Welcome to the Listening Time podcast.
Hey everybody, this is Connor and you're listening to episode 170 of the Listening Time podcast.
Thank you all for listening.
I hope you're doing well.
I hope that your English learning is going great and that you're ready for another episode.
Today, I want to talk about about how I think of ideas.
How do I come up with different ideas for this podcast, for other things that I do?
How do I come up with my ideas in general?
By the way, the phrasal verb come up with refers to when you think, think of something, you think of this thought, this idea, etc.
So how do I think of ideas?
I think this is a really interesting topic and The reason why I want to talk about it today is because I was listening to this French YouTuber talking about the creative process and he was talking about this topic and I realized that I agreed 100 with what he was saying.
He was talking about how people come up with creative things, creative ideas, and I realized that this was really true for me.
So I want to talk about this because I think a lot of you will also be able to identify with this.
And maybe this will give you some ideas about how you can help yourself be more creative and creative.
Think of ideas for your work or your life in an easier way.
So I'm sure that this episode will be interesting for all of you.
And, as always, remember that if you feel ready to start practicing with real English spoken at normal speed, then make sure to sign up for my advanced podcast episodes.
In those episodes, I speak faster than I speak in these normal episodes.
I speak at normal speed, but of course I also provide the transcript to help you understand what I'm saying.
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And it's a lot of fun.
It's very educational.
I have some very interesting conversations with people from all over the country.
For example, I just recently recorded an episode. with someone from Mississippi, from the South.
And it was great to be able to talk about the South of the U.S. and Southern culture.
So that's the type of cultural experience that you get when you listen to my U.S.
Conversations episodes.
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All right, let's get started.
Are your ears ready?
You know what time it is.
It's listening time.
All right, let me talk first about what people normally do when they want to come up with ideas.
So when people need to think of ideas for a project that they're doing or for anything that requires them to think of an idea, then what they typically do is they sit down at their desk or their table and they try to think of ideas and they make a list of ideas on their computer or they write it on a piece of paper and they really try to concentrate and think of different things, think of different ideas And maybe they search on the Internet or whatever.
But really, they do it in this type of environment.
And this makes sense, of course.
We sit down at our desk. as if we were working and we try to come up with ideas.
I've done this many times, especially because I have to think of ideas for topics for this podcast and for my other material, for my membership, all of that right.
However, the problem with this is that this is the environment in which we're the least creative.
This is typically not a creative environment.
This isn't an environment that that is conducive to coming up with new and interesting and creative ideas.
When we say that something is conducive to something else, we're saying that this helps that other thing happen or be produced.
Sitting down at our desk in our normal work environment is not the most conducive to our being able to come up with new ideas.
And this is a shame because this is where people tend to do this.
This is where I tend to do this.
And this is where we think we can be productive and produce good ideas.
And sometimes we can, of course.
However...
I've noticed that in my experience, this is not where my best ideas are actually produced.
I don't know if you've heard this before, but a lot of people talk about having interesting thoughts or ideas while they're taking a shower.
People kind of joke about this, but it's actually true.
I don't know if you've ever experienced this before, but it's common for people to have some interesting thoughts and ideas while they're showering.
And this is something that I've experienced and it's a pretty interesting thing.
Like, why would we come up with interesting ideas while we're in the shower?
That's a little bit strange, right?
However, the truth behind this is that ideas tend to come to us when we're actually in a different environment than the environment, like at our desk where we normally work or study, for example.
And ideas tend to come when we're not actually really trying to think of them, when we're not forcing ourselves to come up with new ideas.
And so if we're at our desk forcing ourselves to think of all these new ideas, that isn't actually where we come up with our best ideas.
If we think of the shower example that I just gave, this is a different environment, Not an environment where we're supposed to be working.
It's an environment where you're relaxing, just washing yourself.
You probably don't go into the shower thinking that you're going to be productive in there.
Right.
However, this happens and you think of new ideas, or maybe you're able to think of solutions to certain problems that you've been having while you're in the shower.
And you might just have really interesting thoughts.
And so I was thinking about that.
And I was listening to this French YouTuber talk about this and talk about this process of getting outside of your normal work environment and being able to think of a lot of ideas when you're not there at your workstation, your work desk, for example.
And I thought of the other places where I have creative thoughts and where ideas tend to come to my mind just out of the blue.
By the way, the phrase out of the blue means that something happens with no warning.
It just suddenly happens.
So I thought of a few different situations in which I tend to think of ideas for this podcast, for my membership, for new projects that I want to do, and I think of solutions to problems that I'm having.
I thought of a few different situations in which this tends to happen.
So the first one is when I'm walking outside.
I do a lot of walking.
I walk a lot.
I mean a lot like every day basically, and sometimes for a couple hours a day, it just depends on the day.
But I walk a lot and I love this.
It's one of my favorite activities and It helps me de-stress.
It helps me feel better physically and mentally.
And when I walk and I'm walking around my neighborhood, for example, the ideas start flowing.
The verb flow refers to when something is flowing freely, moving from one place to another.
Like we say that a river flows, the water moves freely and consistently down this river.
So the ideas start flowing and it feels like my mind is more open to new ideas.
It's not as stressed and just thinking in the same way that it always thinks.
And it's not in work mode anymore.
And my brain just feels freer.
And, like I said, the ideas just start flowing, even if I'm not really forcing myself to think of a bunch of different things.
And I just feel inspired when I walk.
It's pretty interesting.
Ideas come out of the blue when I'm not forcing myself to think of them.
And that change in my environment from my workspace to the outdoors really just awakens me.
I think my creativity, when something awakens something else, that means it wakes it up.
It inspires it.
It produces it.
Right.
So my creativity is awakened when I'm walking outside.
And suddenly, I'll have an idea for my next podcast episode.
I think that happens a lot.
It tends to happen when I'm not really trying to think of ideas.
Because I try to think of ideas for this podcast here at my desk.
And I pull up my document on my computer where I have my list of ideas, and it's very hard to think of ideas when I do that.
However, when I go walking, those ideas just come naturally and easily.
It's amazing how that happens.
So if you need to think of new ideas for something, that's one thing you might want to try.
You might want to try walking outside in a nice area, maybe in nature or anywhere really where you like to walk.
And you might see that these ideas just start flowing and you feel more creative.
And I recommend that you try it because it works for me.
Another situation in which I tend to think of ideas is when I run.
And this was really true a couple years ago, when I first started my membership and I had to think of how I was going to produce content through my membership and how this business model would work.
And during that time I would run a lot and I would always have my French podcast that I was listening to.
At that time I wasn't learning French seriously, but I've always kind of done some type of language learning as an adult.
So even if I'm not learning something seriously, I'm still usually listening to something in the background and kind of learning a language, even if I'm not serious about it.
And at that time, it was French.
I definitely wasn't serious about it, but I would put on this podcast, this French podcast, when I would run and I thought that I would focus on that French podcast, but that never happened.
What would always happen was I would start running and then suddenly I would start thinking about my business, so to say my new membership, and I would just have idea after idea and I would think of all these different things.
It was crazy how that would happen, but it would happen every time I would run.
And when my run was over, I would realize that I had no idea what the French podcast episode was about, because all I had done was thought about these different ideas for my business.
So whenever I would run, when I was in that period, when I had to think of ideas for my membership, whenever I would run I would just have tons of ideas and I wasn't running in the most beautiful place or whatever.
I was running outside and just that change of environment not some really beautiful place, like I said, but just that change of environment was very conducive to creativity and And I think that those running sessions really helped me think of the different things I needed to do to start my membership which, of course, I still have today.
So running is another thing that has helped me think of ideas in the past.
And another situation in which I tend to think of creative ideas and I tend to just think better overall and have a clearer mind is when I'm traveling.
This is one of my favorite things about traveling.
I love traveling like most of you do.
But one specific thing that I like about traveling is that it allows me to experience.
Take a step back, as we say.
This means that you kind of remove yourself from the situation and you see things from a broader perspective, a wider perspective.
You have a change of scenery which kind of gets you out of your normal mode and you can just reflect more effectively in that type of situation.
This always happens to me, literally 100% of the time.
When I travel, I reflect on my life, my work, my future, my past, different things.
And I always have very deep and very meaningful thoughts and ideas when I'm traveling.
I don't know if you've experienced this or not, but this is something that happens 100 of the time when I travel.
This is the best way, I think, to remove yourself from your normal environment and to be in a completely different state of mind, and that change really sparks the thought process, the creative process.
It really sparks all of that.
When something sparks something else, this means that it causes this other thing to happen.
It produces this other thing.
So that huge change of scenery, change of environment really sparks the process of coming up with new ideas, thinking more clearly about problems or just normal things in your everyday life, your work, things like that.
When you're traveling, you're in a completely different environment and you can see things from a completely different angle.
And I remember last year when I was traveling, I had probably my most creative business idea that I've ever had and I haven't implemented this idea and I might never do this, but when I think of this idea, it's definitely something that's very out of the box.
This means that it's not conventional.
It's something that is very different from what is normal for me.
So I had my most out-of-the-box idea that I think is a pretty interesting business idea, but I don't know if I'll ever do it.
But I'm impressed that I even thought of this idea, because it's something that is very different from what I do and it's a pretty cool idea, I think, But that's something that I probably never would have thought of just here at my desk.
It's something that just came to me when I was traveling and it's kind of representative of just what always happens to me when I travel.
I always have interesting thoughts and ideas and I always reflect in a better way when I'm traveling.
So that's one other situation in which I come up with ideas.
And one last situation I wanted to mention is that I come up with ideas when I'm talking to other people.
I don't know if this has happened to you before, but this has definitely happened to me.
When I talk to other people, it gets me out of just my own thoughts and It removes me from that context where it's just me alone thinking and trying to solve problems or come up with ideas.
And I'm just talking to another person and I see another point of view.
I see things from their point of view and I hear about their experience.
And I think this is natural, because you hear about another person who is dealing with other things in their life and they talk about their experience and their, their ideas and the solutions to their problems, etc.
And all of this helps you analyze your issues and your problems and your life more effectively, because you're getting ideas from the other person and You are using their experience and their ideas as a way to think of your own.
And I also wanted to mention this situation, because this is actually how I came up with the idea to start this podcast.
I didn't just think of this when I was thinking of new projects to do.
I was talking to a Brazilian girl because I was having a Portuguese class.
And during that conversation she mentioned that she had a podcast and immediately she This idea just came to me and I knew that I had to do this.
I knew that it was the perfect project to start.
It was literally just that conversation with that Brazilian girl.
And from that point on I've been doing this podcast thanks to the idea that came to me during that Portuguese tutoring session.
So even this podcast came from that context.
So I think that's pretty cool.
I hope that this has given you ideas about how you can spark your own creativity and and think of ideas more effectively.
Remove yourself from just your normal everyday work situation where you're just thinking of things alone at your desk, and try these other things that I mentioned and see what happens.
All right, I hope you enjoyed this episode.
And I want to encourage you to challenge yourself with my advanced podcast episodes.
If you want to sign up for them, the link is down below in the episode description.
And I also want to encourage you to start practicing listening to two people talking and not just one.
And so you can listen to my US Conversations podcast if you want to do that.
The link to sign up is also down below.
All right.
Thank you so much for listening to this episode and I'll talk to you on the next episode of Listening Time.
