Get Your Own Idea

This post might make you angry. I'm just saying this up front so you can stop reading if you're easily offended. But, I know that there are people out there who need to hear this:

Stop hijacking bandwagons!

Bandwagon Hijackers are the folks who you didn't INVITE to participate (or give feedback) on your project but feel duty-bound to tell you HOW you should implement YOUR creative idea in a different way.

OR, they offer no support (or comment) UNTIL they see you succeeding with something and then want to add their two cents or get involved.

I know, I know, it is far easier to jump on someone else's bandwagon rather than build your own.

I get it.

Everyone wants to be part of a winning team.

I'm not going to lie and say that I haven't been a Bandwagon Hijacker myself. I'm not proud of that and I do my best every day to focus on my OWN ideas rather than someone else's.

I don't think it is malicious behavior at all but instead, I see it as the behavior of people who wish there were magic fairies to do all the dirty, boring, painful things that must be done before a creative, winning idea becomes a reality.

But, you know as well as I do that there are no shortcuts.

You might've been oblivious before, and didn't know what you were doing, but now that you've read this far, I'll say it again:

You need to stop hijacking bandwagons!

If you're hijacking someone else's bandwagon, your behavior is obnoxious and harmful.

It is not helpful OR appropriate to sit back and watch someone else putting in the sweat and TIME on a creative project and casually EXPECT to hop on just as it is gaining momentum . . .

. . . without being there from the beginning to UNDERSTAND why the creative is doing what (s)he's doing the way he or she is doing it . . .

. . . without putting in the hours  . . .

. . . without having any idea of the passion, meaning or intent behind the art . . .


Even worse, Bandwagon Hijackers can completely destroy an idea if the creative isn't confident.

Especially in those early stages when an idea isn't fully formed.

That is the stage when the wheels are on but all the nuts and bolts aren't tightened so the bandwagon is barely held aloft on wobbly wheels. One casual push could send the whole thing crashing into a pile of rubble.

It is that point in the process when the creative is struggling to pull through a patch of sand and the extra weight of YOU, sitting on back will prove to be too much and the creative will leave everything sitting in the desert of unfulfilled visions never to be seen again.

There has been nothing more frustrating in my life than seeing truly original and creative projects destroyed by hijackers.


So, if you weren't invited to be a part of the project then enjoy it for what it is or keep quiet.

If you weren't invited to give your "feedback" or ideas, then don't.

If what I'm saying is making you feel angry because you KNOW that you have GREAT ideas for other people's projects, I'm here to tell you that what you're really hearing is your own inner creative SCREAMING to be let out.

So, today I DARE YOU to:

1. Step away from someone else's bandwagon;
2. Do your own thing, be original. Be brave.

I cannot promise that your original idea will succeed but I can promise that the more time you spend creating your own work, the less time you'll have to take a sledgehammer to someone else's bandwagon.

P.S. If you post an unformed idea on social media, you can expect it to be hijacked. Only do this if you have a super-confident thick skin -or, you are trying to weed out and identify the hijackers!