Ideas not Laptops

Where do you get your best ideas? What inspires you? I get my best ideas while walking. Sometimes I get ideas while doing something else, but usually it’s walking. I was reading Austin Kleon’s book, Steal Like an Artist, last week and came upon the following quote that I just had to reproduce:

We don't know where we get our ideas from. What we do know is that we do not get them from our laptops." John Cleese

I love it. Have you ever gotten your best idea from your laptop? I haven’t. I spend hours on a computer for work, but my ideas don’t come from it. I learn things, but those flashes of insight and sparks that make me want to drop everything and pick up a pen don’t come from sitting in front of a screen.

So I hope you take some time to get away from your screen, be it a desktop, a laptop, or your cell phone. Take some time and get some fresh air, do something, make something with your hands. Doodle, sketch, write, create something–anything–away from your screens and wonder at the ideas that come.

I hope you have a lovely week full of new ideas, even if you don’t know where they’ve come from. 🙂