002 / Extraordinary Ideas

Hey there.

Today, I'll share a few things I've been thinking about, and working on. I've been super busy building something special for ya'all.

The secret to extraordinary ideas.

Extraordinary ideas are different than just your everyday ideas. Extraordinary ideas aren't by chance, they're by choice.

On any given day you’ll have thousands of thoughts. Hundreds of ideas. And if you’re lucky you’ll stumble upon extraordinary ideas. But at first glance, you won’t know it.

Ideas are building blocks for creativity. They’re your manifestations of a better future. It’s how we express our humanity.

Capturing ideas and exercising creativity is a mechanism of mental wellness.

What stops us from our extraordinary ideas?

1. Not having space for them
2. Technology disruptions
3. Productivity-oriented mindset
4. Overthinking / Mental clutter
5. Creative Blocks
6. Killing them before they can take root
7. Using the wrong tools to capture them
8. Not trusting your intuition
9. Not understanding their lifecycle
10. Not having a structure/system to create, curate, or iterate extraordinary ideas.

I'm hoping that going through the course, you've started to overcome some of these issues.

Why don't you tell me about your extraordinary ideas, I'd love to hear about what you're up to. (BTW, Thinkable is one of my extraordinary ideas.)

Extraordinary Things

I recently picked up a couple of products that are hyper-focused, and incredibly well-designed. I am always looking for products to enhance my creative-productive stack. To be considered, the tools must minimize friction and stay out of the way. So I added two products to my list. The first is a tablet for writing - the Remarkable* and the second is a portable camera for easy laptop videos - Opal's Tadpole.

*(Wait aren't you always talking about paper? Yes I am, but there are times I need to bring the analog world into the digital. And remarkable is easy to grab and transfer my mark to the screen)

Unlock

So Joey Cofone followed me (he runs Baronfig). Welcome Joey! Are you following me?

Feedback Loop

I've been overwhelmed with the feedback from the course. It's quite rewarding to hear from you.

What was the most memorable part of the course for you? It would help me greatly if you could fill in the survey or give me a testimonial (or do both!).

Blend Conference

A few weeks ago I attended the Blend conference in Stratford Ontario. It was hosted by the University of Waterloo Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business. The highlight of this event was meeting up with Albert Shum, who was very humble and welcoming. It's incredible to see how design is changing, but also still staying still, here are my thoughts on the topic.​

Building the Next Instrument

I'm building something physical, to help you create, curate and iterate your ideas. It's top secret. And I just started to get prototypes built. Let's see how it goes. I hope I'll be able to launch a Kickstarter later this year.

In the meantime, have you considered buying the book? It's incredibly rich and takes 25 years of design, to serve you up with pure value. It will inspire you to create extraordinary. Get your copy now.

Just launched! Buy the book to get access to richer content. Buy the Book

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Thank you.