Thomas Edison, c. 1918-1919According to Thomas Edison, "Genius is 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration". We dreamers could learn a little from this. It's great to have ideas, but even better (and ridiculously harder) to make them happen--and this is where most of us slip into the cracks and fall into the vast abyss of space and time. God knows how vast the graveyard of my ideas have become. I seem to discard of them like lollipops--I suck them dry of their flavor and sweetness until i get to the very thing that holds them upright--the hard part--which I send away to the wasteland of ideas that coulda-woulda-shoulda.
So what holds me back? Apart from the fact that the actual "doing" part is way less glamorous than the "idea" part, there is also the "fear" part. I know I have the stamina to pull ideas off, but what keeps most of us from doing anything is the gripping, all-consuming fear of failure, of judgment, of being cast aside as another unoriginal and mediocre experiment that's just more stale than savvy. And then what? All that investment in time, energy and resources--was it worth it all?
I came across the 99% Conference on the Behance Network the other day. Frankly, I'm a little tired of the conference scene (there's just too many of them!) but this one stands out a little--it has the feel of TED, but retaining it's own brand (and of course, is much smaller and less techy). I was pulled in by the speakers and the quick blurbs they had about what each of them had to say about generating and executing ideas. It's all very basic stuff really, but packaged in such a way that has maximum impact to the audience. The simplest message can be the most effective:
"The purpose of a strategy is not to come up with the right answers. It's to enable you to act." -Frans Johansson
"Transforming society begins with transforming yourself."-Martin Ping
"Don't get angry. It's not useful."-John Maeda
"We must not be afraid to kill new ideas that will take us off course."-Scott Belsky
And my personal favorite....
"The three most harmful addictions are heroin, carbohydrates, and a monthly salary."-Fred Wilson (quoting a tweet he read)
I really liked the one by Martin Ping. Who is he? I've thought myself before, that surely the best way to test your own morals and ethics is by asking yourself this question: If everyone else interacted with society, economically and socially, in the way that you do so, would society be better or worse? People talk about ideals, and criticise governments, but most of us, including myself, are hypocrites.
ReplyDeleteI think Frans Johansson's quote is potentially catastrophic. Had he never heard of the Nazis? Their strategy is one that could've done less with enabling people like Hitler to act, and more with evaluation over whether it the strategy was the right answer (for whatever issue they thought they were addressing).
haha. your comment on the nazis is funny--only because you've taken the quote out of context, which i can totally see how. All those I quoted are successful entrepreneurs, people who have proven to be, what i like to call, savvy "idea engineers". They had an idea, and followed through to its implementation--in a business or social enterprise context. most of these people have created enterprises for social good, which is why they were invited to speak at this conference.
ReplyDelete