One of my favorite films is Amadeus.

Amadeus tells the story of the great Austrian composer, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who, during his relatively short life, composed hundreds of extraordinary symphonies, operas, concertos, and pieces for small ensembles.

Mozart lived during the 18th century, a time when it wasn’t unusual to die at a relatively young age. And Mozart’s “rock star” lifestyle: late hours drinking, gambling and partying probably didn’t help.

Amadeus suggests an interesting twist on the composer’s early death; that a court rival  Antonio Salieri manipulated events causing Mozart’s finances, family life, and health to suffer. Salieri believes it was his manipulation that caused Mozart to die at 35.

Other than the fact that both Mozart and Salieri were composers and contemporaries Amadeus is fiction.

Still there’s a scene in the film that has always fascinated me. It’s one of the reasons I think it’s so important that those of us who want to make a difference get what we know out of our heads and into information products.

It’s No Good to Anyone in Your Head

In this scene Mozart is struggling to complete two commissioned projects. He desperately needs the money and each project’s sponsor is pressuring him to finish the work they’ve commissioned.

One of the projects is The Magic Flute commissioned by impressario Emanuel Schikaneder.

Rehearsals are about to begin and Schikaneder visits Mozart to find out when the score will be ready.

“It’s finished,” Mozart tells him.

“Wonderful,” says Schikaneder, “Can I have it?”

“No,” says Mozart.

“But you said it was ready,” says Schikaneder.

“It is,” says Mozart.

“Than why can’t I have it?” Schikaneder is quickly losing patience.

“Because it’s up here, in my noodle,” answers Mozart pointing to his head and giggling. “The rest is just  scribbling and bibbling, bibbling and scribbling.”

Schikaneder having lost all patience grabs Mozart by the collar, then calming downs tells Mozart, “Look, it’s no good to anybody as long as it’s in your head. Write it down.”

Fortunately for music lovers everywhere, Mozart DID write it all down. In fact he wrote down over 600 separate works.

What You Have is Important, too

Mozart is an extraordinary example and but that doesn’t mean you’re off the hook when it comes to sharing your work with the world.

If you’re an independent business professional, much of what you do is based on years of experience, expertise you’ve acquired, and resources you’ve carefully developed.

In our modern world of antibiotics and cutting edge medical technology, most of us can expert to live far longer than those living in Mozart’s day.

But that doesn’t mean we’re doing a better job getting it out of our heads and documenting what we know. Even with so much technology that makes it so much easier to do so. In fact, we could learn a thing or two from Mozart who was extraordinarily prolific during his 35 on earth.

There will never be another Mozart but there also will never be another person like you.  There will never be another person who sees things in exactly the way you do or has the exact same ideas. And there are people who really need to hear what you have to share.

So take my advice. Or better yet, let the work of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart inspire you. Get it out of your head and get it on paper or on an audio recording or in a video.

Because as long as it’s in your head, nobody benefits.

Are you creating an information product? Comment here and share your experience about what’s working or what’s not working.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 28th, 2011 at 3:19 pm and is filed under Product Development. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.