Inspiration is a funny beast. I love me some inspiration. The thoughts of wonder excitement and opportunity are all great highs. But, wouldn’t you know it, there’s a downside.

My creative little portion of brain meat is excellent at looking upon things, anything really, and finding wonderful amounts of opportunities and interpretations and applications. Great. Fantastic!

The rub? Time allotment and effort.

One thing you learn real quick when you have ADHD like ideas pouring through your skull all the time is the trust you have for that idea. Good idea, awesome! Great feelings, even better! Now, let’s strap on our filter and tally the costs.

How are you gonna feel when that inspiration fades while new ideas flitter through? How about when you come crashing down from that initial high? Or the grind of discipline starts to bite and removes those initial romantic thoughts? How much time and effort do you invest into bringing that idea to fruition? Do you cut corners when bringing the idea to life perhaps compromising the vision? Is the payoff even gonna be worthwhile?

Those last two questions are especially applicable when measuring any endeavor you take on in life.

So, bringing it back around. I got me inspiration in spades. But that don’t mean squat until I have some discipline to temper it against. Even if your on the other side of the equasion, you’re all discipline with few ideas, you’re still gonna need both sides and in respectable ratios. Betcha 1:1 is the best ratio. Edison famously said that ratio was 1:99; one part inspiration, 99 parts persperation.

Better get to work and make sure we pay our perspiration dues.