You Have a Brilliant Idea, Now What?

“The air is full of ideas. They are knocking you in the head all the time”  Henry Ford

‘Wanna play?

Let’s assume you have a ‘Oh, what a brilliant idea’ brain flash: a moment of sheer fecking genius, inspiration on tap, creativity bounding, what do you do with it?

A. Sit on it.

B. Act on it right away.

C. Question it’s brilliance.

E. Dismiss it because it probably wouldn’t work anyway.

F. None of the above.

Let’s now go have a tangent moment.

Remember your summer school holidays?

Endless fun, fun, summer fun. The days when you returned home filthy, rugged, scorched from the sun, covered in scratches, bumps, bruises but by goodness you were one happy being.

Remember what you used to cram in, in the space of what, 12 hours?

If you, or one of your friends had an idea, it would get tried and quickly, depending on it’s success, it would be dumped, or played out for days, and days, and days, and days.

Yeah, I know you aren’t a kid, the ideas that you have now will (probably) have a greater impact on your life, to those you had when you were an 8 year old.

Deciding to go for a bike ride is not, I agree, the same as changing career.

Deciding to make a den out of sheets, is not the same as creating a new product, or service if you’re a small business owner.

Different consequences, perhaps a higher risk, needing more thought, research and planning.

But the point is, the time it takes to take action on an idea as an adult is too long, for most. 

Why? (Fear aside for a minute)

Right, some ideas you have are going to be massive and their implementation won’t happen right away. But you probably have hundreds of little ideas that crash into your head, those are the ones we’re talking about here.

The ideas that present themselves to you in the strangest times: on the loo, in the shower, having a casual conversation, reading a blog post or comment on the Internet, a tweet, a visit to a website, watching a soap opera (okay, maybe not that!)

Do you keep them safe?

Do you nurture the idea?

Do you write them down?

Do you take action right away, at the risk of not finishing something else?

A big fault for many of us is we don’t complete one project before we move onto the next. If that’s you, you have a not so good habit there, finish what you start, don’t be hypnotised by the shiny green on the other side of the fence, until your own grass is topnotch.

And your ideas, try this:

This is what I do, most of the time (do as I say, not as I do!)

1. Write the idea down.

2. Take some form of action on it right away (when you have finished the most important tasks that require your full attention at that moment of course.)

3. Take action:  research, running it past someone, writing a blog post, tweeting it, give it your full attention for 20 minutes.

4. Commence the ‘sit on it’ part here, 2 days max. Even if you’re tempted to revisit. Do nothing. Just hold onto your galloping horses.

5. Revisit after 2 days. How do you feel about it now?

6. Still the same way? Take more action.

7. Not as excited? Shelve it for one month.

8. Revisit after a month.

9. Does it inspire/fit/mean more now? Yes? Take more action.

10. No? Ditch it. (Or keep a little folder of ideas!)

You’ll have other ideas. Probably better ones.