on having more ideas—

1. it is a muscle. every day for maybe 7 years, I've written about what I think in detail, and the more I’ve done it, the better I've gotten at articulating what is new and interesting and meaningful in my thoughts. making myself publish 1-5 essays a month has made this even more intense—the ideas keep branching out into more and more ideas and the problem these days is how to filter the ideas, not how to have them

2. i get ideas in communion with others—by talking and by reading and by thinking about what I read. I take detailed notes about what I talk about and often even record and transcribe my conversations to save the ideas and suggestions. if you look at people who have been fountains of ideas they have often had a dinner crew of witty people they met every day, and they would try to impress each other with interesting observations. there is a positive feedback loop here: the more interesting ideas you have and make public, the more interesting people you attract, and they provide you with more ideas, etc

3. for me, the core thing driving me is thinking about how to get better at the things that are meaningful to me—being a better father, husband, friend, writer, etc—and thinking about these things is endlessly rich, always opens up to new questions and observations and ideas. the better I get at these things, the richer my understanding of "the landscape" so to speak, and the more paths onward I spot.

see also: