6:00 pm. Friday night. Post-work brain approaching a state of matter similar in appearance to a mushy grey puddle. The few remaining neurons with enough energy to light a dim bulb show a flicker of excitement.
Morgan Housel’s article titled “Experts From A World That No Longer Exists” is the spark. So here goes whatever this becomes.
Throw away your list of failed experiments, the projects that didn’t get off the ground, the books or screenplays that failed to sell. Keep the lessons learned.
Take comfort in knowing you did what you could with the conditions, resources, and understanding you had at the time. An idea might still have legs worth revisiting.
In another manner of speaking, just because you failed to fly today doesn’t mean you’ll fall tomorrow. I mean, just look at Dave Grohl go.
Believing you can fly isn’t a fool’s errand.
Hop in the way-back machine to witness the Wright Brothers on the sand dunes of North Carolina in 1903. It took the wind conditions to be just right to give the world its first controlled and sustained flight. One minute earlier or later and it could have ended like all of their other attempts: grounded.
Consider this.
What systems, processes, or cultures of belief exist today that might be keeping the next great idea from taking off? Things change. Opportunities open.
Someone somewhere is going to have a breakthrough; yearning to see that idea brought to life that never seems to die, but always feels just out of reach.
Shoot for that.
Keep shooting.
Try again.
Try something new.
Tweak it.
Twist it.
Bring in someone else to review.
Then bring in someone else.
Listen to feedback.
Test it out.
Wait a year and see how the conditions change.
Take a page from Steve Krug’s actual book (Rocket Surgery Made Easy) and “try the same tweak again, only ‘louder’”.
Rinse
Repeat
You might just see your idea fly after all.
