Successful inventors, entrepreneurs and writers say they are often asked where their big ideas came from. They will acknowledge that serendipity often plays a role. But equally as important, they say, is having an open mind - especially in tumultuous times like these. Big and small ideas are out there, they say, if you are looking for them. Consider the experience of Lopa Mehrotra, who was studying to be a political scientist. One hot summer day, she said, she was watching her 6-year-old daughter outside playing. ‘Look,’ her daughter said, as she scraped two gray rocks on stone and watched them turn white. ‘It’s magic.’ ‘I said, ‘Actually, it’s science,’ ‘ Ms. Mehrotra said recently, explaining how that moment inspired her to create TestToob.com, a social networking site that allows students to showcase scientific experiments. Jacques Heim, who founded Diavolo Dance Theater, was in Aspen with his dance company, using an elementary classroom as a dressing room. Naturally, it was full of toys, he recalled. He saw a box of blocks, including three in particular that caught his interest: identical five-sided pyramids that created a cube. ‘I was inspired by the geometry behind it,’ he […]