Constructive discontent. Where do ideas come from?

10 Dec

One subject that always fascinates me is where ideas come from. Very often, an idea will be born out of a discontent with an existing product or a particular problem life presents you.

It most cases you might just throw your hands up in the air and move on, accepting the frustration of such discontent.

But sometimes people do something constructive about their discontent. This could be anything from a small one-off life hack to dedicating years of your life to make something new to solve a problem.

As I’ve discussed before, the idea is the easy bit. You have to actually do something with it to make a difference.

Coat-hingers

I came across a great example of constructive discontent on Kickstarter recently.

Simone Giertz was unhappy with the state of coat hangers. Because she couldn’t fit a coat rack in her bedroom it meant that regular coat hangers didn’t work for her.

Again, most people would just grumble about something like this and do nothing about it. But she didn’t. Instead, she re-invented the coat hanger.

I found this video a really interesting insight into the evolution of an idea and how she took it all the way to Kickstarter.