December 2010

Time2Think

All these tools were designed to make things easier.

Blackberries, iPods, iPads, Facebook, Texting and Email all make communication and catching people in a hurry much easier (usually). The problem is we are all going non-stop and the pace of life swirls around us – sometimes even overwhelming us.

With all this time for doing…when do you ever get a chance to think?

Ideas4Change

If you have read my previous issues, you’ve read as I wrote about the power of the good idea. Some of my best ideas have come during times of quiet. About 12 years ago I was on the tractor when the solution hit me. An advertising agency was spending a huge amount of money on another station and we couldn’t figure out a counter. I loved the idea that flashed in my mind so much, I turned off the mower, got off my tractor, went inside and wrote it down for later.

During the holidays and in early January it is easy for you to get even busier. Resist that temptation and find some thinking time. Gather yourself – unplug that computer one day a week in 2011 – or simply go for a walk. Your brain has ideas in it, they just need time and space and quiet to surface. Make a plan to step back. You’ll be glad you did.

To finish the story that started while I was doing yard work…that advertising agency 12 years ago loved the idea, moved their base buys over to my television station for over ten years (well after I was gone) – keeping the plan in place that came to me in the middle of cutting grass.