Benefiting at work from Brain Based Insights

Put off a great plan today and watch it disappear from mind before tomorrow. Why does it happen? Have you ever wondered why you cannot think of a great idea that inspired you earlier that week – when you finally get a free minute to work it out?

The brain briefly holds your new and best ideas in it’s very small and easily emptied working memory. Add a new bit of information at work and most of your latest ideas simply fade from your mind. So how can the best of your thoughts, plans and adventure ideas be held until you get time to work with them?

There are two ways to hook and grow your best ideas …

1. Jot an idea down in your target book – in the same few words that inspired you in the first place – and then revisit this idea when time is freer. It’s like outsourcing your best ideas to avoid lost opportunities dumped daily from your working memory.

2. Stay with one idea daily until you have it firmly hooked to your brain’s basal ganglia – the place beyond working memory where things will stick and easily come back to mind. You get ideas into solid basal ganglia grips when you apply them to solve real problem, or teach them to somebody else, or simply use them to create a project.

Easier said than done though.  It takes determination to prevent the best ideas out there from passing you by … while they stick to the next guy’s basal ganglia. It’s how winning results find their way to your competition.