A lot of people think the moment of discovery is a loud, bright, crash-bang thing that happens all in one instant.

I think that’s wishful thinking.

As humans, we can be guilty of sitting around, waiting for the next big idea to hit us. We reactively reflect, think about things, expose ourselves to relevant material and hope to have some sort of epiphany that will make us the next Alexander Graham Bell. But it’s just another excuse for not producing. Is waiting for something to be revealed to us just divine laziness?

Think about some of the biggest inventions in history. The telephone. The lightbulb. The computer. The inventors of all these things worked their butts off over a period of time to get the results they ended up with. They pitched their ideas. They got rejected time after time. But they made progress, then made improvements on their progress. They got to their finished product in increments- not all in one day.

So, instead of waiting for greatness to strike and our names to go down in the history books in the blink of an eye, we should spend our time improving on the baby steps we’ve already taken…. The path less traveled.

Interesting related reading: Myths of Innovation by Scott Berkun

I was watching a documentary on Thomas Jefferson the other weekend. This one to be specific: http://www.pbs.org/jefferson/

We all know he was a polymath who had a strong influence on the basic foundation of the U.S. that is still relevant today- hundreds of years later. But he was cool to me for another reason.

Despite his sometimes obvious shortcomings, Jefferson knew one thing. He knew how to study.

In school, I was a smart kid who had been taught by the system to do the minimum. Studying never occurred to me; I either absorbed info while I was doodling, or throwing things at classmates, or I crammed, cheated, and faked my way to a C. Jefferson had it right though. To pseudo-quote the documentary, Jefferson lived life to its fullest, he had no fear of learning, and no fear that he could not be good at everything. Keep Reading

When do you get your ideas? I mean literally, in the middle of the night? During your work hours? While eating dinner with your family?

My husband snorts at me every time we’re in the car and I turn my purse inside out looking for my notebook. I’m usually in a panic to jot down the idea I just had- but that’s me; if I don’t get it down in a hurry, who knows if I’ll remember it later. (I quite possibly have memory issues…)

My ideas aren’t always directly tied to work- in fact, most of the time, they’re not. (I’m one of those who has to really step away from the monitor a few hours a day.) But if I try, I can steer them in that direction eventually. Keep Reading

“Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and get the work done. If you wait around for the clouds to part and a bolt of lighting to strike you in the brain, you’re not going to make an awful lot of work.” – Chuck Close via Joshua Blankenship

I totally disagree. I’m not saying inspiration is the only way to get anything done, but it can be the boost you need to do it really, really well. In my opinion, it’s the rare combination of work ethic and inspiration that leads to really great results.