Thinking about ideas

I love Seth Godin's blog. The posts are often short, making them easy to read during a busy day, but they almost always hit me in the gut. He's usually referring to business, but his thoughts often stretch quite easily to writing and the rest of my life. This morning's post was a list of where ideas come from. I've included the ones which spoke most loudly to me here (with my notes in brackets). Click the link for the entire list.

1. Ideas don't come from watching television [I think mostly this is true, although once in awhile, something on TV will send me down the path to an idea]

2. Ideas sometimes come from listening to a lecture [This is true for me. I especially like the TED Talks]

3. Ideas often come while reading a book [Boy, do they ever!]

8. Ideas fear experts, but they adore beginner's mind. A little awareness is a good thing [I find when I've started researching a subject I know little-to-nothing about, I'm soon bursting with ideas. Further down the road, when I'm more familiar with the subject, the ideas are fewer, so I have to agree with this one. This might make me tempted to be a dabbler, but I find that you need to keep learning in order to bring those ideas to reality]

9. Ideas come in spurts, until you get frightened. Willie Nelson wrote three of his biggest hits in one week ["Spurts" of creativity or activity are when I do my best work]

10. Ideas come from trouble [What's that old saying? "Necessity is the mother of invention" I think creative thinking is best when it solves a problem]

16. Ideas come out of the corner of the eye, or in the shower, when we're not trying [The shower! My fountain of ideas :) ]

picture by qisur (Ramunas Geciauskas)