up:: [[Efforts]] # How ideas and efforts play nicely together The best way to understand "efforts" is to walk through an example of how "efforts" naturally support existing ideas. For example, check out [[Sensemaking happens by triangulation]]. It started out as an idea I had. I wanted to better understand what "sensemaking" was and how it worked. - So I made a new note. - It was called "triangulation" - I looked up stuff and brushed up on the history of triangulation in navigation. - Slowly, the note developed into a direction *I could not plan for ahead of time.* - I adjusted the title to match what was growing within the note. - So "triangulation" became "Sensemaking through triangulation" - I felt the spark of wanting to share this idea. - ***That's when it became an effort!*** - That forced the title to change one more time. - So "Sensemaking through triangulation" became [[Sensemaking happens by triangulation]]. Yes, that's much stronger. - Then I made it into a workshop lesson. - Then I replaced it in the workshop because I wanted to get us more on hands-up repetitions. - But I still liked the idea, so I rewrote it into a youtube video - ...and a twitter thread - ...and later I even rewrote it for my newsletter - ...and later, I want to get it up on my website. - ...and always, I have this treasure to fuel my own thinking. - That's the power of thinking in "efforts" and not projects. Go back to the first bullet. Can you imagine if tried to call this a "project". A project of what?! I didn't even know what I was trying to do! It would have smothered my spark of curiosity and replaced it with feelings of guilt for not completing it—whatever "it" was. > It was only because I eventually framed this note as an "effort" that I benefitted from the space to breath with the idea and allow it to grow into one of my favorite ideas! Had I been worried about some sort of project-driven output, with a hard deadline, this idea would have never evolved to what it has now become. This is the power of "efforts" over "projects" when it comes to developing your ideas. --- > If you work in a corporate environment with clear deadlines and less creative work, you'll be fine with projects. > If you work with ideas, you'll finally feel free with efforts. Back to: [[Efforts]]