Take offence at anyone accusing you of lacking ideas
YESTERDAY I woke up to find Moky Makura in my bedroom. Well, a bit more about her later.
Take time to cogitate on this, though: "It is the winter of Warren's 9th year. Outside in the yard, he and his little sister, Bertie, are playing in the snow.
"Warren is catching snowflakes. One at a time first. Then he is scooping them up by handfuls.
"He starts to pack them into a ball. As the snowball grows bigger, he places it on the ground.
"Slowly it begins to roll. He gives it a push, and it picks up more snow. Soon he reaches the edge of the yard.
"After a moment of hesitation, he heads off, rolling the snowball through the neighbourhood.
"And from there, Warren continues onward, casting his eye on a whole world full of snow."
From that time on, the American billionaire investor and philanthropist Warren Buffett, now 80, never stopped snowballing his wealth. He's made so much of it he now donates huge amounts to the most needy in the world.
Having occurred to him when he was only knee-high to a lizard, as a dear friend is wont to describe childhood, the snowball has been such an intrinsic part of Buffett's business psyche he's given it as a title to his biography.
It all began with an idea that hit him at 9.
Back to Makura. My eyes heavy as lead because this was the morning after the night before, it took time for Makura's excited banter to penetrate my cranium.
She was on about her new book on South African entrepreneurs and as my eyes leapt ahead of my head to make heads or tails of the interview, she rattled off the names featured in the book, people who started off whole empires with, yes, an idea.
Men like Mark Lamberti, Sol Kerzner and a host of others my sore head wouldn't allow me to grab as they rolled off Makura's mouth either had ideas happening to them or latched on to existing ones.
Nandos, Massmart and others that Makura droned into my detached head that couldn't take them in were all birthed of an idea.
An idea is a wonderful thing. So take serious umbrage at anyone ever accusing you of lacking in ideas.
Being clueless sounds like a swear word. I'm especially unnerved by one synonym - discombobulated.
This says you can play in the snow all you want, nothing will ever occur to you. Or, no matter how many number of trees you can sit under and duck apples, but because your name is not Isaac Newton, the falling fruit will inspire no theories of physics in you.
Such is the marvel nature of an idea that TBWA creative genius John Hunt dedicated a whole book to it: The Art of The Idea, he calls his book about which the Nelson Mandela Foundation had to say: "An original and beautiful book. It suggests that the surest way to liberate ourselves is through the power of our ideas."
Our living space is littered with ideas so much so that motorcar pioneer Henry Ford, known for his litany of quotes, had something to say about them too: "The air is full of ideas. They are knocking you in the head all the time.
"You only have to know what you want, then forget it, and go about your business. Suddenly, the idea will come through. It was there all the time."
There are names you will not find in Makura's new book. Being a tenderpreneur is, after all, not an ideas thing.
For this lot we invoke Honoré de Balzac (1799 - 1850): "Behind every great fortune there is a crime."