6 Tips on How to generate Good Ideas

We love to come up with ideas. However, a lot of them are either too impractical or just plain dumb. So, how can we come up with good ideas? Here we have listed out some tips and tricks to create great ideas. 

1. Read a Book

All of us have heard this time and again “Read a book if you want to expand your vision” and you probably are tired of hearing this as well. But have you ever thought about why this sentence has become almost a staple of every motivational speaker? 

The reason for that is simple – a book is a collection of experiences and thoughts of the author. While reading a book may not give you an idea straight away, if you read enough books, you can get inspired and there is a good possibility that light might go up in your head to spark a genius idea. 

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2. Talk with People Outside of Your Social Circle

The concept behind this is – since you already know how and what the people in your close social circle think, you have probably used just about all of them. In order to generate new ideas, talk to people outside of your social circle to gain a different perspective on an existing topic. 

Don’t get us wrong, we can still generate good ideas within our close circle but the issue is we know how these people think. Due to this, our vision narrows down. Going out of your social circle and talking with people out there can very well give you a new way to see things and spark some good ideas.

3. Apply the Knowledge of One Thing Into Another

While this tip may sound weird at first glance, if you think about it, this is a good idea to spark a good idea. All you have to do is find the right combination. 

For example: 

If you are a tailor and are unable to create new designs, why don’t you try applying the knowledge and ideas used in origami into tailoring? Both of them deal with turning a soft piece of material into different shapes. 

If you are a sketch artist and are unable to come up with new ideas, try looking into the concepts behind the ad-posters and TV ads. You can study how the ads make use of the visual elements to attract the eyes of the customers and apply them to your art. If you are a salesperson, you can vice-versa this concept as well. 

4. Think in Reverse

In this day and age, very few people go back to the past in search of good ideas. However, despite this, one can go back and take a glimpse into the past every now and then to get some ideas.

A good example of this is while thinking of designing a unique logo. Many people think about what to do next while designing logos. This is a completely normal behavior but the issue is, just like you, many people think the same. In this case, regardless of how good of an idea you come up with, you will be – in the end- just one among many in the masses.  

But what if you think backward? Take this instance – when you think about phones, the first image that comes into your mind is a smartphone, and just like you this is what a lot of people think. But what about the dial-up phones of the past? If you use that as an icon for “phone” not only will it be unique and make younger generations curious, it will also trigger nostalgia in people of older generations. 

5. Break Old Assumptions

As we mentioned, we are bound by our beliefs. When we think of anything, our belief directs our thinking in some form or another. Like for example, when we think of sculpting, a lot of us still think about those stone or clay statues. But sculpting not only uses clay and stone as a medium but a wide range of them like paper, brick, and sand.

With the change in time, we have to break old assumptions in order to gain new and good ideas otherwise we will never be able to move on into the future. 

6. Surf the Internet Randomly

One of the easy and surprisingly productive ways to generate good ideas is to surf the internet randomly. Sometimes random things can spark something great in you. If not at the very least you will give your mind some much-needed break.

Just go into Reddit or quora or any other websites and browse them without any goal in mind. If you have a goal in your mind while browsing the internet, you will ignore a lot of content that is not related to your goal. This will then close your mind and as you may have guessed, a closed mind cannot generate new nor good ideas.

Final words

There are a lot of ways to generate new ideas and the ones that we have mentioned here are just the most basic and often the most ignored ones. The goal of all of the tricks on generating good ideas is to “open up your mind” and “think outside the box”. 

However since these are easier said than done, we use some simple tricks to achieve these goals. After thinking of some good ideas you need to validate these ideas so why don’t you check out our tips on How to validate your ideas.

Or if you are a business-minded person and want to pitch your ideas, you can check out our tips on How To Pitch Your Business Ideas to Investors Effectively