Writing FAST - Jeff Bollow 2012

The elusive idea
Capture your idea
Focus

Ideas are incredibly slippery little beasts. They’re almost impossible to grab. They pop into your head without warning.

But as you reach for one, it slides out from between your arms. You wait for it to come back. But you sit there for days or weeks racking your brain, and it never returns.

I know. We’ve all been there.

When you “capture” an idea, you’re able to hold onto it. You don’t forget it. You don’t lose it. And it doesn’t keep disappearing because a “better idea” takes its place.

The rest of this chapter is about capturing your idea.

If you struggle, you’re generally in one of two groups.

The first group has no ideas. None. At all. You know you want to write a novel or a movie or whatever. But you have no idea what to write about. You need to capture something.

The second group has too many ideas. They’re gushing out of you like you’re a leaky tap. You can’t decide which way to go. And you’re just as stuck as if you had no ideas in the first place. You need to capture the right thing.

In both cases, you’re looking for your central idea.

And there’s only one way to capture it.