3 ms·

trouble is everyone thinks their idea is a fantastic one.. I think mine is but many can't even get their heads around what I see as a simple concept... IMO id

trouble is everyone thinks their idea is a fantastic one.. I think mine is but many can't even get their heads around what I see as a simple concept... IMO ideas need space and air to bloom, grow and flourish and you can't do that under lock and key.

rl3 11y ago
I define fantastic ideas as ideas that I would have no qualms committing myself to for years on end. I've only ever had a few of these ideas, and it took months to develop them to the point where I fully believed. Upon sharing with people I trust, the reactions I received might have been approximated as anything from indifference to them secretly thinking "this guy is totally nuts." This in turn wavered my own belief. Later, two of those very same ideas ended up successful YC companies. The moral of the story is: if you need to seek external validation to confirm your own idea is fundamentally good or not, you probably have no business executing on it in the first place. I know that flies contrary to the oft-repeated dogma of seeking validation at every step (market or otherwise), but having to do this in the first place - at least on a fundamental level - reflects negatively on one's sense of product. It also underscores a lack of vision, and I dare say vision is one part unwavering belief. Generally speaking, unless you're having a casual chat with Sam Altman and Paul Graham, you probably want to trust your own laboriously-thought-out conclusions much more than you would someone else's off-hand opinion. It boils down to a difficult psychological balancing act. On one hand, you need to drink your own Kool-Aid to a point where others view you as crazy. On the other, you need to be mindful of traps such as bias and fear creeping into your thought process, rendering you truly delusional. >IMO ideas need space and air to bloom, grow and flourish and you can't do that under lock and key. I would argue they can, provided they are continually evaluated and evolved with rigorous thought. That said, giving an idea space to breathe is certainly a positive thing and should be sought when appropriate.

rl3 11y ago

I define fantastic ideas as ideas that I would have no qualms committing myself to for years on end. I've only ever had a few of these ideas, and it took months to develop them to the point where I fully believed. Upon sharing with people I trust, the reactions I received might have been approximated as anything from indifference to them secretly thinking "this guy is totally nuts." This in turn wavered my own belief. Later, two of those very same ideas ended up successful YC companies. The moral of the story is: if you need to seek external validation to confirm your own idea is fundamentally good or not, you probably have no business executing on it in the first place. I know that flies contrary to the oft-repeated dogma of seeking validation at every step (market or otherwise), but having to do this in the first place - at least on a fundamental level - reflects negatively on one's sense of product. It also underscores a lack of vision, and I dare say vision is one part unwavering belief. Generally speaking, unless you're having a casual chat with Sam Altman and Paul Graham, you probably want to trust your own laboriously-thought-out conclusions much more than you would someone else's off-hand opinion. It boils down to a difficult psychological balancing act. On one hand, you need to drink your own Kool-Aid to a point where others view you as crazy. On the other, you need to be mindful of traps such as bias and fear creeping into your thought process, rendering you truly delusional. >IMO ideas need space and air to bloom, grow and flourish and you can't do that under lock and key. I would argue they can, provided they are continually evaluated and evolved with rigorous thought. That said, giving an idea space to breathe is certainly a positive thing and should be sought when appropriate.