The best ideas strike without warning and can cause a serious mental high. Side effects may include visions of grandeur.

I tend to sit on a lot of projects. Some for the last few days, some for the last few weeks, and some that come and go over the course of years. Story ideas, website ideas, clever craft projects, family history/photo preservation, and home organization/decoration are the main players. I live for the spontaneous moments when an idea hits me, because there’s nothing like the rush of truly believing that I am fucking brilliant. Sometimes the feeling is fleeting and logic and/or self-doubt punches my brilliant idea in the face within seconds; in other cases the idea persists over time and I find myself thinking, “that’s a fucking brilliant idea” all over again. That’s when I know I’ve found a decent one.

The problem with great ideas is that they can require a lot of follow-through. This is definitely a weak spot for me and one that I am actively working to improve.

One of the good, solid ideas I’ve had is to reduce the number of post-it notes and paper bits that clutter my desk and life in general. I put a cheap notebook on my desk and am trying to use it whenever I have to scratch some quick notes, a to-do reminder, or doodle while I’m talking on the phone. I try not to stress about writing my “important” ideas in there, too… it’s easy enough to just rip out the page and put it somewhere else.

This is a similar idea to one I had a few years ago when I was at my height of collecting written-on napkins and envelopes and corners of junk mail flyers… anything I could find in my car to write on, because inspiration seemed strongest during my moderately frequent solitary driving time. I bought a few pocket-sized, spiral-bound memo notebooks and kept one in my purse and another in my car at all times. I still have them, but I don’t always have them with me anymore. I don’t drive very often these days, working from home and generally living the life of a hermit (outreach internet activities notwithstanding). Instead, my home office has become the repository for these random bits of inspiration and reminders.

So, at least I’m now siphoning my brilliance and/or random wacko streams of consciousness into a manageable repository. That helps me feel slightly more sane on a daily basis. And really, isn’t modern life about the ability to maintain sanity in an insane world? Now I’m going to return to my regularly-scheduled program of being pummeled by information and sensory overload. You know: the internet. Whee!