When I come up with a new idea or a new project, I find that simply writing it down amongst the daily scribbling in my journal is nice but no guarantee of it ever becoming anything more than that. Instead, I find that if it is something I’m really serious about, I need to take a small step towards making that idea real.
For instance, Twyla Tharp notes in her wonderful book, The Creative Habit, that every new project for her starts with a box. She notes:
Everyone has his or her own organizational system. Mine is a box, the kind you can buy at Office Depot for transferring files. I start every dance with a box. I write the project name on the box, and as the piece progresses I fill it up with every item that went into the making of the dance. This means notebooks, news clippings, CDs, videotapes of me working alone in my studio, videos of the dancers rehearsing, books and photographs and pieces of art that may have inspired me.
As you can see, it’s nothing big. It’s just some words on a box. But it is about everything that box now represents. It is a simple start, a promise to fill it, and a goal to finish the project. The box is a commitment.
It doesn’t have to be anything special — or even a box. Make a folder for your idea or write the project name and date at the top of a fresh notebook page. The point is to do something. To take the first step. To own it.