Awareness – is the skill of thinking about our thinking. Edward de Bono describes the brain as a ‘self-organising system’, meaning we don’t have to think about what it does. If, however, we recognise that something in this automatic process has pre-disposed us to see things in a certain way, we need to be aware of this. The skill of awareness helps us recognise the times our mind may not be acting in our best interest.

Visualisation – the skill of creating situation-specific and context-appropriate pictures (or patterns) in our mind. Visualisation is about lowering arousal and creating appropriate patterns for particular contexts, or what we call a ‘success metaphor’.

Emotion Management – the skill of understanding where our emotions come from, and being able to manage them better. Emotion management is about recognising the factors that form the emotions, and understanding that changing one of the factors changes the emotion. The process relies on high levels of trust, an atmosphere of transparency and empathy, and lots of practice.

Creativity – the skill that ties each of the other three together. Creativity, higher order thinking, thinking outside the square, each of these terms relate to the capacity to switch from automatic thinking to explorative thinking. And one way to stimulate this process is unfamiliar experiences – ‘walking over new ground’.