Few days back I wrote about collecting ideas but focusing on one (or very few) ideas or projects at a time. I got few messages agreeing and some that did not. Couple even went to say that “Ideas are dime a dozen.” OK, may be or may be not. I don’t know as I have never bought ideas for a dime!
I have always maintained an ideas note – what I call it my “Ideas Bank”. Initially I used to jot only the ideas that were relevant to what I was doing or what I wanted to focus on and was very picky of what I added to my ideas bank. Initially the intention was to capture my ideas (my moments of brightness) so I could select them on the future and potentially use them and execute them when the time is right.
Then late last year I read few tweets about strengthening the ideas muscle (tweets that I should have saved but did not). This got me thinking of expanding the scope of my ideas bank. A bit more research and it made sense to strengthen the ideas muscle and give it a regular exercise. Very recently, I have started to jot ideas of all sorts. Things that may or may not be of any use to me at this given time. Over time (consider time frame in years) this should serve me atleast two purpose, 1) I should improve my problem solving/solution finding skills, 2) I will have this massive collection of ideas, some of which can be applied to a problem that I or others have at hand.
So you may want to focus on one task at a time but don’t let this stop you from building up your “Ideas Bank”. You never know what future problems you might be solving today in your notes! Go strengthen your ideas muscle.
TEJAS PATEL'S LIFESTREAM 