Where Do Big Ideas Come From?

 

Forget "Genius" – What If Your Best Ideas Are Just a Tune-In Away?

The Muse visits during the process of creation, not before. Roger Ebert

Ever had a brilliant idea hit you in the shower? Or woken up with the solution to a problem that had been bugging you all day? It feels like magic, right? Like it came out of nowhere.



We’re taught to believe that creativity is a struggle—a grueling battle of will where our mighty egos wrestle ideas into existence. We celebrate the "self-made genius." But what if we’ve got it all wrong?

What if the most game-changing ideas aren’t created by us, but received by us?

I was listening to a deep-dive conversation that completely flipped my understanding of creativity. The core idea was this: throughout history, the world's most brilliant creators—artists, musicians, inventors—often describe themselves not as inventors, but as vessels. They feel less like the source of the idea and more like the radio receiver picking up a signal.

The Muse Was Real (And It Wasn't You)

This isn't a new-age concept. In ancient Greece, poets didn't pray for personal brilliance; they called upon the Muses—external goddesses of inspiration. Socrates spoke of being guided by his personal daimon, a kind of spiritual advisor.

The big shift happened with the Renaissance. Before that, you had a genius (a guiding spirit). Afterward, you were a genius. The ego took center stage, and we started claiming all the credit.

But the creators themselves keep telling a different story.

The "Downloads": When Ideas Arrive Fully Formed

Think about Paul McCartney waking up with the entire melody for "Yesterday" in his head. He was so sure he’d heard it before that he called it "Scrambled Eggs." That song, which felt alien to him, became one of the most successful in history. He described it as a download.

Or take Bono’s story: he dreamt a fully orchestrated song that sounded like a Roy Orbison track. The very next day, who randomly shows up backstage? Roy Orbison himself, asking if Bono happened to have a song for him. The dream-song became the title track for Orbison's comeback album, Mystery Girl. The timing is so uncanny it suggests the song was "out there," just looking for the right connection.

This even happens in science. History is filled with "multiple independent discovery," where the same invention (like the telephone or calculus) pops up in different parts of the world at the same time. It’s as if the idea was ripe, floating in the collective consciousness, waiting for someone to tune in.

So, How Do You Tune In? Silence the Editor.

If the brain is a receiver, then the biggest problem is static—the internal noise of our analytical mind, our ego, and our self-doubt.

The key to clear reception? Quieting the left hemisphere of the brain—the part responsible for logic, judgment, and that nagging inner critic.

How do creators do this?

  • The Hypnagogic State: That hazy space between sleep and waking (where McCartney got "Yesterday") is incredibly fertile ground.

  • Deep Meditation: Carlos Santana prepares for creativity with a meditative ritual, describing the process as waiting for a "fax" from a higher source.

  • Letting Go of Control: When musician Tom Waits felt a song idea hit him while driving, instead of panicking, he famously looked up and said, "Can’t you see I’m driving? Come back later." He stopped being a desperate victim of inspiration and became its manager.

Incredibly, science offers a clue. Researchers using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to temporarily quiet the left brain found that nearly 40% of subjects developed temporary savant-like abilities—like instant artistic or mathematical skills they never had before. By shutting down the analyzer, they unlocked a gateway.

The Ultimate Question: Do We Own Our Ideas?

This view of creativity leads to a mind-bending question: If a song or invention is a "download" from a non-local field of consciousness, what does that mean for our concept of ownership and intellectual property?

If we’re all tapping into the same well, then true "originality" might be more about our unique ability to translate the signal than to create it from nothing. It challenges the very foundation of how we reward and attribute creative work.

The Takeaway: Stop Pushing, Start Receiving

The practical lesson for anyone trying to be more creative is liberating: Stop struggling.

The pressure isn't on you to generate brilliance from your exhausted ego. The pressure is on you to get quiet enough to hear it. Stop trying to force the river. Create the conditions for reception—through meditation, walks in nature, or just allowing yourself to daydream—and trust that the signal is there, waiting for the noise to die down.

What if your next big idea is already up there, just waiting for you to pick up the phone?

#Creativity #Inspiration #TheMuse #Consciousness #Genius #Innovation #Mindfulness  #Psychology #Art #Music #BigIdeas #FlowState #Bono

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Image
UFOs – What does the President Know? Grant Cameron Don't interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties. Abraham Lincoln Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. Quote from Dwight Eisenhower inscribed on a wall surrounding his final resting place in Abilene, Kansas There is a commonly held belief inside the UFO community that President Eisenhower was the last president to be in control of the UFO situation. By the end of Eisenhower’s second term, as the theory goes, a secret government within the government had taken control of all things dealing with UFOs. The president was relegated to playing the role of ...
Read more

Ron Pandolfi and the TicTac Video Hoax Explained

Image
  Ron Pandolfi and the TicTac Video Hoax Explained Ron Pandolfi, a high-level intelligence official, has now stated that the Tic Tac video, released by the New York Times in 2017, came from a German film online in recent Sarfatti chain email. This relates to the fact that the TicTac video appears to have been leaked in Germany years before appearing in the New York Times. Pandolfi is rumored to be the man with the keys to classified UFO stuff, who spends most of his taxpayer-funded job trashing UFO material on the internet and answering UFO mail from people. He was recently the subject of an investigation by Bloomberg News who called him a troll. Pandolfi has complained about being loons, crooks, and worse. I always remind him that if he wants to tell everyone what is going on, I will be willing to listen and record it for history. Until he does we will continue to guess. What other option is there? Here is one statement he made in an email exchange ( on the same day of the NYT 201...
Read more

New Death Bed UFO Testimony from High Level Canadian Official

Image
                         As some Canadian members of parliament have been briefed on UFOs, here is some material from the past that sheds some light on UFOs in the Canadian past. On Saturday June 25, 2016 a major story was revealed at the Alien Cosmic Expo’s – “A Hearing on ET Disclosure,” in Brantford, Ontario.  As you will see, if you read this whole article, it may just point to the operations center of the UFO cover-up. The Hearing on UFO Disclosure, arranged by Victor Vigianni, involved a panel of UFO researchers presenting best evidence and a panel of reporters who listened and asked questions. Literally hundreds of people, cameras, and reporters jammed the large ballroom. I was one of the presenters at the Hearing. I presented very statements from the Canadian Government Top Secret memo on flying saucers, and statements made by high r...
Read more