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of sleight of mind tricks for short circuiting your censor:

1. Free writing. List as many topics as you can that relate to the problem at hand. Now as fast as you can write free associate to each one (you needn't do this in any order. Go ahead and jump from concept to concept if you like) for a pre-specified period of time. Then for each concept choose five of your associations and work them all into one semi-coherent paragraph.

2. Distraction. Do a psychological 180 degree tailspin and get your mind completely off the issue. Well, not one hundred per cent. Allow the problem to simmer in the back of your brain as you move on to something as or more engaging. Read romantic poetry, a technical journal, or go for a bike ride. Or, head for the nearest pub and have a few cold ones. Perhaps a solution will just bubble up from the unconscious. Like passing psychological gas.
3. Tarot cards. If your problem is of a literary, psychological, social, or academic nature free associating from the random imagery could help you shift gears and slide into a wholly other frame of mind. This is a great exercise for writers and great for blocks. Make sure you get one of the most vivid and surrealistic decks. Try the Crowley pack for starters.
4. Use the internet. Cross reference your subject and approach it from a variety of disciplines. Use an electronic encyclopedia like the Britannica which cross references by historical timeline and numerous other means.
5. Sleep on it. You didn't think to get through an article on creativity without the obligatory reference to Coleridge and Kublai Khan now, did you?

Learn more about this author, Dexie Runns Long.
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