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Ideas Are Cheap and a Quote About Ideas
This Week's Note
Ideas Are Cheap
As artists it's easy to think that our ideas are our golden ticket. As people willing to take a risk, it's easy to think that the only ingredient we’re missing is our next big idea. As diligent laborers it's easy to think that if we just knew what to work on, we would be well on our way.
In reality though, ideas don’t really work that way. Ideas, even the really good ones aren’t the secret ingredient to our creative practices, financial planning, or career goals. Ideas by themselves can only take us so far. We can (legitimately) have a fool-proof idea, but without time or capacity (which are incredibly expensive) to create meaningful movement, our stores of really good ideas will never amount to more than a mental itch or scribbled note.
Ideas by themselves can’t lead to change, or impact our lives for the better. Fortunately, that’s not what they’re here for. We generate a lot of ideas precisely because they are cheap. We have a lot of ideas because we’re meant to churn through them. We have a lot of ideas because a lot of ideas is the starting point.
When we allow our ideas to be sparks (that in all likelihood won’t ignite a fire) we can allocate our expensive stores of time and capacity to the ones that seem most likely to grow.
This Week's Resource
A quote from Designing Your Life Written by Bill Burnett and Dave Evans.
You choose better when you have lots of good ideas to choose from.
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