This morning I was excited to switch on my computer and start jotting down my thoughts on Generating New Business Ideas when I realized that I had created an entirely new article (do you see the process of viral thinking taking place). So I decided to switch hands for a minute to complete this article first because I believe that the power of one’s imagination directly effects your ability to generate new business ideas.
As I began typing the word imagination I started thinking back to when I was a child, sitting in front of the television with a big yellow bird rambling on in the background and doodling on colored pieces of construction paper. I was never at a loss for what to create, as soon as that crayon hit the paper my mind was a flood of new ideas. As a child those ideas were of course robots, monsters, aliens and other delightful creatures that may or may not make sense to the average adult, but the point is they were all there just waiting to be drawn out. I remember getting excited thinking that I would somehow create a toy that all of the kids would want and Mattel would have no option but to pay me millions of dollars for the idea. Ok so maybe it was not about the money and more about seeing my idea as a toy but you get the idea. My question is what happens to that imagination as we grow older and how can we work to get it back? Now I am not suggesting that we all break out the #2 and start frantically doodling monsters and aliens on office memos but I do suggest you stop and think about why you did such things as a child.
As a child things are so new and undiscovered. How could you have been so sure that there weren’t monsters out there somewhere waiting to be discovered. In fact some of you may have been entirely convinced that when your mother shut the door at night that those little creatures were lurking in the shadows just a few feet away. My point that perhaps you need to sit back and think about what caused you to have such visions as a child and begin thinking of ways that you can apply that lost imagination to your life now. Think of generating new ideas as the search for those lost monsters, unicorns and aliens that so excited and scared you when you were a child. Just because you are told that it is not true does not mean that it is not possible.
So yes maybe I am saying that we should all take out a #2, sit down at your desk (I think at home might be the best environment) and doodle out something totally unbelievable. Now think to yourself, how did you come up with that and it may not be to far off from the thought process Henry Ford used when coming up with his vision for the automobile. All it takes is a little imagination and the ability to see things that aren’t quite there yet.
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