Thoughts are like rays of sunshine.
I can't help but notice the sun beaming in through the window this morning and see a similarity to something that has been slowly frustrating me. The light pouring through this window is pretty spectacular; it will blind you from your surroundings if you stare into it *don't do that*, if you place a glass of water into a beam you can focus the energy caustics, and shutting the blinds will block about 90% of the light. The funny thing about this light though is that it is always moving, just like our thoughts.
So how do you capture the light?
Some people take pictures of the energy. Some use light within artwork. Others harvest the light with solar panels and transform that energy into something useful.
And we capture thoughts in a similar manner?
A sticky note snapshot of our thought. Sketchbook book by the bedside. Audio/video logging thoughts as they appear.
I have found myself on many occasions wishing I could take a picture of a thought. If we were only so lucky. So what options have I found that come close to this? Well the one I'm talking about today is: Audio logging mixed with a stream of conscious monologue. Start recording, much like Jean Luc Picard with his Captain's Log, giving some context to the time and space, then follow it up with some thought and reflection. It's actually pretty cool how when listening to the audio file that it brings you back to the thoughts you had when recording. Its almost like you encode more communication into the words than the words alone can offer.
Awesome right? SO, the frustration part....
How to have a voice recorder, that can organize thoughts for sorting later, that can capture those moments instantly?
Handheld recorder (doctor style)? Smartphone? Smart......watch?
It's frustrating how many steps this takes, but it is about as close to capturing a thought as possible I have found. I don't exclusively use this method so it's not the only way...
How about you? How do you capture your tangent thoughts?
Dude... WHAT?! You like either wrote a hardcore serious blog post on our private "no search engine indexed" blog or... we just got spammed by an incredible powerful spam-bot.
ReplyDeleteI just pressed the "new post" button. That doesn't happen when you click it? Mine must be broken.
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/e-NQSAL-c0c?t=1m2s
Well. It just looks insightful and deep. Do you want me to flip on the public stuff? I can.
ReplyDeleteJust the exercise of setting this up quick and thinking about things I could write has already given me ideas about content for my subscribers etc.
Nice, I like the invite only private club feel. I've been writing new content for my website just about each day, it must be wearing off in here. I was really just streaming my thoughts in this fishbowl.
ReplyDeleteAlso to follow-up on the actual post, I searched for an app that would make audio recording easier..................and there isn't something quite like I was expecting............It looks like Evernote would actually provide an improvement by sync'ing between mobile and phone. It still feels clunky, and it uses Quicktime (which I used to love, but find slow today) for the audio files...bummer.
ReplyDeleteDude... THIS post SUPER inspired me friend... be ready for my response!
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteI forgot that this address pipes straight to my phone... Awesome.
I just took a breather and actually read your post man. Seriously - whoa. That's a fantastic article and interesting idea.
I hope you get a chance to listen to that post where you inspired me.
Might give you some insight.
Now that I absorbed your post - I realize I actually talk to my phone with Siri a lot. To note things sometimes. But often my noting is for immediately actionable stuff.
I pretty much stopped recording ideas that I wasn't in a position (or enough interest) to immediately execute on.
I often don't do todo lists anymore unless it's for that specific day. I either do the thing I'm thinking or forget it - again only ever noting or archiving very specific actionable information.
Wow. Great content, man. Really got me excited.