Where ideas come from – Part I

It is the people with ideas who win most of the desirable places in the world. The person who can create something new and different is wanted—and rarely by the police! He is in demand for his ability to develop ideas. Those who achieve conspicuous success in business and advertising, in radio, drama, literature, journalism, in politics, society, and indeed all the professions and walks of life can attribute the large portion of their success to their capacity for getting and using their ideas.

Many large corporations maintain research departments which do nothing but look for and create new ideas. It is the new in automobiles, airplanes and technology in general—the new in government, politics, labor and industrial relations—the new in fashions, entertaining, advertising, books—that people constantly seek. We even say “What’s new?” as a greeting instead of “Hello.”

Many people work long and hard at a piece of work only to discover that their idea was no good to begin with. Why not make your ideas count for something? Do you have difficulty in getting ideas in the first place?

It is interesting to note that your education, race, age or experience have nothing to do with your success as an idea producer. You do not have to be a scientist, a technician, a writer, an artist. If your idea requires skills in these directions you can hire them later if needed. Successful ideas come from persons in all walks of life, all ages and the least experience. No credentials are needed to go in the idea producing business. Even the sick and handicapped can participate in this rewarding activity.

Neither do your ideas have to be of long lasting value. As soon as they are utilized they make their contribution in increased production, jobs and sales even if only for a short time. Change and novelty may be useful in themselves and may encourage further ideas. Since every new idea is merely a combination of two or more old ideas or parts of old ideas, every new idea contains parts or material for a still newer one.

What is the process of creating ideas?

People have been successful in extracting the wealth of the earth for their use but they have not learned to seek for the untold wealth which lies hidden in their own hearts and minds. It is in human beings as it is in soils where sometimes there is a vein of gold concealed.

To get ideas is a matter of creative thinking. It is a method for those who wish to get results in their own fields of work and in their own lives, for people with ideas live more enjoyably and more profitably than those without. A method of producing ideas is fundamental for any occupation and for life itself. Everything that man produces begins as an idea. From the wrapper on a loaf of bread or the tube of shave cream all the way up to the latest best-seller; from nylon stockings to television; from seedless grapes to a magazine printed in Braille for the blind—all began as an idea.

Most of our ideas come from someone else. Where does the someone else get them? Is there any way we can get an idea, better yet, a succession of ideas, by ourselves? Yes, there is a way, and I don’t mean inspiration which some people would like to meet by appointment in a lunch room.

Developing an idea is much like developing an invention. Sir Joshua Reynolds​, the great painter and founder of the Royal Academy, tells us that invention is little more than a new combination of those images which have been previously gathered and deposited in the memory. Despite the ingenious preacher, nothing can come of nothing, at least by man made efforts. He who has laid up no materials can produce no combinations.

Accordingly, the idea searcher explores human experience and thought—history, psychology, science—anything and everything for analogies and stepping stones for the imagination. The more extensive our acquaintance with the work of those who have excelled, the more extensive will be our own ingenuity. Then when an image comes to us, we can use it, juggle with it, be receptive to its possibilities, not simply hold it isolated as an amusing or interesting curiosity, but have it as a basis for experiment. Most of us get ideas that we do not develop in this way, and nothing ever comes of them.

Some people have their heads full of so-called bright ideas all the time, but only too often they are merely half-baked notions. The techniques suggested herein should improve the quality of the ideas so they really become workable and useful. Practicing better methods need not mean getting more ideas when one is prolific already, but it should mean getting better ones. To be receptive to the creative impulse, one must have a certain discontent, a confidence in the potential ideal, a sense that betterment is always possible. This gives birth to constructive curiosity.