A Light Bulb
Everyone is looking for the Big Idea. Maybe it’s that thing to sell on a late night infomercial peddling something nobody realized they needed but everyone buys anyway. Because some of us want that million dollar, quick hit, make my money and retire thing to come our way (as long as it comes to us while sitting in front of our TV.) Some of us want that Greatest Love of All. Not the insane Whitney Houston version or the kind monopolized by the children of our future, but that, Disney, yes it can be real if you let it be real kind of blow my heart apart with this amazingly good thing Love. And we want to be a princess and we want the prince to ride up on a white horse…
But here’s an idea, pursuing the Big Idea means taking a risk, gambling on your dream, and changing the world you live in. And so, the Big Idea has become inconvenient. And how can it not be when it requires action. It requires us to do something. It requires us to think beyond what we know and into the realm of what can be. Acting on the Big Idea means well, acting on something. I mean, really doing something. Not just thinking about doing something and how cool it would be if you did it. Acting means work, chance, vulnerability, and risk.
If you want the Big Idea, you have to wonder. You have to explore. You have to try something. You have to stop being the roadie and start being the star. Get a piece of paper and a pen. Write something down. Get a guitar and strum it. Kick a ball. Build a website. Kiss someone you want to love and see what happens.
The Big Idea doesn’t have to be too big. It can fit in all sorts of spaces. It can be as simple as a note jotted down in a moment of inspiration or a new invention that makes life easier (for those other people who don’t want to get off the sofa.) But for you, Idea Explorer, it means jump roping over a string of ideas, skipping your plans over the river of innovation, and sending electricity through your brainstorm.
I’m personally tired of being a victim to my laziness and my good intentions. I’m tired of hearing myself think, “yeah, but…” I’m done wasting time not doing stuff. Thomas Jefferson said, “Do you want to know who you are? Don't ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.” And damn it if George Lucas got something right (no, definitely not Episode 1-3) when he had Yoda say, “do or do not, there is no try”. It’s so fucking simple, it’s almost ridiculous. I mean, you just have to do it. You just have to pick yourself up and exercise your imagination – and work it out and push it, until you find that Big Idea and you can hold it up for a long time without getting tired.
So keep looking. Find the big idea – make it so big and so beautiful and so complex that you’re confounded, confused, and crazy over trying to get it – but keep looking – because that really is the big idea.