Share Your Ideas

Frameworks and Clarity Walks

This week we had good walking weather after what felt like a month (but was only one and a half weeks) of rain. I get a lot of good ideas walking, and I listen to a lot of content while walking, which feeds more ideas.

This month my thoughts have orbited around clarity of intent.

We aren’t clear on a thought if we stumble over speaking or writing it down. Clarity is manifest when an idea can be communicated minimally. One sentence is artful. I think two or three sentences when speaking about a business is ideal. Three sentences give space for a very concise articulation of:

1. Why is it needed?

2. Who is it for?

3. What is it?

June thus far has been an orbiting of me around my idea; the output I am seeking is the singular and clear articulation of why it matters.

Personally, I don’t do well with fluctuations in my schedule. Even with planning, I have anxiety about time away from a big project. No project has ever been so great as the starting of a startup.

I also believe (quite strongly) that shaking it up is extremely important to spur creative momentum. Plan for your shakeups and use frameworks to minimize mental and physical disruptions. What I mean by frameworks is the following:

• If you abandon all healthful eating habits when traveling, use an accountability tool such as Noom and commit to tracking what you eat even while traveling.

• Research dry alternative specialties in the area where you will be if maintaining a dry lifestyle becomes difficult while traveling.

• Create winding-down rituals that you enjoy and look forward to at the end of the day. We program our minds and bodies with repetition toward the negative and the positive; it is up to us which way we go.

My sister and I will be traveling to the west coast next week. I am really looking forward to our trip, and I am also anxious, but because I have frameworks around productivity and I plan to use this period of time to exercise the playful part of my brain, I am okay about feeling anxious. I believe anxiety is fear, and fear is an aspect of ourselves we must learn to dance with. When I am anxious, and I have a plan, I don’t feel the anxiety in the same way.

Playful thinking gives our brains a break from intense focus. As my friend and mentor Runa teaches, play is as important as work and rest. Play is actually one form of rest. I will allow for play and lean into being the dorky little sister to my big sister on this trip, and I am really looking forward to it!~

Sticky and Fluffy Ideas

Surround yourself with as many people who encourage your ideas and who are looking for feedback on their ideas as possible.

If your income is statistically the median of the combined incomes of your three closest friends, the same surely can be said about the quality of your ideas. I have a very close group of people from whom I seek feedback. My group members are individuals who take risks themselves. The important part is having at least one other person you trust to put you on the hook for your ideas.

Ideas are too abstract when they are stuck in our heads. Dictate a big idea you have right now to your phone, and you will likely encounter some extra words fluffing out the edges. The edges are where your idea is still under construction. Talk to a person you trust about the idea; remember they should have some skin in their own game for the feedback to be useful. Your friend should be a sounding board for the “fluffy edges” of your idea.

Finally, don’t be afraid to scrap an idea that isn’t crystallizing or no longer sounds interesting when you simplify it.

If you are stuck, imagine the person you want to build your product for. I find this exercise challenging but reverse engineering the process makes it easier.

The feeling is sticky and motivating. I am really enjoying thinking about products from this vantage point. My heart and my head are suddenly in the equation in equal parts. I love helping others realize their fear is the only thing holding them back. I especially love helping other women realize their strength.

We (women) are notorious for making ourselves small and thinking we don’t belong in places we don’t see a strong female demographic. Women have supported everyone around us for millennia and are long overdue for a character change.

All this to say, I know what this feels like, from the self-sabotaging doubt to the battle with rage that is best played out at the gym or through creative expression. Focusing on (and harnessing) the power inside of us is the only way to change our external reality. Nothing else will do this work for us. There is power in that realization. Self-reliance is the power I want to help my customers realize; empowerment is a gift that will continue to pay dividends for generations.

You will find a deep connection as soon as you try this exercise. That connection will translate to your idea and your solution. Keep talking to your customers and fleshing out the idea until you have no more questions.

Creative Exploration (Serious Play)

I have been exploring AI in my video art workflow. Primarily, I have used Runway.ML for the AI component in my process. Adding AI is like adding another person to my process. Because it is generative, I can never predict the output, which is exactly what I want.

Find mediums to work in that are tangentially related to your primary area of focus.

Working across mediums or disciplines allows your brain time to play and puts you squarely in a beginner’s mindset. Choose mediums outside your domain of expertise to optimize for a beginner’s mindset. Digital art and video are mediums that I am very familiar with but where I am also very free and unconstrained with my process. Adding AI increases the requirement to embrace detachment from outcomes, and I love it.

For the sake of play, here is the process for a video I made this weekend: I created a dance to Blinding Lights by The Weekend, filmed myself dancing, and clipped and ran the video through my process, including Runway.ML.

Here is a clip from the finished version.

If you like my creative experiments, let me know by subscribing to TheTechMargin on YouTube. I will be adding a premium feature to this newsletter in the near future. Access to content that I don’t share publicly is one perk I am considering offering to supporters of TheTechMargin (premium subscribers and customers).

Podcast Interview on Community

Before I head out for the week, an update. Last month I spoke with Rafi Mendelsohn from Cyabra, a social threat intelligence company. We spoke on Cyabra’s Too Much (dis)Information Podcast about communities and their role in our lives.

Specifically, I am interested in the platforms on which we default to use as the substrate of our communities. I am obsessed with why we accept the defaults, what pushes us to make a change, and how to encourage groups to make a change.

If you don’t have people, you have no community, and what motivates people to change might be intrinsic to what they seek in a community. Lack of change can also be hugely influenced by inertia. We have a thousand choices to slog through on a given day. The last thing most of us want to throw on that pile is the potential disruption a platform change will bring to our lives, especially in the social context.

I will be writing more on the topic of community as it relates to the work I am currently doing at TheTechMargin.

While I am out west playing and rocking my super cool purple leggings and rollerskates, I will think about the moment my customer is inspired and empowered. Keep coming back to your why and your who. The what is far less important and irrelevant if the who and what are unclear. Oh, and the who is never allowed to be us, the founders.

The California sun inspires me, and I will write while the sun sets over the ocean instead of the land. My good friend, Eric Best, describes the difference between East Coast and West Coast sunsets this way. The light is different in California.

Shake it up, have a plan, use frameworks to keep yourself accountable, and play!

Check out the episode linked below.

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