The thought we cannot stop thinking is worth paying attention to
An inventor and a couple with a troubled marriage walk into a bar.
The inventor says to the bartender, “Scotch. Neat.”
The couple says “Ditto” and “Likewise.”
All three say to the bartender simultaneously, “Can I tell you something crazy?”
Putting a big idea into motion often starts with a small, incidental conversation. The kind of conversation that feels unburdening—like if I don’t say this, I will be itchy and agitated.
The big idea is the one we cannot stop thinking about. It’s the one we return to again and again in conversation with friends and family until they tire of hearing about it. Maybe it’s an invention. Or an insight into a process. Perhaps it’s a trouble spot in a relationship that defies the easy fix, and talking is the only relief.
Those hard-to-ignore thoughts are worth paying attention to.
That small conversation can make or break an idea. We depend on the responses to help us gauge if the idea makes sense, has a future, or matters at all to the universe. We also need to hear ourselves saying the big idea out loud. Somehow the big idea becomes more real when our ears hear what our mouth says to the human in front of us. There is a relational aspect to our big ideas.
Of course, the real test is whether the person we are talking with takes hold of the idea. Often, we unburden ourselves to someone we think may be sympathetic to our idea. If they take it, ask a question, or turn it around to look at other sides of it, we may have something. If we come back in a week and they are still thinking about it, the idea is worth pursuing.
One of our great joys as copywriters is hanging around with people hatching big ideas. We love collaborating to help articulate the idea, which then draws other interested people into orbit. Advertising is so often about disrupting people’s attention, but big ideas pull interested people into their orbit.
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