How To Think Like Leonardo Da Vinci

        How To Think Like Leonardo Da Vinci 

About the author –

Michael Gelb is an Executive Coach and Management Consultant. He teaches organizations and people about creativity, leadership and innovation. Michael has also written 17 non-fiction books. He also motivates people through his keynote speeches and seminars. 

Introduction 

Have you heard of Leonardo da Vinci? who were they? He was a genius as well as a great artist. He made many great paintings, of which the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper came to be called masterpieces. Not only was he a fine artist, he also had a good knowledge about many different fields like botany, anatomy, military engineering etc. For this deep knowledge , he is called renaissance polymath i.e. a man who has mastery and expertise in one field but along with this he also has very deep knowledge about almost every field. 

Many of Leonardo’s paintings were given the title of masterpiece, including St. John the Baptist, Madonna of the Rocks, and Salvator Mundi. Da Vinci’s work received a lot of accolades and praise, but he always remained the cause of discussion by being embroiled in controversies. His sketches made in his notebooks are considered as valuable as his paintings. 

He has made such an accurate and lively picture of horses, faces, flowers and even the child in the mother’s womb, which if you look at it, it seems as if this picture will speak now. Leonardo was such a genius that he thought far ahead of the time he lived in and he went ahead of his time to invent many things like parachutes, helicopters, machine guns and he also made sketches of these great inventions. But did you know that Leonardo was an illegitimate child? His father was a budding lawyer and mother was a simple girl working in the fields in a small village. Da Vinci did not follow in his father’s footsteps as children who were born without marriage were not allowed to pursue a professional career. In this way, da Vinci carved his own path and became one of the world’s greatest artists and thinkers. 

In this book, you will learn about 6 such principles that will help you develop multiple skills like Leonardo. You will learn to be a person who does not limit his knowledge to a single field and always wants to know and learn more. 

Leonardo was Italian, so the author Michael of this book has explained these principles in his own language. Leonardo’s 6 principals are – Curiosita means desire to know, Dimostrazione means learning from experience, sensazione means using your five senses to the maximum, Sfumato means not judging anything immediately. , arte / scienza (art and cinja) means to strike a balance between art and logic, and corporalita (corporalta) means physical fitness. So let us understand them one by one in detail. 

1st Principle :  Sfumato 

The word sfumato means to rise up like smoke or to become blurred where nothing is clearly visible. We get a glimpse of this in Leonardo’s unique painting style. If you google the painting of Mona Lisa, then you will see that the painting is very mysterious. No one has been able to know the secret of Mona Lisa’s smile till date. There are so many emotions hidden in him that you will not even know what is the real emotion behind his smile. It is designed in such a way that you will not be able to understand the hidden message in it at once. Good and evil, seduction and innocence, kindness and cruelty are all seen in that light smile. What do you think Leonardo wanted to convey with this? 

The very interesting thing about this painting is that if you look closely, you can see that the corner of Mona Lisa’s mouth and eyes are covered in a light shadow. This is what makes that smile mysterious. The wrinkle in her eyes and the edge of her lips could tell us what she was really feeling in that painting, but Leonardo intended that he left it like a puzzle to those watching the painting. 

This is the first principal that we should not immediately judge or jump to any conclusion. There can be many different aspects of the same thing, so the thinking of understanding the reason behind it should be adopted then only you will be able to judge it properly. Try looking at the situation from a slightly different angle. Seeing a new thing, there should be a desire to ask questions about it and find its answer. It helps you to understand the difference between truth and falsehood. It increases your thinking power and intelligence. 

2nd Principle : Curiosita  

From childhood, he had a desire to know about the world around him. Often he used to go for a walk in the forests with paper and pencil with him. Whatever he notice, he sat down to sketch it. He used to stare at the trees, flowers and leaves for hours. He used to write down his every thought in a notebook. Many questions used to come in his mind like “How many kinds of animals, flowers and rivers are there in this world?” How do these birds fly? Where the stone collides with the water, what starts to form like a roundabout? I don’t know why these strange questions keep occupying my mind all the time.” How a bird flaps its wings in the air, they also captured it in the picture. There was another special thing about Leonardo that made him different from other artists. 

3rd Principle :  Dimostrazione  

As a child, Leonardo never got a chance to read and write properly. When he grew up, he became a disciple of the master painter and sculptor Andrea del Verrochio. In his studio, Leonardo learned how to mix colors and create canvases. Verrochio believed in learning from experience. He taught Leonardo the work of bronze casting, the art of sculpture and so on. He also taught Leonardo to study the structure of the body of trees, plants, humans and animals. This education helped him a lot. Leonardo’s first painting was on Verrochio’s Baptism of Christ. It is said that he made the picture of the angel in the lower left corner. 

Art experts once tried to look closely at it through X-ray. He noticed that the strokes made by Verrochio’s brush were clearly visible in the x-ray. But Leonardo’s brush strokes were so fine and smooth as butter that the x-ray passed through him. He had filled it with great workmanship. So the x-ray passed through it. It seemed as if he had not made a picture but had actually created an angel. 

After training, he became an expert and joined a guild. It was a group of doctors and artists named “Saint Luke”. To understand the structure of the body, he also cut the bodies of about thirty humans and the bodies of countless animals. He had made pictures of his body parts in his notebook. This is the reason why the sketch of the physical body in his painting was so perfect. 

4th Principle : Sensazione  

Leonardo attached great importance to our five sense organs. He believed that we should make maximum use of it. This principal means looking at everything in detail. They increase your brain power and learning skills. They make us genius by increasing our focus. Making more use of the senses means listening carefully to every sound, if you are eating food then taking full taste of it, seeing the details of everything through the eyes. 

Leonardo always used his senses to the maximum. He carefully observed and learned from his surroundings, mountains, waterfalls, gestures of animals and people. He used to wear as nice clothes as he could. Leonardo filled his studio with the scent of flowers and perfumes. He used to eat healthy food in low quantity which was beautifully decorated in the plate. Did you know that Leonardo was also a musician? He could play veena, flute as well as many instruments. It is said that Leonardo’s  voice was also very melodious. 

Leonardo used to say that it is a pity that most people do not use their senses properly, they eat only to fill their stomach but do not taste it, they speak but without thinking, they listened but feel something used to not. 

Tell me when was the last time you looked at the sky and admired the beauty of the moon and stars? When was the last time you tasted your food without rushing? We don’t appreciate what we have. Try to be more sensitive towards the sense organs nature has given you. Today we have become so busy that we are only present, we are not living. If you also want to feel the true meaning of living, then like Leonardo, use your senses more and enjoy every moment of life to the fullest. 

5. Arte / Scienza (Art and Sinza)  

Leonardo was left handed, so we can say that his right brain was more active. But as you know, he was not only an artist but also a scientist. He also had a very unique habit, he used to practice mirror writing. All his notebooks were written in the same way. Some psychologists tried to understand the deeper meaning behind why Leonardo used to write in reverse, but then they thought it would be more comfortable for him because he used to write with the left hand. In 1994, Bill Gates bought 18 pages of Leonardo’s notebooks for $30 million. Science has proven that the left side of the brain works with logic and reasoning, and the right side with imagination and creativity, but Leonardo believed that art and science go hand in hand, intertwining the two. cannot be separated from. He carefully observed the human body, running water, flowering plants and used them to express his art. He used accurate measurement of maths to outline his paintings and sculptures. 

He said that those who shape their art without applying science. They are like those sailors who set out on a sea voyage without a compass, such people can never reach their destination. He believed in the fact that an artist must study the human structure in order to bring out the beauty of a human being on canvas. Without this knowledge the painter would only be able to draw pictures of inanimate people in which there would be no beauty and art. Leonardo encouraged his students to pay attention to detail, logic and maths and asked them to openly use their imagination power along with it. His ability to see the whole picture instead of looking at small things helped him to create a very accurate map without the help of any modern technology. He used to say “Study the science of art and study the art of science” i.e. “understand the science behind art and look at the art behind science.” Leonardo is probably the only great artist who has given us many unique inventions, sketches and notes which are known today. 

6. Corporalita 

In Leonardo’s notebook, you will also find many interesting tips about good health and how you can become physical fit. Leonardo believed that good health gives you a fit mind. 

Giorgio Vasari, who wrote about many famous artists, says about Leonardo that he was very skilled in horse riding. He also used to do swimming and fencing as an exercise. These things made his body very strong, attractive and fit. 

He has also given some health tips in his notebook. They say that stay away from anger and sadness. Keep your heart happy. Do exercise everyday. Pay attention to what you are eating. Chew the food slowly and eat it. You should Eat food only when you are hungry and eat light food. Take good sleep at night and keep your digestive system right. Leonardo was a vegetarian and was also an expert in cooking. According to them, creating a balance between healthy food and exercise gives you good health. 

Conclusion 

King Francois of France hired Leonardo as a painter, architect and engineer, but in reality he used to discuss wisdom and philosophy in depth with the king. The king had given him a luxurious bungalow to live in and he was also given salary every month. While there, Leonardo said goodbye to the world at the age of 67. 

Some people say that Leonardo was a homosexual, while many say that he was a free thinker whose thinking was different from religion, and nothing is known but there is a truth that no one can change that he was a genius. 

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