If you live in the horthern hemisphere and want to harvest your own vegetables this summer, you need to begin to consider buying seeds. If you want to have a large tree in your garden a decade from now, now is the time to be planting one. Every year trees, flowers, vegetables, and ‘weeds’ all spread hundreds, if not thousands, of seeds in the air. They hope some seeds will find fertile soil in a safe place so that their ‘legacy’ (and species) will continue. There is a need to spread hundreds and thousands because the survival rate is extremely low.
We, as individuals, teams, organisations, have ideas for change. However, we often keep them to ourselves out of fear or out of the notion that ideas must be perfect from the start. We need to learn from nature and scatter ideas liberally with the hope that one or some might find a safe place to grow. Or find another idea to join with.
This can seem basic. And yet, how many of our teams or organisations have cultures in which creative idea sharing for change is actually encouraged. Not tokenism, but actually encouraged? And where ideas are encouraged, how often are trying things which might not work? Are we looking for certainty or seeking exploration?
Start this week sharing one idea per day of how things could be different, better. Or an idea of what you think your team, your organisation, your family should be exploring. One idea per day. Read books, articles, posts from people working in different industries to you, living in different parts of the world. Take ideas from there and discuss how to apply them in your world.
Don’t worry about perfect. Go for quantity. Do it for a month, a year. Over time, it will rewire your brain.