You have enough good ideas. Without energy they stay daydreams.

Key takeaways: Good ideas rarely appear at your desk. They appear in the breaks: in the shower, on a walk, in the sauna. But an idea is only worth as much as the energy you give it afterwards. Capture every idea within 60 seconds, test it within 72 hours with the smallest step and plug the leaks that drain your inner energy.

Your best idea came to you in the shower yesterday. Today you no longer quite remember what it was.

Or you still remember it. For three years now. And you've never done anything with it.

You don't lack ideas. You lack the path from idea to action. And the energy to walk it.

Why don't good ideas come at your desk?

Because your mind keeps working when you stop pushing it. But only if you did the work beforehand.

There is the story of Archimedes in the bath. In the water he is said to have understood how to measure the volume of his king's crown, and to have run home naked shouting "Eureka". It was told by the Roman architect Vitruvius, about two centuries later. Whether it happened exactly like that, nobody knows.

Henri Poincaré, on the other hand, is well documented. The mathematician had worked on a problem for weeks. Then he went on a geological excursion and stopped thinking about it. In Coutances, as he put his foot on the step of an omnibus, the decisive insight was suddenly there. He only checked it later, back in Caen, and it was right. He describes it himself in "Science et méthode" (1908).

Both stories share the same core: the idea came during the break. The work came before.

"In the fields of observation, chance favours only the prepared mind."
Louis Pasteur, lecture in Lille, 7 December 1854

That is why the shower, the walk and the sauna work. Not because they are magic. But because they are the only minutes in which nothing steals your attention.

Why don't your ideas turn into projects?

Because they leak away at three points. And none of them has anything to do with talent.

• Not captured: The idea arrives at 7:10 in the shower and is gone by 7:40 on the bus. Your mind is an idea generator, not an archive.
• Not tested: The idea stays in your head. There it gets more beautiful, bigger and more impossible every month. An untested idea is a daydream with a business plan.
• Too many at once: Ten half ideas use up more energy than one whole one. And deliver nothing.

An idea without a first step is entertainment. An idea with a first step is a project.

What is inner energy?

Inner energy is your capacity to act: alertness, focus and drive. It is limited, and it refills. Whether you see it spiritually or quite soberly, the arithmetic is the same: whatever you spend in one place is missing in another.

In the HMF method, energy has three sources. Health refills it: sleep, movement, silence. Motivation gives it direction: a goal worth the effort. And your foundation keeps it stable: if you aren't churning over money worries, aren't carrying an open conflict around and live by your values, you lose less energy to side issues.

You don't have too little energy. You have too many holes in the tank.

Where does your energy drain away?

Mostly into things that give nothing back. Check these five leaks:

• Open decisions: Everything you postpone keeps running in the background. Put it on the red card and decide it on review day.
• Anger about things you can't change: Other people's gravel in your wheelbarrow. How to tip it out is in "You carry yesterday, tomorrow and other people's gravel".
• Constant noise: Every glance at your phone is a small receipt. You pay the total in the evening. More on that in "You're not resting. You're numbing yourself."
• People who talk every idea to death: Not malicious. Just expensive. Tell them about your idea only once the first test has run.
• Too little sleep: No protocol in the world replaces the hours you're missing at night.

How do you capture an idea before it evaporates?

With the 60-second rule: within one minute you write down two sentences. Sentence one: what is the idea? Sentence two: what would be the smallest test? Nothing more. No elaboration, no research, no logo.

And everything goes in one single place. A notebook, a notes app, whatever. But only one. Ideas on five scraps of paper, three apps and a napkin are not a collection. They are confetti.

How do you test an idea within 72 hours?

With the smallest step that gives you a real answer. Not with a plan. With a test.

1. Business idea: Ask three people from your target group whether they would pay for it and how much. Not friends who like you. People who have the problem.
2. Creative idea: Make a rough draft in 30 minutes. A paragraph, a sketch, a melody. Ugly is allowed.
3. An idea for your life: Try it for one day instead of planning it for a year. Getting up earlier, eating differently, working differently: one day, then evaluate.

If the test doesn't happen within 72 hours, the idea goes to the car park. There it waits until review day. Once a month, one idea may move from the car park to become a project. One.

The question is not whether your idea is good. The question is whether it survives the first test.

What does the 7-day energy protocol look like?

Three days of measuring, one leak plugged, your best hour protected. And every day you capture ideas instead of losing them.

1. Measure (days 1 to 3): In the evening, write down what gave you energy today and what took it away. Plus or minus, one word per activity.
2. Plug (day 4): Take the biggest minus and limit or cut it. One. Not all of them.
3. Protect (from day 4): Find your hour with the most energy. For some it is the morning, for others late evening. That time belongs to your most important task. Phone off.
4. Capture (daily): Every idea within 60 seconds, two sentences, one place.
5. Test (ongoing): Every idea you want to pursue gets its smallest test within 72 hours.
6. Evaluate (day 7): Which leak is plugged? Which idea is tested? Change one parameter for next week.

The 1% rule applies to your protected time: you start with 30 minutes. After one month it is 40 minutes (30 × 1.35, rounded down), after three months 74 minutes. On day 111 it is 90 minutes, and that is where you stop increasing. Worked example, not a promise. Your result depends on you.

How does the planner help?

The planner doesn't collect your ideas for you. It makes sure one of them gets a task. The 72-hour test is one of the five tasks on your day page. Your protected hour sits next to it with a time, and the "1% better" field holds today's length. Whatever doesn't happen goes on the red card. The planner is written in German. Details are on the planner page.

Frequently asked questions

Where should I write down my ideas?

In one single place that you always have with you. Whether it is a notebook or a note on your phone matters less. What matters is that after every idea you know where it is, and that you go through that place once a week on review day.

What do I do with ideas I never act on?

You park them and go through the car park once a month. Whatever no longer appeals to you after three months, you delete without a guilty conscience. A deleted idea costs no more energy. One you drag along does.

How do I recognise a good idea?

By the fact that it survives the first test. For business ideas, that means someone other than you wants it, ideally with money. Excitement in your own head is not a test. It is only the reason to run one.

What if I have no energy for weeks on end?

If you feel exhausted for weeks even though you get enough sleep, that is not a motivation problem. Then you see your doctor and have it checked. Protocols help you with leaks, not with illnesses.

Your task for today

1. Collect: Write down the last three ideas you had. Two sentences per idea: what it is and what the smallest test would be.
2. Choose: Pick one and schedule its test within the next 72 hours, with a time.
3. Name: Write down your biggest energy leak this week in one sentence. Just name it. You'll plug it next week.

An idea only belongs to you once you've done something with it. Until then it belongs to chance. You'll find more protocols on the DailyInspire.ch blog.

Ideas are free. Execution costs energy. Don't spend it on leaks.