I love ideas. I come up with them all the time because its an addictive process. Coming up with new ideas makes me feel good, great in fact – its a wonderful release to take a few days or even weeks maturing an idea from early sketches and concepts into a plan to make the idea happen.
In this video Scott Belsky details exactly why this addiction is a trap. Most ideas never get to the ‘plan’ stage never mind the ‘doing’ stage. My vast collection of notepads, journals, post-its and emails are testament to that.
The fact is that as enjoyable and addictive as the idea generation process is it kills productivity and sucks time. When it comes down to it, idea generation is simply another form of procrastination that eventually leads to ‘idea fatigue’.
Idea fatigue is like a bad hangover and is incredibly damaging to a creative mind because it can make the process of maturing new ideas feel cynical and painful.
So the next time a new ides springs to mind don’t throw everything at it. Simply make a note of it, jot down the key points and concepts and get back to work.
Interesting idea (no pun intended) – and one I can identify with. I’m losing track of the domain names I’ve registered to use for a new idea that never comes to fruition cos I haven’t got the time.
Coming up with ideas is great fun though and occasionally there are great ones. In future I’m going to start a file/database/whatever (see? An idea) and dump ideas in there when they come up – then when I do have some time on my hands I can revisit them and develop the good cones and laugh at the absurd ones!
Thanks. I’m a project junkie and an idea person. I am trying now to limit myself to the few ideas I can make happen. I’ve finished up some old ideas and put to fruition. Now trying to limit myself and get some sleep. Unfortunately, when I get a reakkt big idea, I ( it, the idea)suck other people in and then when I want out, I can’t get out gracefully. I’m working on it. This addition does some good, it keeps me out of trouble in other areas, but it also isolates me, which isn’t all that bad for the time being.