About this quote

Kicking the day off with wild ideas loosens your reflex to self-censor. Give yourself a strict, small window each morning to be outrageously imaginative before chores and messages take over. That practice lowers the threshold for creative thinking and makes practical options easier to see. Try a quick timer: jot six ridiculous ideas, then pick one to refine into something you can actually try.

When to use it

• Before the design sprint I tell the team, 'Let's spend five minutes listing six impossible product ideas to shake up our assumptions.'
• On thesis mornings I force myself, 'Six ridiculous hypotheses before coffee, then sketch the one that seems least plausible' .
• At breakfast with the kids I say, 'Okay, name six impossible pets we'd keep if we had a zoo in the kitchen' and we build stories around them.
• Before a long run I tell myself, 'Think up six impossible routes, then pick one odd element to test in training today.'