Your Best Ideas Are Hiding in the Wrong Drawer

And exactly where to go looking for them.

You know that drawer.

Not the one in your kitchen or wardrobe.

The drawer. The one in your desk stuffed with things you might need someday—rubber bands, expired loyalty cards, batteries that may or may not work, half-filled idea notebooks, and a mysterious key you’re too afraid to throw away in case it opens something important.

Your best ideas are not in there. Trust me, I’ve opened and closed that drawer more times than I care to admit.

But they’re not in the writer’s “special drawer” either—our brains.

We tell ourselves, “When I sit down to write, I’ll just pull something brilliant from my mind.”
Except when we do sit down, all we pull out is static. Our mental drawers are chaotic, sentimental, beautiful even—but not the best place to find usable ideas on demand.

Because when you're under pressure to write, those brilliant ideas tend to scatter like socks in a dryer.

If you want good ideas, don’t go rummaging through drawers—physical or mental.

Go steal them.

Yes, you read it right.

Go steal them, and when you do, post a note of thanks to Austin Kleon, patron saint of creative kleptomania, who gave us all permission in his book, “Steal Like an Artist.”

Idea generation isn’t about brainstorming, but about noticing, stealing, and remembering differently.

But let me add something important: just stealing is not enough. You have to transform what you take. Improve it. Twist it. Add glitter. Paint it in your voice and wrap it in your worldview. You've got to make it yours.

So stop digging through the mental sock drawer. The real gems are outside it—waiting to be stolen, shaped, and turned into something only you could write.

Now that I’ve handed you a bright, shiny idea, let me show you how to turn stolen ideas into something gloriously your own.

Full credit (for what I’m going to share) to Barry Davret, who admits he stole it from James Webb Young, who, in turn, probably stole it from the ancient scribes of Babylon.

You see, there is nothing new under the sun (a quote from nothing less than the Bible) and every idea originates from some other idea.

When Barry challenged himself to write every day, he ran out of steam (and ideas) within two weeks. A friend tossed him a lifeline in the form of a 76-year-old advertising book:

“A Technique for Producing Ideas” by James Webb Young (1940)

In it, Young laid out a five-step process to generate ideas. Barry zeroed in on two:

1. Combine something from your product

2. With something from your general knowledge

Mash those together and voilà—creativity.

Barry tweaked it and made it his own formula:
Life + Connection + Knowledge = Creative Output

I stole Barry’s version and turned it into my own idea machine:

Sub-Sub-Topic + Life + Knowledge + Style = Fresh Idea

Here’s how it works:

Step 1: Pick a topic

Pick a topic (or “niche” if you’re into marketing jargon). Make it specific. The more specific it is, the easier it is to write. I promise you, you’ll never run out of material.

Either pick something you already know, or something you want to learn and teach as you go. Teaching keeps things interesting—and your impostor syndrome busy.

Step 2: Break it down

Take your main topic and break it into 10 sub-topics. Just one word each. If your topic is storytelling, your sub-topics could be things like: life, fiction, elements, language, insights, etc. Keep it tight.

Ten possible sub-topics of Storytelling

Step 3: Go one layer deeper

Now, for each sub-topic, create 10 sub-sub-topics. Again—one word each. (Okay, two words if you're feeling rebellious, but no sentences. I’m serious. Don’t make me come over there.)

See how easily I am able to expand each sub-topic to sub-sub-topics.

By the end of this exercise, you’ll have 100 sub-sub-topics to work with. Resist the urge to flesh them out into headlines just yet. Think of this as your idea pantry—we’ll season and cook later.

Step 4: Capture daily life

Each night, jot down 10–12 interesting things from your day. Anything goes: a snarky comment from your kid, a weirdly worded email from a client, something you overheard at the café, or your moment of genius while talking to your dog. Don’t judge. Just list.

Step 5: Make the connection

Now, this is where the magic happens. Pick one or two experiences from your daily list. Then, pull up your sub-sub-topic list and ask:

• What connects this real-life moment to this topic?

• Where do they intersect?

• Does this experience prove or challenge the concept?

• Can this personal story illuminate that piece of knowledge?

This intersection—between your lived experience and your expertise—is where original content lives.

It won’t be easy at first. You’ll squint at your list and think, “These don’t go together.” But trust me, with practice, your brain becomes a connection-finding ninja.

Step 6: Add your knowledge

You’ve got your sub-sub-topic and your quirky life moment. Now add knowledge—the part where you show your readers how, why, when, where and what.

Knowledge doesn’t mean quoting academic journals (unless academic your thing). It means drawing on what you know about your topic. Things you’ve learned through your work, reading, mistakes, or sheer stubbornness.

This knowledge can also come from research and other people’s experiences. This is where you borrow authority—like saying, “I studied 20 novelists, and here’s what I learned about storytelling from them.”

Step 7: Add your style

Style is the seasoning. It’s how you deliver the goods.

Your style might be:

• Reflective: Weave a quiet lesson into a personal story.

• Humorous: Turn the whole thing into a self-deprecating comedy sketch.

• Instructive: Break it down step by step like you're teaching a 14-year old to cook.

• Conversational: Talk to your readers like you’re sitting across from them with a cup of tea and a biscuit (or a margarita—no judgment).

This is where you come in. This is what no one else can replicate.

Step 8: Write

Now that you have a clear topic, a personal anecdote, your earned knowledge, and your specific style—you’re ready to write.

With all the ingredients, crafting a 750-word piece becomes less about “finding time” and more about following a recipe.

There are many frameworks for writing, but here’s the simplest one I always return to:

1. Open with a personal experience (story)
2. Transition into the insight or connection
3. Deliver the knowledge or transformation

That’s it. Three moves. And like all good dances, you can vary the rhythm once you’re fluent.

Here are three examples you can model:

Example 1: Storytelling

Sub-sub-topic: Conflict

Life: An argument over who left the milk out

Knowledge: Conflict drives the plot

Opening: A fight over who left the milk carton out almost ended my marriage. Overreaction? Maybe. But it taught me something powerful about storytelling.”

Lesson: Conflict doesn’t need to be epic. It needs to be relatable. Readers stick around when tension simmers—even if it’s just over lactose.

Example 2: Voice

Sub-sub-topic: Sarcasm

Life: Told my husband “Sure, go ahead” and he actually did.

Knowledge: Sarcasm doesn’t always translate in writing.

Opening: Apparently, when I said ‘Sure, go ahead and buy that treadmill we’ll never use,’ my husband heard permission—not sarcasm. And now we own a $1200 clothes rack.

Lesson: Your voice carries tone, but your reader doesn’t have facial expressions or side-eyes to decode it. Sarcasm in writing? Handle with care—or risk being wildly misunderstood (and mildly broke).

Example 3: Productivity

Sub-sub-topic: Batching

Life: Sunday meal prepping

Knowledge: Batching work improves focus

Opening: If I can chop onions for the week on Sunday, I can batch newsletter ideas too.

Lesson: Batching saves time, sanity, and onions. Also applies to writing.

So, your best ideas aren’t buried in the chaotic, overstuffed drawer of your brain, waiting to be yanked out on deadline.

They’re hiding in plain sight, in your daily life, in the scraps of conversations you overhear, in that book you read last summer, in that annoying email from your boss, and yes, in that passive-aggressive text from your cousin.

The magic happens not when you dig frantically through the junk drawer hoping for brilliance, but when you build a system to collect, connect, and elevate the ordinary. Your brain isn’t the drawer—your process is.

Now go fill it with gold.

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That’s all from me today.

As always, thanks for reading.