Categories: Articles

The Trick With Inspiration

Believe it or not, you’re constantly being inspired.

The trick with inspiration is being able to both acknowledge that moment and act on it when it happens. I was reminded of this earlier in the week. I was listening to Howard Stern interview Chris Martin from Coldplay (it was a repeat from earlier in the year). Martin was talking about how the hit song Yellow came to him. He said it happened very quickly – in maybe fifteen minutes. He was in the studio, messing around with his acoustic guitar and doing impersonations of Neil Young in between takes, when the line "Look at the stars. Look how they shine for you." came out in Young’s quirky tone. He kept at it… "And everything you do. Yeah, they were all yellow." Something felt right, so he kept tinkering with the guitar chords and melodies and that’s when the part, "Your skin, oh yeah, your skin and bones" came along. He told Stern that he knew it was a hit once it was written and the other members of Coldplay had their way with it.

Do you have that kind of courage?

There is a lot of mind space in between Martin’s explanation. You have to have a serious ability for self-inflection to be able to recognize that what was, initially, a goof on Neil Young could be the germ of something more. Pushing it and letting the melody take you somewhere is the hardest part. This isn’t about thinking up a great idea in a dream but not writing it down and then forgetting it by the time you wake up, this is about what happens to you – day in and day out – on a conscience level. It could be from staring out of your window or from reading this blog post. Inspiration is everywhere and one of the greatest gifts that you can give yourself is the ability to acknowledge it. Not every moment of inspiration will be a hit song like Coldplay’s Yellow, but you just never know where it will come from.

Inspiration is (not) magic.

It may look, feel and act like magic, but it’s a very real proactive acknowledgement of something – usually something quite small – that can take you to strange and beautiful places. I’m thankful that there are artists like Chris Martin who act as reminders that inspiration is not a flash of genius or something that just pops into someone’s head. Our brains are constantly spurting thoughts out there and it’s important – especially in the work that you do – to be cognizant when than thought is something that can be turned into something that is much bigger and brighter.

Mitch Joel

Mitch Joel lives at the intersection of technology, business transformation and consumer culture. He is the Executive Director of Next Era Institute, a strategic intelligence platform helping leaders understand the forces reshaping business, technology, culture and society. The Institute identifies which shifts matter, explores their wider significance and translates them into strategic direction and momentum. Mitch is also a globally recognized keynote speaker. He has delivered thousands of presentations across both B2B and B2C industries to organizations including Google, Walmart, LEGO, Shopify, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble and Unilever. Strategy Magazine has called him “one of North America’s leading visionaries.” Mitch built his career by working directly inside the waves of change that reshaped modern business. He founded and built a digital marketing agency that worked with some of the world’s largest brands and was later acquired by WPP, where he served as President of a firm operating in 25 countries with almost 3,000 employees. Mitch is the bestselling author of Six Pixels of Separation and CTRL ALT Delete, and the host of Thinking With Mitch Joel, one of the longest-running business podcasts in the world. His writing and commentary appear in outlets including Harvard Business Review, Fast Company and Inc. Magazine. He is a member of Dr. Marshall Goldsmith’s 100 Coaches and was named to the Thinkers50 Radar. Mitch also hosts Groove – The No Treble Podcast, documenting the oral history of electric bass players. Mitch is also Co-Founder of ThinkersOne, a platform that enables companies to bring personalized thought leadership from world-class experts into meetings, events and off-sites in focused 15-minute bursts.