What To Do If Your Idea List is Super Long
Some ways to get them out of your head and over the finish line.
I tend to have a lot of ideas for projects — blog posts, research, and fun experiments.
I’ve tried ignoring them and focusing on one area at a time, sometimes for years together. All other ideas had to wait until a slot opened up.
Some of those ideas were for massive years-long projects (e.g., my novel, some research papers), and others were for small projects I could just knock out and feel good about (e.g. this blog post). It didn’t matter, they all had to wait until I was done with my current priority.
This way of working was too restrictive and didn’t suit me at all.
In 2019, I read the book Refuse to Choose! and started keeping an Idea Notebook. Instead of shoving ideas aside, I nurtured and journaled about them. This felt free, creative, and fun. However, that isn’t the whole story.
When I have an idea, it goes through the following stages:
- A vague undefined idea in my head
- A defined idea on paper
- An idea selected for working on
- An idea in active development
- Shipping or publishing an idea
