

It triggers me on many levels. Why would you come up to land something so futuristic on such a characteristic building. I can imagine that the artist looked through the eyes of the aliens. If you would land on a place, would you just pick any place, or would you pick out something iconic (irregardless of the bad parking). I for sure would pick the iconic one.

This thought triggered other thoughts in me. As we sometimes are surprised by the questions from children on things we think are completely normal, can we challenge ourselves to look at our own life, work, thinking through the eyes of an alien. Imagine you have no background knowledge on topics, but you can ask questions through the eyes that just landed on earth.

I think this is something that people and organisations can adopt. Call it the “Alien sessions”. Take a certain topic and form two groups. One will act in their normal way of thinking and one group will act as the aliens. Challenging everything and really try to look through the eyes of an alien. Share the outcomes and see if this leads to new ideas. Also discuss and try to understand where the questions came from.

Remember, sometimes your clients or stakeholders are also not fully aware of your knowledge and will act like an Alien.

To give some extra inspiration listen to the amazing track “Little Green Man” from Steve Vai. Will bring you into alien spirits for sure!