1. Find a Place to Think Your Thoughts
If you go to your
designated place to think expecting to generate good thoughts, then eventually
you will
come up with some.
Where is the best place to think? Everybody’s different. Some people think best
in the
shower. Others, like
my friend Dick Biggs, like to go to a park. For me, the best places to think
are in my car, on
planes, and in the
spa. Ideas come to me in other places as well, such as when I’m in bed. (I keep
a special
lighted writing pad on
my nightstand for such times.) I believe I often get thoughts because I make it
a habit to
frequently go to my
thinking places. If you want to consistently generate ideas, you need to do the
same thing.
Find a place where you
can think, and plan to capture your thoughts on paper so that you don’t lose
them. When
I found a place to
think my thoughts, my thoughts found a place in me.
2. Find a Place to Shape Your Thoughts
Rarely do ideas come
fully formed and completely worked out. Most of the time, they need to be shaped
until they have
substance. As my friend Dan Reiland says, they have to “stand the test of
clarity and
questioning.” During
the shaping time, you want to hold an idea up to strong scrutiny. Many times a
thought that
seemed outstanding
late at night looks pretty silly in the light of day. Ask questions about your
ideas. Fine tune
them. One of the best
ways to do that is to put your thoughts in writing. Professor, college
president, and U.S.
senator S. I. Hayakawa
wrote, “Learning to write is learning to think. You don’t know anything clearly
unless you
can state it in
writing.”
As you shape your
thoughts, you find out whether an idea has potential. You learn what you have.
You also
learn some things
about yourself. The shaping time thrills me because it embodies:
Humor:
The thoughts that don’t work often provide comic relief.
Humility:
The moments when I connect with God awe me.
Excitement:
I love to play out an idea mentally. (I call it “futuring” it.)
Creativity:
In these moments I am unhampered by reality.
Fulfillment:
God made me for this process; it uses my greatest gifts and gives me
joy.
Honesty:
As I turn over an idea in my mind, I discover my true motives.
Passion:
When you shape a thought, you find out what you believe and what
really counts.
Change:
Most of the changes I have made in my life resulted from thorough
thinking on a subject.
You can shape your
thoughts almost anywhere. Just find a place that works for you, where you will
be able to
write things down,
focus your attention without interruptions, and ask questions about your ideas.
3. Find a Place to Stretch Your Thoughts
If you come upon great
thoughts and spend time mentally shaping them, don’t think you’re done and can
stop there. If you do,
you will miss some of the most valuable aspects of the thinking process. You
miss bringing
others in and
expanding ideas to their greatest potential.
Earlier in my life, I
have to admit, I was often guilty of this error. I wanted to take an idea from
seed thought
to solution before
sharing it with anyone, even the people it would most impact. I did this both
at work and at
home. But over the
years, I have learned that you can go much farther with a team than you can go
alone.
I’ve found a kind of
formula that can help you stretch your thoughts. It says,
The Right Thought
plus the Right People
in the Right Environment
at the Right Time
for the Right Reason
= the Right Result
This combination is
hard to beat. Like every person, every thought has the potential to become
something
great. When you find a
place to stretch your thoughts, you find that potential.
4. Find a Place to Land Your Thoughts
Author C. D. Jackson
observes that “great ideas need landing gear as well as wings.” Any idea that
remains only an idea
doesn’t make a great impact. The real power of an idea comes when it goes from
abstraction to
application. Think about Einstein’s theory of relativity. When he published his
theories in 1905
and 1916, they were
merely profound ideas. Their real power came with the development of the
nuclear reactor
in 1942 and the
nuclear bomb in 1945. When scientists developed and implemented Einstein’s
ideas, the
whole world changed.
Likewise, if you want
your thoughts to make an impact, you need to land them with others so that they
can
someday be
implemented. As you plan for the application phase of the thinking process,
land your ideas first
with…
Yourself:
Landing an idea with yourself will give you integrity. People will buy
into an idea only after they
buy into the leader
who communicates it. Before teaching any lesson, I ask myself three questions:
“Do I
Key
Players: Let’s face it, no idea will fly if the
influencers don’t embrace it. After all, they are the people
who carry thoughts
from idea to implementation.
Those
Most Affected: Landing thoughts with the people on the firing
line will give you great insight.
Those closest to changes
that occur as a result of a new idea can give you a “reality read.” And that’s
important, because
sometimes even when you’ve diligently completed the process of creating a
thought,
shaping it, and
stretching it with other good thinkers, you can still miss the mark.
5. Find a Place to Fly Your Thoughts
French philosopher
Henri-Louis Bergson, who won the Nobel Prize in literature in 1927, asserted
that a
person should “think
like a man of action—act like a man of thought.” What good is thinking if it has
no
application in real
life? Thinking divorced from actions cannot be productive. Learning how to
master the
process of thinking
well leads you to productive thinking. If you can develop the discipline of
good thinking and
turn it into a
lifetime habit, then you will be successful and productive all of your life.
Once you’ve created,
shaped, stretched, and landed your
thoughts, then flying them can be fun and easy.
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