I started listening a podcast of Steve Seskin talking about his song, co-written with Tom Douglas “Grown Men Don’t Cry,” which they wrote for Tim McGraw.
He and Tom had finished the first two verses. They needed the third.
The first verse tells about seeing a mom and her child in a tough spot, but not being about to do much about it, or stop to help.
The second verse talks about a man visiting his fathers grave when it’s too late to make amends and “talking to the wind.”
Where could the third verse go?
They explored ideas about what else might make a man cry, more sickness, death, and loss. But they’d already explored all that pretty well. As Steve tells it they spent three days knocking on those doors without any ideas idea they liked answering.
Then they found the answer: tears of joy–a tender scene between father and child.
For me the less is it’s easy to get anchored to a point of view or idea. How do you get unstuck? One way is to test out that idea’s opposite.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQjp5s6DJlw
*Tip of the hat to Tim Ferriss
timmyr.com 