Think Like Da Vinci: 7 Easy Steps to Boosting Your Everyday Genius

Think Like Da Vinci: 7 Easy Steps to Boosting Your Everyday Genius
Michael Gelb

Ebook edition, including a new introduction by the author, of this inspiring guide to developing your full potential. A perfect buy for the business market as well as those wishing to explore their power of their brain, this book shows you how to imitate Leonardo Da Vinci’s thought processes and so enhance your aptitude in every area of your life.Learn how to fulfill your true potential by developing the thought processes used by Renaissance master Leonardo Da Vinci. Simply by imitating his insatiable quest for information and experience, we can all enhance our own aptitude in all facets of our lives.Michael Gelb discusses the seven fundamental elements of Da Vinci’s thought process and offers practical ways to incorporate them into our own lives. The techniques outlined in the book help readers to develop the same traits of whole-brain thinking, creative problem solving and continuous learning, all of which are vital in today’s world.Numerous exercises, anecdotes and illustrations help readers to master these techniques and create a personal and professional renaissance of their very own.

THINK LIKE DA VINCI

7 EASY STEPS TO BOOSTING YOUR EVERYDAY GENIUS

MICHAEL GELB

Dedication (#ulink_9e0b6243-c83a-594a-8743-629b0fab0d84)

This book is dedicated tothe Da Vincian Spirit manifested inthe life and work of Charles Dent.

Contents

Cover (#u8aff22b3-1232-5d1b-abf3-ce2c88a8be63)

Title Page (#u6eab1937-ee3a-52ec-9c8b-d65079272732)

Dedication (#u7662bf8c-c920-5998-bfe3-214a48114a7a)

Preface: “Born of the Sun” (#ubf83cbc3-37ce-55c2-a4e0-28cfa4f686f1)

Preface to the New Edition (#u518ab5b1-ec45-5a39-865d-f53379e103ad)

PART ONE (#u0df280d6-668e-57e3-93d1-86ed9a853afd)

Introduction: Your Brain Is Much Better than You Think (#u2bdc1044-f4a0-5ab3-8c07-d1f828099314)

Learning from Leonardo (#ulink_fc9ed07f-ce13-529c-8a94-7cd677f0d0d3)

A Practical Approach to Genius (#ulink_a07bbe2b-df18-5bb2-b7e3-5c769a51bb51)

The Renaissance, Then and Now (#ub1ec4888-16d1-57a9-aa74-df622a67dfad)

The Life of Leonardo da Vinci (#u6f447085-97a3-5b0a-9527-ba0851df4494)

Major Accomplishments (#ulink_b7308da6-0929-5ff4-aa06-f61d03935bc5)

PART TWO The Seven Da Vincian Principles (#uad1687a0-f716-5957-affc-642904f794c5)

Curiosità (#u3f0a6aa9-01aa-543f-9cf6-11d9b767572f)

Dimostrazione (#litres_trial_promo)

Sensazione (#litres_trial_promo)

Sfumato (#litres_trial_promo)

Arte/Scienza (#litres_trial_promo)

Corporalita (#litres_trial_promo)

Connessione (#litres_trial_promo)

Conclusion: Leonardo’s Legacy (#litres_trial_promo)

PART THREE (#litres_trial_promo)

The Beginner’s da Vinci Drawing Course (#litres_trial_promo)

Leonardo Da Vinci Chronology: Life and Times (#litres_trial_promo)

Recommended Reading (#litres_trial_promo)

List of Illustrations (#litres_trial_promo)

Acknowledgments (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)

Preface: “Born of the Sun” (#ulink_a396f8fc-a185-55e3-bb0e-2602d18e4a32)

Think of your greatest heroes and heroines, your most inspirational role models. Maybe, if you are very lucky, the list includes your mom or dad. Perhaps you are most inspired by great figures from history. Immersing yourself in the life and work of great artists, leaders, scholars, and spiritual teachers provides rich nourishment for the mind and heart. Chances are, you picked up this book because you recognize Leonardo as an archetype of human potential and you are intrigued by the possibility of a more intimate relationship with him.

When I was a child, Superman and Leonardo da Vinci were my heroes. While the “Man of Steel” fell by the wayside, my fascination with Da Vinci continued to grow. Then, in the spring of 1994, I received an invitation to visit Florence to speak to a prestigious and notoriously demanding association of company presidents. The group chairman asked, “Could you prepare something for our members on how to be more creative and balanced, personally and professionally? Something that will point them in the direction of becoming Renaissance men and women?” In a heartbeat I responded with my dream: “How about something on thinking like Leonardo da Vinci?”

It was not an assignment I could take lightly. My students would already have paid substantial fees to attend the six-day “university,” one of several opportunities the society offers its members each year to meet in the world’s great cities to explore history, culture, and business while pursuing personal and professional development. Given the chance to choose among several concurrent classes – mine was running at the same time as five others, including one taught by former Fiat president Giovanni Agnelli – members were invited to rate each speaker on a scale of one to ten and were encouraged to walk out of any presentation they didn’t like. In other words, if they don’t like you, they chew you up and spit you out!

Despite my lifelong fascination with my new topic, I knew I had work to do. In addition to intensive reading, my preparation included a Da Vinci pilgrimage, beginning with a visit to Leonardo’s Portrait of Ginevra De’ Benci at the National Gallery in Washington, D.C. In New York, I caught up with the traveling “Codex Leicester” exhibit sponsored by Bill Gates and Microsoft. Then to London to see the manuscripts in the British Museum, The Virgin and Child with St. Anne at the National Gallery, and to the Louvre in Paris to spend a few days with Mona Lisa and St. John the Baptist. The highlight of this pilgrimage, however, was visiting the château of Cloux near Amboise, where Da Vinci spent the last few years of his life. The château is now a Da Vinci museum, with amazing replicas of some of Leonardo’s inventions crafted by engineers from IBM. Walking the grounds that he walked, sitting in his study and standing in his bedroom, looking out his window, seeing the view that he gazed at every day, I felt my heart overflow with awe, reverence, wonder, sadness, and gratitude.

Of course, I went on to visit Florence, where, eventually, I gave my talk to the presidents. The fun began when the person introducing me confused her notes on my biography with the paper I had submitted on Da Vinci. She said – and I am not, to quote Dave Barry, making this up – “Ladies and gentlemen, I am extremely privileged today to introduce to you an individual whose background surpasses anything I have ever encountered: anatomist, architect, botanist, city planner, costume and stage designer, chef, humorist, engineer, equestrian, inventor, geographer, geologist, mathematician, military scientist, musician, painter, philosopher, physicist and raconteur … Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to present … Mr. Michael Gelb!”

Ah, if only …

Well, the talk was a success (no one walked out), and it gave birth to the book you hold in your hands.

Before that unforgettable introduction, one of the members approached me and said, “I don’t believe that anyone can learn to be like Leonardo da Vinci, but I’m going to your lecture anyway.” You may be thinking something similar: Is the premise of this book that every child is born with the capacities and gifts of Leonardo da Vinci? Does the author really believe that we can all be geniuses of Da Vinci’s stature? Well, actually, no. Despite decades devoted to discovering the full scope of human potential and how to awaken it, I side with Da Vinci’s disciple Francesco Melzi, who wrote on the occasion of the maestro’s death: “The loss of such a man is mourned by all, for it is not in the power of Nature to create another.” As I learn more about Da Vinci, my sense of awe and mystery multiplies. All great geniuses are unique, and Leonardo was, perhaps, the greatest of all geniuses.

But the key question remains, Can the fundamentals of Leonardo’s approach to learning and the cultivation of intelligence be abstracted and applied to inspire and guide us toward the realization of our own full potential?

Of course, my answer to this question is: Yes! The essential elements of Leonardo da Vinci’s approach to learning and the cultivation of intelligence are quite clear and can be studied, emulated, and applied.

Is it hubris to imagine that we can learn to be like the greatest of all geniuses? Perhaps. It’s better to think of his example guiding us to be more of what we truly are.