Tales of the Rampant Coyote

Adventures in Indie Gaming!

Idea Hoarding

Posted by Rampant Coyote on June 3, 2016

IdeaFairyWhen first setting out in a creative endeavor, there’s a temptation to hoard ideas. It’s easy enough to do… we’ve probably come into it because we had one or two really awesome ideas stuck inside our head that we think is so incredibly awesome and we absolutely HAVE to see them made into reality. But we worry about using them all up at once. Like these are the coolest ideas we’re ever going to have, and we have to make sure we do a perfect job on them, because once they are done, they will be used up. We have to make them count.

The reality is… most of the time… once you get engaged in a creative endeavor, and really start focusing not only on the current tasks at hand but on potential future projects, the ideas begin to flow. Big time. Often that super-duper idea that motivated you to commit to actually engaging in the first place may start to pale, especially under the cold hard light of implementation reality. ‘Cuz abstract things that only exist in your imagination as a sort of platonic ideal are almost always better than anything in the real world.

But the point is, if you fully intend to engage in a creative career (whether as a main career or a side-career, it makes no difference) and make that part of your lifestyle, the only kind of idea hoarding you need to do is to save all the tons of ideas that are going to have in some kind of file until you are ready to work on them. You will soon have more than you will ever have time to invest into them. And frequently, the more you work on them to turn them into something real, the more you’ll have.

The creative mind is kind of awesome that way.

 

(H/T to TheMeatly for the comic)

 


Filed Under: General - Comments: 2 Comments to Read



  • Tesh said,

    Ohhhh, yes. Ideas are the *easy* part. It’s hard *not* to have ideas. Finding time to develop them and ways to monetize them, that’s tricky.

  • Rampant Coyote said,

    And you can have five authors start writing a story based on the same idea. If they are any good, the result will be five very different stories.

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