Kelty® Gunnison Tent Tan / Ivory / Burgundy

Live the good life, now with quick and easy setup! Kelty Gunnison 4 - person Tent, PRICED RIGHT! Looking for the trail to better camping? The experts at Kelty show the way with their new and improved Gunnison Tent. All the rain-ready comfort and long-lasting durability you need. With better ventilation and easy setup thanks to the addition of color-coded assembly clips. Inside you'll find room for 4 hard-trekking adults...just the thing for your next backpacking, biking or canoeing mission. Get the Gunnison here for ONLY LESS! Kelty quality camping: DAC PressFit 11 mm aluminum poles for added strength and reduced weight; Color-coded all-clip assembly for faster setup and better air circulation; 70-denier breathable nylon taffeta walls, floor and roof; UV-resistant 75-denier nylon vented rainfly with taped seams and 1,800 mm weather-resistant coating; Perimeter floor seams are off the ground and inverted for superior water resistance; No-see-um mesh on all 4 sides for venting and bug-free star gazing; 2 large side-entry doors; Noiseless zipper pulls stay quiet in the wind; Gear loft, accessory pockets and TWO 15 1/2 sq. ft. vestibules for keeping your equipment stowed neatly; Measures 8'4" x 6'10". Center height is 4'6". Packs down to only 28 x 8 1/2".; Weighs 8 lbs., 11 ozs.; End each day's journey with a smile! Order your Kelty Tent today! Kelty Gunnison Tent, Tan / Ivory / Burgundy

Would you like to develop some problem solving skills that can make you a more effective and creative problem solver? The skills of visualization and knowing how to direct your attention are two of the best. Take a look at the examples that follow to learn how to use and develop these tools.

Visualization - A Problem Solving Skill

Not all of us easily visualize things. I do my mental work more with words than with images, for example. But all of us can get better at visualization, and the payoff is more creative and sometimes quicker solutions to problems.

Let's suppose you operate a gas station, for example, and you want to boost your business. You visualize a customer driving into your lot. You try to get inside the head of that customer and try to see things as he does. But your nice vision of him pulling up to get gas is intruded on by another car that gets in his way and makes him wait. Do you need more gas pumps, or a better design for incoming traffic flow?

Visualize as clearly as you can. Clarity and detail lets your unconscious mind more easily play with the images, so it can suggest solutions, or point to things you haven't yet consciously noticed. There is always a lot going on in your mind that is below consciousness. Good visualization is one way to access that part of your thinking.

For another example, let's suppose the problem you want to solve is that you live in a tiny crowded apartment. To put your problem solving skills to work, you visualize your apartment, and see yourself being crowded by the stuff in it. You play with the image, and imagine that the apartment is empty. It seems bigger now, and you realize that owning fewer things could be a partial solution. Storing things more efficiently might also open up some space.

In your visualization you feel too enclosed in your apartment, so you see yourself leaving, perhaps climbing up the stairs to the open roof. You then think about what it means to "live" in a place. Use the apartment for eating and sleeping only, and carry a few essentials with you always, and you could "live" in the small space only part-time, and spend more time in open spaces, whether they are roofs, parks, or coffee shops.

Visualization is a way of directing of your attention as well, which is the second powerful problem solving skill we cover here.

Directing Attention - A Problem Solving Skill

In my mind people are essentially decent to each other, but when I pointed this out to a friend, he immediately argued that people are essentially rude to each other. Who is right? Maybe "decent" and "rude" can't be defined with enough preciseness to answer this scientifically. But the more important question here is why we differ so much in our beliefs.

The answer is simple. I look for examples of decency, and so I find them - and probably miss seeing many examples of rude people. My friend looks for examples of people's rudeness, and doesn't notice many of the real examples of decency. How we choose to direct our attention dramatically affect what we see and believe.

Why not use this phenomenon as one of your problem solving skills? Just direct your attention to possible solutions to problems. Let's look at a simple problem: backpacker's tents get too hot in the sun. A backpacker who wants solutions can start to think about cooling, and look for examples. This process of directing his attention gets his unconscious mind to look for anything relevant inside his mind or outside.

He sees an air conditioning unit - not practical for carrying. Then he gets cool as he walks in the shade, and becomes aware of this because his attention is directed. A tent pitched in the shade will be cooler. It's not a new idea, and isn't always practical, but he wonders if a lightweight tarp would shade the tent enough to work. It's a possibility.

When water spills from his glass onto his arm he notices the cooling effect of the evaporation. It reminds him of something in a book he read. Before there was more advanced refrigeration, some people put food in a box covered with a wet cloth. The evaporation would keep the interior of the box as much as fifteen degrees cooler than the outside air. The same principle might work with a thin cloth draped over a tent and kept wet. There may even be a new product in this idea.

We see more of whatever we direct our attention towards. Start looking for blue cars, for example, and you'll soon realize they're all over. To solve problems however, be careful to direct your attention to possible solutions, and not to more problems. Noticing all the reasons you can't start a business, for example, would make matters worse. On the other hand, you might find a solution if you start noticing all the ways in which others have started businesses.

Want to develop these problem solving skills? It's simple. Visualization and consciously directing your attention are skills you already have. To develop them further, you just need to use them more often.

Copyright Steve Gillman. For more on Problem Solving Skills, and to get the Brain Power Newsletter and other free gifts, visit: http://www.IncreaseBrainPower.com