Please, for the love of god, steal everything from me

Do you have a friend who is territorial about their creativity?

Someone who warns you not to tell anyone when he comes up with a great idea?

Me too. It’s infuriating. Almost as frustrating as the guy who has tons of great ideas, but never executes a single one of them.

But both personality types suffer from a scarcity mindset. Paranoid that there isn’t enough creativity to go around, they paint themselves into an unproductive corner. Cagey about other people stealing their ideas, their expectation enables the very problem they’re trying to avoid.

This is the reason my product development and innovation gameshow has been such a joy. Because the project is rooted in generosity and abundance and optimism. Every time we play, dozens of new ideas are put out there, and we literally tell people to steal them.

Please, go right ahead, take this concept and run with it.

Matter of fact, the card game edition contains nearly three hundred ideas in the box, many of which could easily and quickly scale into profitable businesses, if somebody really wanted them to.

And part of me hopes and prays that happens. What a privilege to know that my absurd brain fart had a kernel of truth that some entrepreneur was inspired to convert into a valuable product that made the world better. Open innovation truly is a beautiful thing. Every creative should be fortunate enough to be plagiarized at some point in their lives. Sure beats being ignored.

Besides, starting a new company, scaling that business, promoting the product, there’s simply not enough fuel in the tank for me to do that anymore. Obsession is a young man’s game, to quote the great inventor.

And yet, that reality is not going to stop me from generating the seeds from which other people can build their forest. Nor is it going to keep me from sharing my ideas with the world out of the misplaced fear that my work will become bastardized for somebody else’s gain.

Please, for the love of god, steal everything from me. You have permission to pick my pocket.

And ask yourself. Are you focusing so much on protecting your ideas that you never do anything with them?

It sounds like the climax of a cheesy romantic thriller where the jealous, narcissistic character demands to be loved, telling their partner, if I can’t have you, then nobody can.

Wrong. Everybody can have everything. And when you’re creatively optimistic, in a state of forward motion, you’ll find that collaborating and innovating with others comes easily.

Hyde said it best in his book about artists in the modern marketplace:

“Passing the gift along is the act of gratitude that finishes the labor. And when we have fed the gift with our labor and generosity, it grows and feeds us in return.”

What’s the last idea you let somebody steal one of your ideas?