Free Entrepreneur Myths by Damir Perge Page A

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Entrepreneur Myth 17 | Ideas and ideation come through purpose or special intent
     

     
Some people think an entrepreneur comes up with ideas by sitting in a quiet corner with no disturbance and suddenly, poof , ideas flood into their head at 100 miles an hour. We can debate this myth forever. However, in my opinion: ideas and ideation are, first, a state of mind.
     
Ideas, like life situations, arise from randomness. Randomness does not allow predictions. Predicting when you will come up with that one “eureka” idea is nearly impossible.
     
If you want to be a great idea person, study the life of Nikola Tesla. If you aren’t familiar with Nikola Tesla, that’s too bad.  He invented the A/C motor, transformer and wireless — just a few simple things that we cannot live without today. Nikola Tesla was a genius. Only Albert Einstein and Isaac Newton are in his intellectual capital league.
     
Tesla was a loner. Unlike his nemesis Thomas Edison, Tesla invented most of his inventions by himself. Thomas Edison, who tooted his own horn as the best inventor in America, if not the world, did quite the opposite. Edison is famous for experimenting thousands of times before cracking the code on making the light bulb work. But he didn’t invent alone. He had a team. Most people don’t know that Edison actually took credit for inventions developed by others in his lab.
     
Tesla had an incredible record of coming up with new inventions. He calculated and played out every detail of a new invention inside his mind before he even put it on paper. I learned from studying Tesla that visualization of an idea is critical. When Tesla developed the solution to the A/C motor, the visual came to him as he was strolling through a park with his friend, discussing a Serbian poem. Random, non-related events can enable any entrepreneur to come up with a genius idea if their mind is open to it. Ideas, if you want them, will come to you if you’re ready for them.
     
When I was younger, I believed you had to be an expert in a particular area in order to come up with an idea. Formal education does not play as important a part as some people think. Einstein said, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.”
     
How do you come up with ideas? Here’s how it works for me:
     
Step 1: Keep your mind open and willing to receive ideas.
     
Step 2: Always be fully aware that ideas will come to you — often at odd times and hours.
     
Step 3: Random events can cause trigger points for an idea. The trigger points may or may not be related to the idea itself. It depends on the idea, situation, person, environment, etc.
     
Step 4: The idea will flash in your mind, and it will play out all the way to the end like a movie. It only takes a second or two.
     
Many inventors say ideas come to them in this manner. It works for me all the time. The key is to keep your mind open to all kinds of trigger points. Trigger points can come to you from anywhere - media, newspaper, internet, television, humans, events, etc. I can’t tell you how to develop the trigger points. I’m still trying to figure it out myself. My guess is that you just have to be aware of your surroundings.
     
One day I was talking with my business partner about something completely random, and two completely unrelated words triggered an idea unrelated to the words. The two words were trigger points for new idea generation. This time they coupled together to create a new and unrelated idea. Anyone who has experienced this knows what I’m talking about. If you haven’t, I promise shit like this happens.
     
I developed this ideation process after reading Tesla’s biography. So if you think of an idea based on reading this book, thank Nikola Tesla. He was a genius. Next time you switch on a light, remember, it happens because of Tesla. When you use your cell phone, it’s thanks to Tesla. When you run any electric motor anywhere, which is pretty much everywhere, Tesla