Thoughts vs Ideas: What’s the Difference?
Thoughts and ideas are different.
Thoughts are loose and all over the place.
While ideas are interconnected thoughts that provide value to someone.
When you wake up in the morning, you have a bunch of thoughts:
- Should I go back to sleep?
- Why did Ms. Shepherd yell at me in the 1st grade?
- I wonder what my workday is going to be like.
These thoughts are all over the place and have no theme.
With an idea, we create some sort of filter to determine which thoughts are relevant and which are not.
An idea has a theme.
Any dummy can have thoughts, while a few folks can have ideas.
A few folks can have ideas, while fewer folks can execute those ideas.
A Deeper Look Into Thoughts
The mind is a thought-generating machine.
For the longest time, I thought meditation was about trying to shut my mind off.
The goal during my sessions was to cultivate a blank mind.
But each time I aimed for emptiness, I failed.
My mind would be blank, then I had a thought out of nowhere.
After some time, I realized that my thoughts couldn’t go away.
The mind was a thought-generating machine.
Rather than try to suppress my thoughts, why not learn to coexist with them?
My meditation strategy changed.
Rather than trying to eliminate thoughts, I was going to observe them.
As I observed my thoughts from afar, I noticed something:
- My thoughts were super random.
I had thoughts about childhood, adulthood, scenarios that never happened & thoughts about other people.
When I realized the randomness of my thoughts, strangely, I felt more powerful.
These thoughts were not reality, they came & went!
Plenty of folks have no clue how random their thoughts are.
Instead, when they get a thought about anything, they react.
A person with an iron-strong mind learns a strange life irony.
‘Which is?’
You gain power over the mind by undermining the mind.
Don’t allow your mind to be your master.
Allow it to be a tool.
A Deeper Look into Ideas
Most people are Bubbas who don’t take the time to get to know their mind.
They have no clue about the different faculties of the mind such as imagination, will, memory & identity.
Instead, these folks just hop from thought to thought.
A monkey mind causes someone to sleepwalk through life.
Others are more sophisticated than a Bubba.
I like to call them Mikey.
‘Why Mikey?’
Because Mikey begins with M.
And so does meditative.
- Meditative Mikey.
When I meditated and observed my mind, I realized that thoughts were random.
Thoughts were not a life sentence.
When I made this realization, I felt:
- Calmer.
- Happier.
- In the present.
Most folks can stop at being a Meditative Mikey.
But that was not enough for me.
‘Why not?’
Because knowing that my mind was a bunch of random thoughts felt like the tip of the iceberg.
I wanted to plunge deeper.
I wanted to get practical value from those thoughts.
That’s when Pete emerged.
‘And who the hell is Pete??’
- Problem-solving Pete.
Being meditative was fine.
But to turn random thoughts into organized ideas, I needed problems.
When I have problems to solve, I have an incentive to turn loose thoughts into ideas.
Recap:
- The mind generates thoughts on autopilot.
- A meditator realizes they are not their thoughts.
- Solving problems helps channel loose thoughts into organized ideas.
Thoughts -> Idea Exercise
Pull up a Microsoft Document .
Set a timer for 5 minutes.
Once the timer begins, write down any thought that comes to your mind.
Save that as Document #1.
Next, open another Microsoft Document and set the timer for 5 minutes.
Answer the following question in bullet format:
- How can you make 10 million dollars a year?
Sample ideas:
- Rob a bank.
- Start a Shopify store and sell the company.
- Start a consulting company and hire a bunch of people.
- Rob 2 banks.
With this exercise, you are creating baby ideas within each bullet.
Me giving you the command of generating 10 million dollars gave you direction.
You now have a problem to solve.
Create those bullets and save this as Document #2.
You can stop here.
But if you are up for the challenge, I want you to open a 3rd Microsoft Document.
Get one of your bullets from Document #2 and expand on it.
- Rob 2 banks.
Write a minimum of 500 words on how you plan to execute this plan.
Once you are finished with this entry, you have successfully gone from:
- Random thoughts stage -> Idea generating stage
By the way, all your ideas will not be successful.
Don’t think that just because you hopped from thoughts to ideas, that you have ‘made it.’
Not even close.
You now need to battle-test that idea by executing it in real life.
(I’m not telling you to rob a bank by the way).
Ideas are the starting point, but it’s not the end of the road.
After execution, some ideas will flop.
Other ideas have potential, but tweaks are required.
And other ideas are a homerun from the get-go.
Reframe How You See Problems
As the famous saying goes:
‘You’re either in a problem, just left one, or are headed towards one.’
Many folks have a draining attitude toward problems.
They whine to anyone willing to listen.
Not a smart strategy.
Use problems as a vehicle to turn your disorganized thoughts into harmony.
Add order to your internal world by adding order to the external world.
Soon, solving problems becomes a form of meditation.
For more tips on mindset & creativity, be sure to check out my book:
- Level Up Mentality: A Guide to Re-Engineer Your Mindset for Confidence
In this book, you will learn more about:
- Focusing better.
- Unlocking systems thinking.
- Solving problems & generating riveting ideas.
- How to chronicle your life journey.
- Designing an alter ego to deal with real-world conflicts.
Plus, there will be a bonus section on Life Hacks & Productivity Cheatcodes!
Get the Level Up Mentality Here:
🧠Ebook
🧠Paperback/Kindle
🧠Audiobook
