Mindful ideation

The term mindfulness has many usages. Derived from Buddhist meditational practices, mindfulness is, for example, applied in clinical psychology as a "mode of being" that focuses on what is being sensed at each moment, rather than dwelling on the past or worrying about the future. In the context of design, applying mindfulness to ideation may suggest sustained attention to ideas as they unfold, moment by moment, with openness and without prejudice. Ideation, then, as a purposeful and mindful process, is concentrating on the creative task in hand rather than letting the mind wander constantly, thus in contrast to "brainstorming", which generates lots of random and directionless ideas.