The World of Creativity: Lessons from 75 Countries with Fredrik Haren #363

In this episode of the SuperCreativity Podcast, James Taylor welcomes back Fredrik Haren, the globally renowned Creativity Explorer and author of The World of Creativity: A Journey Across 37 Countries to Discover the Secrets of Creative Minds. Over the past 25 years, Fredrik has travelled to more than 75 countries, meeting everyone from artists in Afghan villages to innovation leaders in global corporations — all to answer one question: What is creativity?

In this fascinating and deeply human conversation, Fredrik shares the most powerful lessons he’s learned from creative people across cultures — from Thailand’s idea naps and Finland’s love of questions, to Japan’s Kaizen and America’s “move fast and break things.” Together, they explore how curiosity fuels creativity, why we must fall in love with the process (not the outcome), and how to un-alienate people to bold new ideas.

Whether you’re a leader, artist, or lifelong learner, this episode will help you see creativity not as a skill reserved for the few, but as a global language of exploration, humility, and connection.

Notable Quotes
“You can’t master what you don’t understand — and most people don’t understand the creative process.” – Fredrik Haren
“If you want to be more creative, become more curious.” – Fredrik Haren
“Don’t be a developed person; be a developing one. Stay soft, stay adaptable.” – Fredrik Haren
“Sometimes the smartest way to innovate is to make the alien familiar.” – Fredrik Haren
“Creativity isn’t about speed or slowness — it’s about knowing when to go fast and when to be patient.” – Fredrik Haren

Resources and Links

Book: The World of Creativity: A Journey Across 37 Countries to Discover the Secrets of Creative Minds
Website: fredrikharen.com
Recommended Read: Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art by James Nestor

Connect with Fredrik: Search “The Creativity Explorer” on Google or LinkedIn

Apple Podcast

Spotify Podcast

Takeaways

Creativity loves process, not product — The most creative people fall in love with the how, not just the what.
Curiosity is the fuel of creativity — In languages like Finnish and Bulgarian, the word for “curious” literally means “love of asking questions.”
Developing vs. developed mindsets — Declaring yourself “developed” kills innovation; true progress means staying open and unfinished.
Un-alienate new ideas — To introduce radical change, make the unfamiliar feel familiar through gradual storytelling and empathy.
Balance exploration and reflection — Fredrik’s creative rhythm alternates between global travel (inspiration) and quiet solitude on his private island (reflection).

In his upcoming book, James Taylor delves into the transformative concept of SuperCreativity™—the art of amplifying your creative potential through collaboration with both humans and machines. Drawing from his experiences speaking in over 30 countries, James combines compelling stories, case studies, and practical strategies to help readers unlock innovation and harness the power of AI-driven tools. This book is a must-read for anyone looking to elevate their creativity and thrive in the modern age of human-machine collaboration.

James Taylor is a highly sought-after keynote speaker, often booked months or even years in advance due to his exceptional expertise. Given his limited availability, it’s crucial to contact him early if you’re interested in securing a date or learning how he can enhance your event. Reach out to James Taylor now for an opportunity to bring his unique insights to your conference or team.

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CHAPTERS

Timestamps

00:00 – Introduction to Fredrik Haren and The World of Creativity
01:31 – What it means to be a “Creativity Explorer”
02:55 – Why so few people actively develop their creativity
04:22 – Loving the process: the German brewer’s lesson
06:18 – Creativity as practice, not performance
07:56 – The student mindset and the power of curiosity
09:52 – Cultural biases in creativity and the danger of “developed” thinking
11:50 – Why progress stalls in the most advanced countries
13:43 – The psychology of complacency and lack of imagination
17:04 – “Un-alienating” ideas: how to make the new less scary
19:45 – Lessons from Thai “idea naps” and Sabai Sabai philosophy
22:35 – The neuroscience of rest and creativity
24:20 – Fredrik’s creative process: selective seclusion and exploration
26:10 – Globalization and why sameness kills creativity
29:46 – Cultural fusion vs. cultural flattening
31:32 – Kaizen vs. “move fast and break things” — two creative speeds
32:33 – Profound patience: creativity lessons from Afghanistan
36:12 – AI, safety, and the speed of innovation
37:04 – How to explore creativity without leaving your city
39:30 – Storytelling, curiosity, and human connection
40:29 – Inspiration vs. respiration: why ideas need to be acted on
41:51 – Fredrik’s current book recommendation: Breath by James Nestor
43:05 – Where to find Fredrik and pre-order The World of Creativity

TRANSCRIPT

James Taylor (00:09)

Today's guest is Fredrik Haren known to many as the creativity explorer. Over the past 25 years, Fredrik has traversed more than 60 countries to uncover the hidden rhythms of creative life, from artists in remote villages to tech innovators in global capitals. His book, The World of Creativity, a Journey Across 37 Countries to Discover the Secrets of Creative Minds, is not a how-to manual, it's a map of how creativity actually lives, breathes and adapts across cultures. Fredrik's own story is creative. He built and sold a company, then pivoted to a life of storytelling, exploration, and keynote speaking, shifting continents and mindsets along the way. So whether you're curious about how to take ideas from local to global, or how your environment can become your creative teacher, then this is a conversation I think you're really gonna enjoy. Fredrik Haren, please welcome, I welcome you to the SuperCreativity Podcast. Fredrik Haren (01:01) Thank you so much. So happy to be here. James Taylor (01:04) Now you've been on this show before and so I will put a link for people who want to listen to that and we talked a little bit more about your background, your story, but I remember when I met you at an event or we were a conversation recently and I was asking you kind of how you describe today what you do, how you think of your identity, what you do today. So if someone come up to you at a party or you're sitting on a plane sitting next to you, how do you describe what you do? Fredrik Haren (01:31) Well, then I would describe myself as the creativity explorer, as you just did. But then what does it mean to be the creativity explorer? the more I basically, to explore means to venture into unknown territory in order to learn more about something. And that's what I do about creativity. But the way what I realized is what I really enjoy is meeting with people around the world from all walks of life and to discover what they can teach me about creativity. So it's this meet, it's this encounters with other creative people and the lessons they can teach us. The more people I interview, the more I realized that that's where the interesting stuff. James Taylor (02:16) I remember watching one of the very first videos I ever saw of you and you asked a question to the audience about how many of you consider yourself creative. And I'm interested, as you've traveled around the world, does that number differ? Does that percentage in the room differ or does it differ more by industries that you're speaking for? Fredrik Haren (02:36) It does differ through industries. It also differs through countries. So I was in Cannes on Friday and I interviewed, I did a speech for lawyers and lawyers tend to be more confident than the average profession. But on the hand, they were from Finland, which is slightly above average, but not super high. So we got around 70 % there. So countries and cultures and professions both affected how people answer. But recently I've... James Taylor (02:55) Yeah. Fredrik Haren (03:05) I've added another question. So I've asked this question. Do you think you are, do you think creativity is important in your job? And then I asked the second question, do you think you are creative? I've started to ask, and that I've been asking over a million people, but recently I've asked, I added another question and that question is, do you think you're doing enough to develop your creativity? And the funny thing is that almost no one says yes. Not the people who don't think they are creative. But also not the people who raise their hand and say they are creative. They also don't think, they usually don't say, yes, I'm doing enough. Or basically they are saying, I could do more. And that's the thing that fascinates me the most right now. Like how do we get people to want to become a little bit more creative or a lot more creative? James Taylor (03:49) So if we think we had a guest on the show, Professor ⁓ Anna Abraham, who from the Torrance ⁓ School of Creativity in the US, and she was talking about this idea that creativity being like a muscle is something you can improve ⁓ on over the ages. So why do you feel most people... don't have a sense that is like working out and going to a gym something that they can improve on over time. Is that the issue they just don't think is possible or is the issue that you know it's just not something that's just not on their radar at all? Fredrik Haren (04:22) I think it's that we don't think about it enough as a process. so I, one of the first sentences in the book that's coming out now, I'm so sure we're going to talk about it. One of the sentences in the book is you can't master that which you don't understand. And most people don't understand the creative process. So that, and that's, that's what I want people to understand, to become better at, to understand them. And I, one of the people I mentioned in the book is a German brewer, like a student of, he went to a brewery school. He's a German. It's the oldest brewery school in the world. They've been brewing beer in the same location for 700 years and they have a brewery school there. So it's super cool. But he said there are two kinds of people who apply to the brewery school. Half of the students love beer. They just love drinking beer, right? And they say, maybe I should work with beer and make beer. And the other half, they love like chemistry. They like the process of making beer. And he said it's a two year course, but after one year, half of the students have quit. Almost all come from the same category. Which category quit? James Taylor (05:29) This first group is the ones that just like drinking beer. Fredrik Haren (05:32) Exactly. So they get super bored when they have to study all that. They just don't want the beer to come out at the end. But the people who love the process, that's like, oh, I wonder why this happened. And it doesn't matter what creative process we're thinking about. If we're thinking about delivering a speech, like you and I do, or brewing beer, or painting, or whatever it is, the truly creative ones are the ones that are in love with the process. And if we can learn to master the creative process, learn more about how the creative process works, we will become more creative. So that's the mission I'm on right now. James Taylor (06:08) It's almost a little bit like those that think that Scott Adams, the artist who said, ⁓ you should focus on ⁓ process, not outcomes. I think that was the way that he said it. So, you know, he said, if you're going, if you wanted to get fit, rather than focus on, I wanna lose a stone, you say, every day, I'm gonna walk. Fredrik Haren (06:18) Mmm, yeah, exactly. James Taylor (06:28) you for 10 times, you I just, kind of, you turn it more process driven and then it allows a little bit more flexibility and a bit more fun perhaps with it. We had a guest on the other day, just talked about tiny experiments. You know, sometimes we get overly fixated on these big things, but actually if you take it from the perspective of you're like a laboratory technician, a scientist going in, like, what can I explore today? Like, what can I test today to see how this process is going to change? Then I guess you kind of, you, fall in you can fall in love with that process even if the end outcome is not maybe the thing that you thought of like a scientist, no. Fredrik Haren (07:00) Yes. It's not even the most important thing for most people. I mean, that's a lot of people contact me and say, oh, I want to become a keynote speaker. And I say, usually say, so why? And the people who say, oh, I love being on the stage. I are the ones I'm the most skeptical about. I mean, and I like, you know, I really like you as a speaker because you are very focused on the process, both the speaking process, the writing process, the selling process. You're a process guy and you're very successful in it. James Taylor (07:28) Yeah. Fredrik Haren (07:31) It's the people who, and I just interviewed a musician in Indonesia. He writes all kinds, he's in a band, he writes movie music, all kinds of stuff. He's been doing it for, I don't know, 40 years. But when I asked him to introduce himself, he didn't say, hello, I am a musician. He said, I am a student of music. And I think that was so beautiful. Because when you're a student of music, you're never dumb. James Taylor (07:56) student. Fredrik Haren (07:58) You always just want to continue to learn and you want to know how does that work and how does that person do that and why is it that way? And if you approach it that way again, you're loving the process of it and if you fail it's just an interesting learning experience, right? It's part of the process. James Taylor (08:13) So it's almost like, know, that going back almost like one step before the creativity bit, I think like is almost the curiosity bit, the fuel that you put in. that's the, know, by saying you're a student of, it's also that kind of ends that beginner's mind, that kind of Zen beginner's mind of like, I'm a student, I'm curious, like what's this gonna be? And then maybe what you do is ends up being creative in the process, but that's not necessarily the key driver. Fredrik Haren (08:20) Hmm. Yes. Yes. And I just learned it yesterday on Friday because I was doing a speech for Finnish people. And I speak about curiosity because I think curiosity is the number one thing for creativity. It's the one, it's the strongest trigger. If you want to become more creative, become more curious. The Finnish word for curious, if I remember it correctly, is Utteleas. And Utteleas means the love of asking questions. Someone who loves asking questions. And the student of music, I mean, that implies that you go and ask them, like, how did you do that? And so I love the curi... It's also the same in Bulgarian, if I'm not wrong. It's lupiten, which means the same thing. It's the love of asking questions. So I love those languages that where curiosity means loving asking questions. I want to more, I want to keep finding out more. I'm going to ask one more question. Before you go, one more question. That is the essence of curiosity. James Taylor (09:39) Curiosita, as they say in Latin. So you speak of, in the book, rigid processes, kind of blocking innovation. So in your travels, you travel to all these different countries, look at creativity in all different kind of ways. Yeah. Fredrik Haren (09:52) I have to correct you though. The internet is not always right. It's not 60 countries, it's 75 countries. James Taylor (09:58) 75, okay, we're gonna add, you can never trust Wikipedia in this thing, but as you've looked, you've traveled around these countries, where have you seen kind of creative systems fail or kind of formalize processes for creativity and innovation where it hasn't worked and where maybe structures kind of suffocated? possibilities and how did those creatives, how did they kind of navigate structures so they can actually get to the thing they actually want to get to? Which examples did you see where there was some blockers up there to ⁓ innovation creativity and how did those individuals try to overcome some of those blockers? Fredrik Haren (10:42) Yeah, it's important to understand that the book is not about how creativity, like how one culture looks at creativity. I'm not an anthropologist. This book is about how I meet with creative people around the world and what they teach me about creativity. But in some cases, like for example, language will affect how we think and so on. But to answer your question, I wrote another book a few years ago, actually many years ago now, 2010 maybe? and it's called the Developing World. And the essence of that book is that it's very dangerous to call yourself a developed country because when you call yourself a developed country, you define yourself as being done. the developed means done, right? That's what it means. While developing means I'm still growing. So developed cement is solid, but developing cement is still soft. You can still change it. So I think the biggest mistake the Developed World did was by defining yourself as being developed, meaning we are more or less done. Because of course we're not done. Like 500 years from now they're gonna look at us and say how on earth could they ever think they were done? they were so, sorry. James Taylor (11:50) They weren't going around in flying cars. How could they possibly have gone... I just need to go to Dubai for that. Fredrik Haren (11:53) Oh, flying cars we have already. Come on. We don't even imagine what they are going to look at. are they going to... So I did a speech. I do speeches in Norway, the most developed country on earth, the richest country, one of the most peaceful countries. They have all the potential. And you ask Norwegians, do you think Norway will be better tomorrow than it is today? 90 % say no. They're like, oh, we've reached, we can't get better than this. I said, come on. That's like looking at someone who's going to Harvard with a rich parent and say, my life can't get better than this. Of course it can. When you go to a developed country where people are much less fortunate, but they look, yeah, of course my life will be better. And so the idea of looking at your side, and I'll give you a very sad example, Sweden, where I left Singapore and moved back to Sweden. Sweden still doesn't have a single airport that has an automatic passport machine reading capability. It's not a single, not even a trial. Okay, Singapore has only that. Like there's a hundred percent have that. And then if it doesn't work, there's one person sitting there to help you. And I was recently coming into Sweden. I had to queue up for like 20 minutes because a human had to look at my passport and they don't have enough humans. And I finally come up and I say, why don't you have this in Sweden? They have this in Singapore since 10 years. And the person there says, that's cute. And then I got so angry. So I went back and I Googled it. It turns out Mongolia has it. How on earth can Mongolia have a technology that Sweden doesn't have? It blows my mind. And the only reason is we think we're so great. So we need to constantly challenge how we do things. And we also have to understand that nothing is not even close to being done. No technology, no process, no procedure is even close to being perfect yet. And we need to stop that mentality. James Taylor (13:43) So that mentality, where is, do you have a sense? Because obviously you've gone around different countries and obviously Norway has this going on, I'm in the UK just now, Sweden, we often have this, in the UK we call it that'll do syndrome, that'll do. It's good enough, that'll do. And then I look at... They've just built the highest bridge ever in China, and I used to live in China as well. Unbelievable feat of engineering, and they've done it in kind of record time. And I wonder, okay, well, why in these supposedly developed countries has that mindset got in, saying, you don't need to be more creative, that'll do. Where does it stem from? Because I don't think it's maybe just a Western thing. Obviously, you travel into different parts, you go to different parts of Asia, and you see it in other parts of the world as well. What's going on there? Fredrik Haren (14:35) No, I think I said it is a mindset more than anything else. It's partly the fact that we think we're so advanced versus others, which and then it's partly ignorance thinking we're so much better than they are. And then it's lack of imagination. They can't get better than this. Of course, of course. Like I saw an interesting, interesting graph of the largest ship ever built through hundreds of years. And I don't remember the statistics now, but roughly, let's say every hundredth year. the largest ship ever built is twice the size of what it was 100 years ago. Here's an interesting fact. Every time when they built that ship, people have said, that's the biggest ship we can ever build. And then 100 years later, we have doubled in size. And now recently, they released the biggest ship ever built, which is like twice as the size that it was X amount of years ago. And people go, yeah, and now we've reached the limit. We can't build bigger than this. Yeah, right. Yeah, probably. Right now, we've reached the limit of ship building. So the lack of imagination is a huge problem. James Taylor (15:31) But I- But I guess there is also something obviously within the psychology of people as well about... being reticent to change, reticent to kind of applying creativity, reticent to the big jump forwards. There was an event I did, I actually did two events recently, I spoke at them and one of the other speakers was a guy called Zach Cass. I don't know whether you've maybe spoken on similar events with him and Zach from, used to be at OpenAI. And he tells a story which I think is quite an interesting story, which is when they first brought in elevators. he said, up ⁓ until that point, no building was taller than three stories, I think it was. whoever invented the elevator, I'm not sure who invented the elevator, but they put the first elevator and the problem that they had is no one would get into it. They thought, why would I go into a box? So they had to do two things. They had to put an attendant. Their sole job was just to press the buttons, which floor do you want? And then the other thing they had to do, which was like a psychology thing, they had to put mirrors inside. So when you went in, the first thing you did was look at yourself rather than look at the room. And then gradually they could remove the attendant and then maybe gradually they could move that. But then after that point, it was possible to build buildings taller than three stories. And that, previously people, you can't go higher than that because it's going to take too long to walk up the stairs as well. So it feels like sometimes you have these inflection points a little bit, but have to find clever ways, creative ways to take people on that journey with you. Fredrik Haren (17:04) Yes. And one of the people I interviewed in the book is she introduces the concept of un-alienating. So when you see something new, like something that's new to you or something that you think like, we can't build bigger, higher buildings than this, like Burj Khalifa. Now Saudi Arabia is going to build something that's twice as big as that. Like, how is that possible? whatever, this is actually, she works with the marketing. James Taylor (17:22) Yeah. Fredrik Haren (17:31) marketing director as a sausage company and they were going to introduce a sausage with no meat in it, like a totally vegetarian sausage. And everyone there said, oh, come on, can't, like we've been doing meat sausages for a hundred years. It's no way that you can make a sausage that tastes good, that doesn't have meat in it. It's not possible. So, and then, but of course they did. And, but the process you call it unalienating is when someone introduced something that is so different than what we're used to, we look at it as literally an alien. It's like, ah, that it's simple, like, And then the process is how do you get people to be befriended? So think of ET. We do the analogy in the book, thinking of ET, you know, the alien. So the first thing you see is, oh, what is that scary thing? And then slowly you befriend it and after a while you're friends with it. That's a process. You can actually, if you're introducing a really novel idea, you can actually ask yourself, how do I, what is the process I need to use to unalienate people to this idea? And you can't just suddenly take an alien and just put it in front of you. You're going to scare the shit out of them. So you need to slowly do in the process of the sausages. It's ⁓ too long to share here. But basically, they did a process. How do we get people used to the idea of a sausage with no meat in it? And we can do that with any new idea. We can un-alienate people towards it. And that skill is rhetoric. You need to develop a rhetorical path to get people to accept your new idea. Apple was very good at that when they introduced new products. They get us to feel like this is totally new at the same time it's not scary. James Taylor (19:04) Yeah. And actually, you talk about sausage making, they say that there's two things you never want to see what goes into the making of. One is making sausages, the other one is making loaves. So you're dispelling that, you're actually showing how the sausages, vegan sausages perhaps, or as I'm told now, you have to say plant forward, not vegan, because some people get a bit funny about the word vegan. ⁓ So you're kind of stripping back that. And all these people you interviewed in the book, ⁓ small scale creators, Fredrik Haren (19:13) You James Taylor (19:32) Artists, in innovation and organizations, whose story shifted your thinking the most when it comes to your conception of creativity, what creativity is and how it operates? Fredrik Haren (19:45) Well, they're actually, like you said, it's 37 countries, but I've introduced thousands of people in 75 countries. You could say that these are the 37. Why 37? It's the 37 that changed the way I look at creativity. So every single one of them somehow changed the way I look at creativity. Did we talk about the Thai, the Thailand, the Sabai Sabai last time? I don't remember. Okay. So this is one of my favorites because it's so useful for us. James Taylor (20:09) No, I don't think we did. Fredrik Haren (20:14) for my own personal development as an individual. So I met this origami artist in Thailand, her name is Kai, and she does beautiful origami paper flowers. And I was interviewing her in her studio, and I asked her, so for some reason we started talking about creative block. And I said to her, what do do if you have a creative block? And she looked at me, didn't really understand the question. So like when you get stuck, what do you do? And she goes, I go to Starbucks. Okay, so what do do when you're a Starbucks seller? Are you thinking of the problem? What are you doing? And she said, I'm thinking of what coffee to drink. Oh yeah, of course. But then what do you do? Then I drink my coffee. And I realized talking to her, I realized she had no concept of creative block. Like she hasn't no understanding of creative anxiety. So she called it an idea nap, which I think is so beautiful. It's like when you're tired, you take a power nap. And when you have a creative block, you take an idea nap. You just leave the idea and go do something else enjoyable, but you don't need to have anxiety about it. She like, OK, I'm stuck. can't do anything. But she's just enjoying her coffee. And then after 30 minutes or an hour, she goes back and she just continues. So the creative process can be done without anxiety. And after meeting her, my creative process is way less anxious. And that is connected to the Thai mentality, the Thai culture. They have something, as you probably know, they have something called Sabai Sabai. And Sabai Sabai means like, don't worry, be happy. It means it's like you're ordering a beer in Thailand and it hasn't come in 20 minutes and you go, where the hell is my beer? And they go, Sabai Sabai, don't worry, the beer will come when the beer will come. So when you have that Sabai Sabai mentality and you get stuck. and it created work, go, okay, sabai, sabai, let's go to Starbucks and drink some coffee and enjoy ourselves and then go back. It's beautiful. It's simple, but it's beautiful. James Taylor (22:14) I love that idea. I love that. I love that idea. ⁓ An idea nap as well. And I guess the other thing, just thinking about that is we had a guest on the show a few weeks ago called Gibelli, Professor Gibelli, and his book is called The Brain at Rest, where he kind of talks about the neuroscience, so he talks about the neuroscience of... ⁓ Fredrik Haren (22:19) Yes. James Taylor (22:35) what happens to our creativity and other functions when we allow our brain to rest. And there's some fascinating stats he was sharing about when we're out in nature. what they're only just now getting to understand, they knew there was something about the color green that has an effect upon our creativity, our ability to relax. What they didn't know was the chemicals that the trees and the plants send off that you as a human receives that kind of relaxes you and it's kind of, it's part of what it does and he said, know, people that do this and in this kind of way, their creativity increases by this amount. Fredrik Haren (22:58) Okay. James Taylor (23:10) because of that, it's like the rest part, the idea naps, the rest part as well, and also the kind of changing of the physical environment that they're operating in as well. seems to be like how these things can link together in some way. Fredrik Haren (23:19) Yes. Yes, that's great. That's why my office is a 360 geometric dome. So I'm always in nature. James Taylor (23:28) You're in a dome. So we should explain to people that don't know you, I was sharing with an audience the other day. about you and I was saying, I was interested, this is my friend Fredrik Haren, he's a wonderful keynote speaker, author, storyteller and he's a collector but not of watches or cars but of islands and so I share that you have Ideas Island which I think is wonderful and people just love this idea as well, so share with us in terms of your own creative process because you've traveled but... There's something about a sense of rootedness, I think as well, that gives some stability in the creative process, at certain times in the creative process. Where you are today, is your home, where you are most of the time, what does that space, that environment do for your own creative process? Fredrik Haren (24:20) Yes, I think it's very, it is crucial. It's essential for people to figure out their own creative process. So you and my creative process, it took me a while to figure out because I'm an introvert, but I like to meet people. So my creative process is that half of the year I travel around the world and I want to go to 50 to 50 to 30 countries per year and meet hundreds of people every year and interview them. And then the other half of the year I sit on, I live on a private island. So this is my island. And there's no neighbors because I'm an introvert and I don't like people intruding on me when I need to be alone. But so it's selective, selective inclusion. is seclusion? What is the word in English? Seclusion. it's selective seclusion. Yeah, selective seclusion is what I practice. So when I sit on my island, I am mentally disconnected from the rest of the world. It's just me on my island and I'm totally in nature. James Taylor (25:03) seclusion. Yes, yes, seclusion, selective seclusion. Fredrik Haren (25:17) trees and water is very important for creativity. So I do that. And so I'm either doing that. And that's where I do my writing and my thinking and also my downtown, my relaxing. then, or I am on a plane somewhere and the more exotic the better. And I need both. If I just live on the island, I would not be as creative. If I travel all the time, I would not be. And a lot of people might say, that sounds very stressful or that sounds very lonely. And it's fine. But for me, this is the perfect creative process. James Taylor (25:47) Now, when you're traveling a lot, you're seeing different cultures and different things. And one of the things that you obviously benefit from is globalization, traveling around the world, being able to do what you do. But it sometimes feels like globalization can flatten novelty. it feels like certain grays are in just now, suddenly every coffee shop you go into kind of feels the same ⁓ now, regardless of where you are. Did you ever feel like some of these creative traditions that you were meeting, or these differences were getting flattened out by a more global way of looking at how things are designed and how things should function? Fredrik Haren (26:10) Hmm. Yeah, OK, that's a good question. I don't like the word global because it has been globalist kind of means someone who is not an interesting in supporting their own culture or something. I like it. So, you know, they're saying think global act local. I yes, I like this. I like the think human act humane. That's my that's my slogan. And what I mean by that is there is so many different ways to do things in the world. James Taylor (26:45) HSBC, yeah. Tightline. Fredrik Haren (26:58) And a lot of the things that are done elsewhere are done better than what we are doing. And if it's better done than what we are doing, we should incorporate it. As you know, I married a woman from the Philippines, right? So Swedish way of raising children is very different from Filipino way of raising children. And suddenly now we will have to have a discussion. Are we going to use the Swedish approach or the Filipino approach when it comes to, for example, hitting our children? In Sweden, we don't hit in the Philippines, they hit. So which one should we do? And I was like, okay, well, this clearly not hitting is better. That's what I think. But I was able to convince my wife or not even, she was, okay, I mean, she was already on board on that. But in the Philippines, they have more respect for the elders. And in Sweden, we don't have respect for the elders. So now we are teaching the Filipino way to our children. So you need to show respect for the elders. So we're taking the best of each culture and we're creating something better. From that perspective, I don't see a negative aspect of it. If you look at it, humanity is getting better. by incorporating the best ideas that are out there. And that is kind of the purpose of this book is to, if you are interested in creativity, you should look at how everyone innovates around the world. And now you have more tools that you can use. The fact that everything becomes the same, I think is a negative side effect of the fact that we're not incorporating things properly. I don't think every cafe looking like Starbucks is, I don't think Starbucks has the best cafe. So. When I lived in China, forgot everything, almost not everything, but they forgot a lot of things they were doing in China. They took everything from the West. But now lately they said, you know what, let's look at if what they are doing is better, we should take it. If what we were doing were better, we're going to go back to how we did it. So they went a little bit overboard. They were so excited about learning from the West. They took everything. James Taylor (28:48) I think you see that in quite a lot of cultures more recently as well where maybe the West or certain countries in the West were held up to be the gold standard. and other countries are kind of now figuring out actually that is not appropriate for what we're about, know, our way of doing things, there's great things we want to learn from these different places. And I always, one of my things, I guess this is maybe a criticism someone's going to maybe level at you, does by talking about creativity and all this thing, does it not create a separateness, a kind of... ⁓ what would you call it, ⁓ a jingoist kind of thing of saying well you know we do this type of thing the best and other people, what would your what would your ⁓ defense be for someone that says like that really creativity is just as purely as a human thing and actually the cultural things ⁓ shouldn't be as relevant. Fredrik Haren (29:46) No, okay, so let's do the analogy of food because food is a way of expressing creativity, right? If you're really interested in food, you're not gonna forget about, if I'm a Swedish chef, I'm not gonna forget about Swedish cooking and learn only about foreign cooking, but I'm gonna be super interested to learn about how do they cook in Japan? How do they cook in Thailand? What can I learn from the French? And now you take the best of that and you combine it with the best of Swedish cooking and now you are enjoying cooking more. It's not forget about Swedish food, it's about let's learn about human cooking. It elevates us all and we can do that on any creative aspect. So I don't think that is a problem. James Taylor (30:25) Yeah, and so I wish my hope, my hope just now is that we do have some owners of airports and I've spoken to some, you've probably done it as well because I often think, ⁓ you your book is sharing lots of examples of creativity and like innovation in different parts of the world. and I think you agree, it's like picking the best from some of these places and learning from all these places and thinking about how it incorporates, because sometimes it's not gonna come in the pure form from that other place. And it feels like a lot of time you go to airports, they've taken the worst from all this, which I guess is one way of doing things. Fredrik Haren (30:58) The words. But you know as well as I do that the best airport in the world is in Singapore. And I worked with Singapore, Changi Airport, and I used it a lot. And they go around the world and look at all the other... When they built Changi, they went to look at the best airports at the time. They went to Charles de Gaulle, went to JFK, they went to Heathrow, and they took the best of each. And they took it and they built Changi Airport, which is now the best airport in the world, while Heathrow, Charles de Gaulle, and JFK sucks at airports because they haven't done the same thing. So it's about picking up the best thing. James Taylor (31:09) Yeah. Fredrik Haren (31:32) And more importantly, it's also to understanding that when you do that, it's not, our minds are not limited. So for example, in America, we have this thing called, like what the quote from Mark Zuckerberg, you have to go fast and break things, right? It's about dramatic innovation and we need to ruin things and break things and go fast and shoot for the stars and all of that. And that's the American way of approaching creativity. The Japanese way is kaizen. It's like small improvements all the time. Now, I'm not saying we should pick between the two. I think we should learn both ways. And now we have two tools in our toolbox that we can now choose. Should we do the American way or should we do the Japanese way? So the more we learn about how people approach things, the more we have ways of choosing what is best right now. Which tool should we use today? There's even an example in the book from Afghanistan. What can we learn about creativity from Afghanistan, which is the utterly opposite of the American way? James Taylor (32:20) Yeah, I think... Sorry, please. Fredrik Haren (32:33) It's a painter who paints the old traditional Afghan way, when Afghan was a cultural superpower, not anymore, but then hundreds of years ago. And she would literally cut down a tree to make her own paper. Then she will grind the gemstones to make her own paint. Then will she cut the hair of the back of the cat to make her own brush. It takes her months to create the material needed to do a painting, which means for months, she can't paint what she wants to paint, but she can think about it. And she says, I'm thinking about it, and she called it profound patience. It's this idea of not, she goes, you go to Amazon, you order it the next day, you have the stuff you start painting. Like where's your process? She thinks about it. She said, whenever she starts to paint, what she paint is never what she thought she was gonna paint, because the idea has changed in her head while she's doing the material. That doesn't mean Mark Zuckerberg is wrong. It just means sometimes we can go, go fast and break things, sometimes we can use the profound patience approach. And now we have another tool to use in our toolbox. James Taylor (33:37) I think, and sometimes obviously these things, switch, they switch modes. ⁓ I think with obviously a lot of AI stuff, is stuff I speak about a lot at the moment, ⁓ things are moving very, very fast. And so many countries are purposely saying, we don't want to put any, as much regulation on these tools. We just, need to move fast, because if we don't do it, then this other country over there is going to do it faster than us. And I think my... can see there's some sense in some of that, where I think will probably happen, and I hate to say this, and I'm, you and I, are kind of, in America we call this motivational speakers, which is always interesting, but, so this is maybe not so motivating, but it's interesting, is I think probably what's going to have to happen is there will be something that will happen very bad, because of AI, and I think where they'll have gone wrong is the thinking of building AI like a the creativity of doing AI, like a software engineer does it, as opposed to a mechanical engineer. So a mechanical engineer builds first for safety. So if that thing fails, there is always something that sits underneath that stops that thing from failing. And I think about where I'm speaking from today, there's a bridge there called the Dunn, the bridge that goes over Dundee called the Tay Rail Bridge. And it was one of the, it was that great push forward, lots of bridge building that happened in the UK. And then one night, the bridge collapsed and it killed lots of people in that bridge. And then subsequent after that, they built a bridge which is one in Edinburgh, which takes you from something you can, if you ever go to Edinburgh, there's a famous red, ⁓ fourth road bridge there, which looks incredibly sturdy. It's got every single girder, it's like red, this like ridiculously over engineered. And the reason it's over engineered, over engineered to look like that, is to give people the confidence that the bridge isn't gonna fall. It didn't need that much structure, but it just gives people the confidence, kind going back to the lift analogy we kind of spoke about as well. And I thought, well, that's great, but that bridge of that quality that's still around today would never have existed probably if you didn't have these other early versions of the bridges, some of which fold and crashed. So I feel like we're kind of in the AI kind of world, we're in that little bit, there's that kind of feel fast, kind of creativity side of things going, but at some point it's gonna have to switch to using our creativity for safety and security. And we're not quite at that point. The economic forces aren't quite there at this point. Fredrik Haren (36:12) Yeah, and the speed one will not slow down. mean, speed of innovation is going to continue to increase. It's a simple math. More people with more education and more access to information and better tools leads to faster innovation. So the speed won't change. It will just continue to increase. James Taylor (36:33) So if the listeners are listening to this just now, you travel all the time. If someone wants to... start one, let's say a creative travel experiment, something to kind of the going journey somewhere, it doesn't even have to be abroad, it could be in their own country, and you kind of want to shift their thinking and use that time, that travel time, ⁓ either the traveling there or the coming home or the when they arrive at their destination to kind of knock their thinking out a little bit and think a little bit more creatively, what advice would you give them? Fredrik Haren (37:04) I was recently in Lithuania and I interviewed a tourist guy who does tours of Eastern Europe, like communist from Soviet Union times, takes them to bomb shelters and things like this. And he said, because he takes people, local people, and he shows them their city again through new eyes by showing them things they didn't know about their city. And I said, how do you know? How do you find out these things? And he says, I go out in the streets and I look for a really old person and I start by giving them a compliment. say, I really liked your dress. And then after, because they are not so used to hearing compliments. And then they say, and then they start talking to me and then I say, Hey, tell me something about this neighborhood. And then they will say these things that they give you all this secret because they've been living there their whole life. And I'm, I'm sharing this with you because we don't have to travel to the other side of the world to learn something new. can learn something new about the place we live by just Asking a person we normally wouldn't ask, right? Go up and talk to a stranger or ⁓ go in a different, take a different, when I lived in Singapore, a good friend of mine, when he moved there, he took a bus and he took it for 12 stops and then he got off and then he looked around and then he jumped on the next bus that came, took it for another 12 stops and got off with no plan whatsoever. Just forcibly, like forced wandering to get to see parts of Singapore that he had never seen before. So it is to awaken, if you think about it, it's a waking the explorer mentality to venture into unknown territory in order to learn more about it because when we explore is when we discover. James Taylor (38:31) I think... I love that. And that's why I'm so thankful that there are storytellers and speakers like yourself that because you travel around, you speak to these very influential groups, these different companies, governments around the world. And because you ask when you're traveling to all these different countries, 75, hopefully I've got that number right, when you travel to these 75 countries, you're not just telling your own stories to these audiences, but you're actually telling... Fredrik Haren (39:02) Hmm. ⁓ James Taylor (39:10) You're asking people while you're in those places their stories. And then you are essentially acting as a voice for them as well and sharing their stories with these global audiences. Sometimes I know some of the people you mentioned, the artists in Afghanistan, sometimes these people don't have a voice in that same way. So you are almost acting as that voice for them. Fredrik Haren (39:30) Yes, because I want to understand, I wrote in my diary, I want to understand creativity through humanity, but I also want to understand humanity through creativity. And that's why I will interview a tourist guide or a taxi driver or a president or a head of innovation. I want to learn from all kinds of people. But the overall overreaching message of the book, but also in my speeches, is to get people to broaden their perspective of what the world is, the ideas that are already out there. and also the inspiration that that can trigger to get people to have more ideas themselves. Because these are the two big potentials. One is just to take the good ideas that are already out there and just copy them. And the other one is to be inspired by what people are doing. If I understand, there's one I interviewed the hotel manager, you might know him, Afif. Have you met Afif? Exactly, we're friends on Facebook, yes. So I interviewed him about, and he talked about, I think the English word is respiration. So inspiration. James Taylor (40:16) Yes, from Maldives. Yeah, from Lux Resorts. Fredrik Haren (40:29) You know everyone your creativity is triggered by inspiration. We see something cool and we're like, this is nice But inspiration doesn't actually create creativity Respiration does so respiration is the act of when you inspire means to breathe in that's the literal meaning to breathe in this to inspire perspire is to breathe out so inspiration is breathing like a It's oxygen for the creative mind right new ideas come in but perspiration is the act of taking that and turning it into something useful in your body. So it's not just enough to be inspired. You need to do something with, like the key question is what do you do with the inspiration? Especially if you're trying to inspire others, are you giving that inspiration in a way that they can actually do something useful with? It's a skill to inspire people in a way that makes it useful for the other person. James Taylor (41:25) reminds me a little bit that the Edison quote was it's success is one percent inspiration, 99 percent perspiration, ⁓ maybe it needs to be respiration now, I'm not sure. We're going to have a link to your book, to this new book that's coming out, if you were to recommend another book that maybe you've been reading just now, you've been recommending more often, I mean know you're always reading, you're always thinking different things, what would that book be? What book should people be checking out just now? Fredrik Haren (41:51) Well, I don't know, because we're just talking about breathing. I'm reading a book called Breed. It's a whole book. I love books like this where they just take a concept that, you know, and then just go all in on it. It's all because I have understood that I'm not doing breathing correctly. So I need to get into that. So, you know, I bought an Apple watch to measure my breathing and all of that. And so I started reading that. So it's one of the... I like it because it's the last book I'm reading. And it's also about this idea of going deep, down the rabbit hole, the curiosity aspect, what can I possibly learn about breathing? So I'm going to say that one. I think it's called just called, breathe. James Taylor (42:33) Breathing. I I'm gonna recognize that to my wife Alison because I know that she thinks as a singer, she thinks a lot about breathing and she's always pulling me up and getting my diaphragmic breath working properly, my articulators and everything as well. Fredrik, it's always a pleasure speaking to you having you on the show as well. Your new book, The World of Creativity, A Journey Across 37 Countries to Discover the Secrets of Creative Minds is gonna be out and we're gonna put a link to that. If it's not out when this episode comes out, we'll put a link so you can pre-order your copy of the book. Fredrik Haren (43:02) the pre-order is out already. James Taylor (43:05) Great, so we're gonna have a link so people at least get it pre-ordered so it's gonna get to you the moment it hits the shelves as well. And Fredrik if people want to connect more with you, learn more about your other writing, your speaking, where's the best place for them to go and do that? Fredrik Haren (43:19) I guess just Google the Creativity Explorer, hopefully that will come up. James Taylor (43:23) Well, Fredrik Haren thank you so much for being a guest on the SuperCreativity Podcast Fredrik Haren (43:30) Thank you so much.

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