Creative ideas hit me at the strangest times—middle of the night, out adventuring, driving, half-asleep, or just listening to music. They never show up when I’m “ready”. That’s the thing about ideas: they’re wild. Fleeting. If you don’t grab them when they pass by, they’re gone.
That’s why I use what I call the “In the Can” method. It’s not fancy—it’s practical. It’s about capturing ideas when they show up, not when it’s convenient.
Here’s how I do it:
SUMMARY AI
This little app lives on my phone. Whenever a spark hits, I open it, speak or type a rough version of the idea, and it spits back a clean summary. That summary becomes a seed—something I can come back to later, especially when I’m low on inspiration.
DRAFTS IN WORDPRESS
When I have a clearer idea, I open my WordPress blog (hosted via Hostinger with some handy plugins) and throw a rough draft straight into the editor. No pressure to publish. No need to polish. I just save it.
Sometimes I revisit it within days. Sometimes it sits for months. Occasionally, I never touch it again. That’s fine. Not every idea needs to become something. But it’s there. It’s “in the can.”
ORGANIZE IT OR LOSE IT
Capturing ideas is step one. But organizing them? That’s what makes them usable.
My wife used to jot her ideas down in notebooks—but not just one. She had them all over the house: in bags, drawers, the car. She had some brilliant ideas during the years she ran her online gift company, Sundog Co., but keeping track of them all was a challenge.
That said, over time she developed her own creative system that works for her now. You can find her at @wild_woman_MT—maybe she’ll share her method one day. It’s worth hearing.
I learned from watching that journey. For me, I keep my ideas in just two places—my app and my blog drafts. That’s it. No scattered notes, no hunting. Everything’s where I can find it.
Here’s what I’ve learned:
If you don’t capture the idea in the moment, it might never come back. You’ll swear you’ll remember, but you won’t.
As Elizabeth Gilbert says in Big Magic, ideas float around, looking for someone to bring them to life. If they can’t flow through you, they’ll find someone else. Ever had a great idea and saw someone else launch it later? Yeah, that.
SO WHAT’S THE TAKEAWAY
Don’t wait for the perfect time to be creative.
Build a system to capture and organize your ideas.
Could be voice notes, an app, a single notebook, a Google Doc—whatever. Just make sure you know where they are and how to get to them later.
Then, when you’re stuck, don’t stare at a blank screen. Open your “idea can”. Something in there will speak to you.
The key is not just having ideas. The key is keeping them. And knowing where to find them.
