Years ago I read a book by the famous trial attorney Gerry Spence titled,"How To Argue And Win Every Time." In one part of the book, Spence talked about certain kinds of wisdom and knowledge that cannot be found in books. Like the wisdom of a truck driver or unique perspective of a night janitor.

These people see and hear things that many of us miss. As an attorney, Gerry Spence learned to pay attention to these people. Because they often held insights and useful information that could be advantageous to a trial attorney. Learning to pay attention to the minutia, nuances and details can broaden our perspective and understanding.

Fresh out of grad school with a master's degree in criminal justice administration, I thought I knew a lot about crime and police work. What I found out as a rookie in field training was that I didn't know squat. Sure, I could wax poetic about the etiology of crime. But that was book smarts, not street smarts.

Early on in my field training, I thought my field training officer (FTO) was some kind of clairvoyant genius. "How did he always manage to spot criminal behavior and suspicious actions?" I used to think to myself. The answer was more than experience. It was that he honed his visual intelligence.

The art of perception

Amy E. Herman is a smart lady. She holds a BA in International Affairs from Lafayette College, a JD from the National Law Center, George Washington University, and an MA in Art History from Hunter College.

Herman tapped her eclectic educational background to create a unique course titled "The Art of Perception." She also wrote a book titled "Visual Intelligence: Sharpen Your Perception, Change Your Life." An Amazon review has this to say about her book:

"Amy Herman has trained experts from many fields how to perceive and communicate better. By showing people how to look closely at images, she helps them hone their 'visual intelligence,' a set of skills we all possess but few of us know how to use properly. She has spent more than a decade teaching doctors to observe patients instead of their charts, helping police officers separate facts from opinions when investigating a crime, and training professionals from the FBI, the State Department, Fortune 500 companies, and the military to recognize the most pertinent and useful information. Her lessons highlight far more than the physical objects you may be missing; they teach you how to recognize the talents, opportunities, and dangers that surround you every day."

In an NPR interview, Herman said, "My hope is that when these intelligence and law enforcement professionals go back on the job that they will not only look at the crime scenes differently and surveillance activity differently that they will step back and say, maybe there's another way to see this, maybe the way that I'm looking at it isn't the only way to see it.

And then when they write their report or they send an email or a text, they think carefully about every word that they're using because one of the things that I emphasize is that every word counts because someone is listening to you."

Wisdom of a street cop

What Amy Herman teaches is the same thing my FTO introduced me to: The art of attention and perception. For example, I learned to ask myself why someone would park their car down the street, away from residential houses. Particularly at night time. The answer? Because burglars don't want to be spotted in the neighborhood, so they park further away.

Another example was the guy my FTO spotted walking away from a commuter lot in the afternoon. "Did you see that guy back there?" my FTO asked. "Go back and arrest him."

I thought my FTO was nuts, but I drove back and we contacted the man. My FTO walked past him to the parked cars, came back over to us and put the man in handcuffs. "Go look over there," my FTO said. When I did, I saw shattered glass on the ground beside the car the man had broken into. We found stolen property from the car in the man's pockets.

"How did you know?" I later asked my FTO. "The commuter bus comes at Noon and 5PM. There's no real reason for this guy to be around here. And he was ducked down when we first drove by." Then he turned to me and said, "It's all about patterns and behavior. You have to attune yourself to see what's there. And what's not there."

Learn to look at art, learn to look at life

Learning to look at art can teach us to look closer at life. It's why Amy Herman takes her clients to art museums. So they can study closely the nuances in each piece of artwork. Learn to find the story. The deeper meaning.

Study art and you begin to see the artistry in daily living. It can be found in the flourishes and gesticulations of a police officer directing traffic. Or the abstract flight path of a bumblebee, dancing among the flowers. It's in the cloud formations, the soft sway of grasslands from an afternoon breeze. And when we learn to slow down and take in this tapestry of beauty all around us, we are enriched and better prepared to express ourselves. We become inspired.

Painter Scott L. Christensen teaches his students to look closely at paintings. Rather than take a photo of the whole painting, Scott would say, "take a closeup of the various sections, so you can record and better study the brush work and edges." Over time I've learned to really study a master painting. I look very closely at how the paint was applied, where the palette knife danced and the close use of values.

The practice of closely studying art teaches you to slow down. It's kind of like learning to talk less and listen more. When you do, you invariably learn a great deal.

The accidental creative

Author and podcast host Todd Henry created the very popular podcast "The Accidental Creative." In a recent episode he interviewed Amy Herman about her "The Art of Perception" course. At the end of the episode, Henry came up with three useful takeaways:

1. What's conspicuously absent? Ask yourself what's missing. For example, emergency room doctors don't just acknowledge the symptoms present, but also the ones that are missing. As artists and creatives, we should study our work closely. Beyond what's obviously working, what's missing? Is there something we neglected to add that would improve the piece?

2. Get out of your silo! Visit a coffee shop and you'll see tons of people with their noses stuck in their smart phones. Others have earphones plugged into their laptops, rendering them oblivious to the world around them. If we want to be successful artists, we need to get out of our studios and interact with other artists. Visit museums. Travel. Take workshops. You'll see and learn more this way.

3. Make time to synthesize! We all lead busy lives, juggling work, family, exercise and more. It's easy to forget about the importance of serious downtime. Daily walks. Early morning reading. Even parking your car somewhere quiet on a lunch break to sketch, write or daydream. Downtime like this is where the magic happens. When our brains slow down enough to let our subconscious thoughts emerge. This is when all that we have read and all our creative experiences seem to synthesize and lead to epiphanies and new insights.

You don't have to become a street cop, go to law school like Gerry Spence or obtain multiple degrees like Amy Herman. All you have to do is slow down, start paying closer attention, and train yourself to absorb more of the world around you. In this way, you'll hone your visual intelligence and greatly improve the quality of your art.