Ideas are funny things. They feel big when they first arrive—loud, full of potential, impossible to ignore. But if you don’t give them somewhere to go, they start to shrink.
They blur at the edges. Fade under the weight of daily life. Or worse, they grow too loud in your mind—too perfect to risk ruining by writing them down.
The fix?
Write it down.
Not because you’ll forget (though you might).
Not because it’ll be perfect (it won’t).
Write it down because that’s how it grows.
When you write something down, even just a sentence or two, you give it shape. You move it from the vague and shifting space of imagination into the tangible space where it can be worked on. Examined. Played with. Strengthened.
Memory is a funny thing (or maybe this is just me). If I write it down, give it form and some sort of structure—even if that structure will likely change—then I don’t need to remember it. It also means I’m more likely to keep it in memory.
Ideas don’t grow in the shadows. They grow in the light.
They grow when they’re given space.
A half-formed sentence in a notebook.
A sticky note on the wall.
A line typed at the bottom of yesterday’s draft.
A file called “Maybe.”
Or maybe it’s 20 pages of detailed notes about what you need to figure out, notes that will, in time, become an outline.
However much you need to write—doesn’t matter. What matters is that you DO write it.
That’s all it takes to turn “just an idea” into something that might become the idea.
So don’t wait until it’s perfect. Don’t hold it in your head like a treasure you’re afraid to touch. Write it down. Hold it in your hands. Help it grow and become something REAL.
Write it down.