Sunday, December 30, 2012

IDEA





Each and every one of has had an IDEA or may be many ideas, to make life more enjoyable,  be it to make more money, find more happiness, enjoy healthy relationships or experience bliss.  Each IDEA would have seemed exceptional to us because each one was based on an Innovative Dramatic Exclusive Assumption. Perhaps one of those unique and exclusive prerogatives granted to the human race is our ability to generate ideas for the progress that the human race has made is only due to our constant evolution by leveraging ideas.

On and individual level though, time and time again we would have discovered that almost every idea of ours after the initial euphoria would have created a number of self doubts, seem to have innumerable problems in execution and largely fizzle out. The idea itself maybe very sound to begin with but they fizzle out because ideas are quick to germinate but like plants require to be nurtured with care and patience. To appreciate this one needs to understand the intricacies of an IDEA as under:

Innovation is the key to an idea. It refers to the ability to generate thoughts that are new and different from the existing. This is also the crux of an idea. The focus is on being different, thinking out of the box and generating thoughts that are novel. Yet the problem with innovation is that they take wings immediately but when they attempt to fly  they realize that the wing span is neither ergonomically right nor well developed to soar high as anticipated. This means that the innovative idea has to be studied in depth and redesigned painstakingly to ensure success. Most of don’t have the self belief , the patience and / or the technical, financial and managerial ability to make the innovative idea fructify.

Dramatic ideas refer to the realization that the idea can be revolutionary and dramatically alter our existing world. When an idea strikes us the impact is euphoric because we believe that now we can revolutionize the world with our dramatically different idea. Yet when we attempt to find out more about the acceptance of the idea we have, we are often stupendified to note that ideas similar to ours have existed in varied forms and the whole drama then ebbs out of the idea. At this point for most of us the idea now becomes deflated balloon and we are too weary and fatigued to attempt to adapt our idea to make a dramatic impact again.

Exclusive idea is the belief that the way our idea pans out will be unique, different and just the prerogative of our fertile mind and imagination. In a world full of ideating individual’s exclusivity is a very rare privilege and even that privilege has to be backed by tremendous confidence, financial support and exceptional marketing to ensure that the difference is visible and noticeable. For many of us the exclusivity of the idea loses steam no sooner we realize the price one has to pay to ensure that exclusivity. We are also drawn into a inner conflict of being pragmatic about our idea and daring to risk everything for it. Most of us then retreat to the safety of mediocrity for then we can continue to sustain ourselves.

Assumptions are the common thread that runs through each element of an idea. At every stage we assume that the idea we have is new, impactful and privileged to us alone.  When the realization that our assumptions were wrong in varying degrees hits us we first do a double take as if someone has hit us on the solar plexus. The wind is taken out of us and unless our mental makeup is that of a gritty boxer we do not hear the count of 8 and close our eyes and allow ourselves to throw in the towel. The fault is not in our ideas, it is in our approach to the idea; we cannot take on and build up on our ideas with kid gloves; what we need is the grit, guts and panache of a world beater heavy weight champion.

Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Larry Page & Sergy Brinn and the Zuckerberg’s of the world are both testimony and inspiration to the power of ideas. You need not necessarily have to be them but certainly you can try to emulate their ideations, their self belief, their grit and hopefully some glory will also rub off on you when you let your IDEA bloom and allow your Innovative Dramatic Exclusive Assumptions to bear fruit with persistence, fortitude and passion.

Action Points:

  1. The simplest idea is to draw up an elaborate New Year Resolution List. For certain you would have done it in the past and by and large the list has remained as it is or perhaps grown in length. Read the post above and notice how almost all of what is said above is reflected in your failure to effectively stick to your resolutions of the past. Do you have an IDEA how you can ensure your current New Year Resolutions can be effectively implemented. ( hint : put a time frame to each resolution, mark timelines to review progress, announce key resolutions to family and friends so that you are more committed to it etc.)
  2. Come up with 5 ideas to enhance your income this year by 25 %. Now work on one or more of these ideas and by March end review the progress. If you are faltering find out the reasons why.
  3. Come up with 5 more ideas on how YOU will contribute to environment protection and any one of your favorite social causes. Review progress quarterly.
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