How The Stars Need To Align For Your (Greatest) Idea (Yet)
I’ve had my fair share of ideas so far and thought, well, why don’t I share how I got to them. A word of caution, likely 99 out of your 100 ideas will prove to fall into the ‘move along, nothing to see here’ bucket. Don’t feel discouraged, don’t hesitate and never stop. And consider that perfection can be the enemy of good. Enjoy!
Your brain, a wonderful thing
Our brain is a marvellous machine. It manages our body but also controls how we feel and what information we store and how we, seemingly, forget. It features about the same amount of neural connections than our galaxy the ‘Milky Way’ has stars. Imagine every single one of us is carrying around a whole galaxy and some change. I do find this an amazing concept to follow. How much of our home galaxy have we understood so far and in comparison, how much of our brains’ functions? I would argue that the beauty grows from within and moves around and not knowing everything leaves room for dreamers like you and me.
What to do with it?
If you were to know how to travel from one distant planet to another within milliseconds, would you elect to do it or just think about it? One of the biggest conundrums we are facing is choice, and quite literally the freedom that our thoughts possess. They tend to bounce around like the ball in a flipper machine. One of the best times for this to happen is in the early morning hours. Yes, the early bird really gets the worm. Your brain is in a state of flux when you are crossing over from the last stages of sleep to being fully awake and the hormone cortisol kicking in. We seek to let them flow in the first place to then put them in handy boxes, aiming to catalogue, structure and assess them. But is this the right path to a great idea, perhaps the greatest of your life? I recall an episode of the Simpsons where Homer had a dream of being the genius who invented the ‘Product in Question’.
They kept praising him and his idea, but Homer never got to see it before waking up in horror. Would it not have been nice if he would have been able to steer that dream a bit more, so the product would be visible to him? This is something you can achieve in those waking moments by letting your mind wander with you at the helm. You can also replicate that during the day. It is called a day dream. Whenever people note a blank stare on your face, that’s when you slip into the day slumber and your brain gets a chance to rest but likewise to meander around, jumping from one neural connection to another. Initiating this at will is going to take a bit of practice but trust me, it can be achieved in any environment, just don’t drive a vehicle or operate heavy machinery is my advice.s room for dreamers like you and me.
Creating connections
Now that you know that you can master the pathways more proactively, you will have to travel along the highway of your neural network and create connections between topics and thoughts or investigate those who have been left untouched. Look for crossovers and identify junctions between topics that are seemingly unrelated and make them work in your head. Don’t look at the things that could prevent it from working rather focus on the benefits that enable your idea to grow. You can look at all the barriers later. Allow for the idea to morph and change in your head, to take turns along the pathway. There will be dead-ends also. Ignore them, turn around and take the next turn left. You may notice that things surface which you have never seen in that light before.
Be obvious
In this stage, don’t discount the obvious ideas. Just because you think it is obvious doesn’t mean it really is to others. You really might the first genius that thought of it. It also could be a winner as others understand it more easily as it is more relatable (since it is so obvious).
Be bold
Long standing beliefs are not to be left untouched. Only 10% of what we thought was ‘true’ 100 years ago still stands now to be true, surpassed by new scientific research which in most cases starts with challenging concepts and, a great idea. Boldness is probably one of the most important features in this whole process. You do have it in you, in fact everyone is capable of being bold. I was the blue print of an introvert for a long time and to a certain extent still am until I learned one key phrase; ‘Who cares?’ You are the master of your own destiny and to our luck we do live in a free society still. So, what is the worst that can happen when you are pushing the envelope? One part of your audience will think you are a self-centred twat and the other will admire you. Fine by me, I’ll take it.
Get it out
We now arrive at a crucial junction. Without you realising it all the above might only have taken 10 seconds or less. And you are still in your head and so is your idea. Until nothing has been achieved. Be quick and write down your idea now, so don’t hesitate. It really doesn’t need to be anything novel like, but it will need to encapsulate the core of the approach. You may want to include the ‘What’, ‘Why’ and ‘How’ but a loose group of words will do also as long as they are in your own mental language and recognisable. After you’ve done that look at it again a few hours later. If it still all makes sense, try to embellish it a little, continuing your mental journey on paper. Then leave it for a few days.
Get a helicopter view
This is all about finding the right balance. Gain distance from others that may thwart your ideation stage with close mindedness or a ‘well I thought of that ages ago’. My typical answer in that case would be, ‘And what have you done about it?’. It doesn’t matter really; None of it does because at this stage, you are the one that is the proud owner of one (great) idea. Well done you!
Initial research time
Now, the time has come to do some first research. That can be as simple as searching for the outlines on Google, spending no more than one to two hours on it. The time limit is so you don’t get side tracked and to make sure you focus on the results that have enough prominence. Frankly, an idea that has not progressed past a forlorn blog post can be picked up again, by you. Furthermore, you are only doing the research now because your ideation process is an exercise for your brain and keeps your juices flowing. Why waste that? If somebody has come up with it, fine. Look at similarities and perhaps you can still find a key differentiator? Perhaps your approach makes it better? Don’t be afraid to discover that somebody has indeed thought all of this through already. If that is the case, try to be very happy for the other person, well done them! But note that you have been along the same wavelength of somebody as inventive or even genius as you, so I wouldn’t feel too disheartened. You just got the timing wrong, that’s all.
Get your star ship ready
If you’re still in the running look for allies and share your idea with a maximum of three people you trust gut check the idea. These should be your friends or family members at first but then look for somebody closer to the topic of the idea, a trusted colleague for example to go more in the details. You are about to make some dough and now need to look for a key stakeholder to support you. Keep it all verbal at this stage and if this is still a great idea or improvement, great. You are onto something. Start looking for input and more evaluation and widen your circle. Highlight that you are in process of creating a concept working on any other form of publishing and identify potential future collaborators that are on board by interest and not necessarily by skill. Skills can be acquired, passion can’t. Now include all the feedback, amend the pieces that have proven to be dead-ends and create a concept of the idea, try to make it watertight. Do some more research, iteration and validation using your network of trusted contacts and potential future collaborators.
3, 2, 1 and take off!
Speed is everything. Now time is of the essence and you need to get moving, fast. The rocket takes off, you are at the helm and it moves fast. Your concept is only as good as long as you are getting enough visibility. Hopefully you are the first out to create a footprint. Publish or communicate your concept to a wider but still limited audience that could help you to spread it and make it stick with other people. You will feel some head winds for the very first time at this stage. The naysayers will come out of the woodwork and try to shoot you down faster than you can imagine.
The journey ahead
Be resilient and ignorant
You won’t know where it goes from here until you’ve tried it. When you go broader, the head winds will get stronger, but you also get more fuel and people that like to come on board. Offer the latter an open hatch to your star ship, you need more allies at this moment in time. I’ve learned that resilience is one of the key treats you need to possess in this, sometimes sorry world of constant negativity. Ignore it as much as you can and fall back on your support network you set up in the early stages of the concept. Residence comes with a pitch of ignorance. Let’s not forget that you potentially greatest idea yet is only still yours if the core doesn’t change too much.
Be ruthless
A true great idea has almost never been developed in a team. I would even argue, it never has. Did Albert Einstein have 10 people around him to develop everything we know about gravity? Did Archimedes do a brainstorm with the neighbouring farmers to come up with is life changing water screw invention? Both would have sat in a room, alone, and brewed over the problem to come up with the solution. I only believe in swarm and team creativity to a certain extent. Yes, you can develop a problem statement together to then come up with a ‘done it, seen it’ approach as a team to solve it. But that won’t be cutting it and will be lost in the wood and the trees eventually. Your idea is yours and you need to defend it and make the right decisions at the right time to make it a success.
One last thought
Completing this piece has taken me about 3 months. Between my partner, the kid, job, dog, family and the dishwasher things can drop and be eaten up by what we call ‘Alltag’ in German. It’s that little monster that slowly munches away the time during your day and doesn’t leave much room for doing the things we dream about. So, don’t be too hard on yourself if you dwell on something for a while. Keep it in your mental pocket though. We all have a life to live thus one great idea I can give you here and now for free: Happiness is key!
