This week’s idiom of the week is used to describe how we move from one idea to the next in our minds, and how that mental journey can also often be derailed!
Your “train of thought” won’t take you anywhere physically, but it can take you almost anywhere in your imagination! This week’s idiom of the week is used to describe how we move from one idea to the next in our minds, and how that mental journey can also often be derailed! Here’s a perfect “train of thought” example from an Apto team member currently managing all the planning and logistics of our upcoming product launch event. By the way, did you know the Apto product will go live and be available for users so soon? Hmmm…it seems I just interrupted my own train of thought here. As I was saying, here’s an example of a team member’s recent train of thought: “Did we post this week’s Idiom of the Week? Do we have any product demo’s this week? What about the Product Launch invites? Oh wait! We have our formal product launch in five and a half weeks! Am I all caught up on my already existing tasks? Do we have the appropriate collateral and speakers lined up for the event? Did we get a DJ? What about food and drinks? Free valet. Check. Time to start a to-do list.” See how one thought leads to the next? While each thought connects to the one that preceded or followed, the irst and the last thoughts aren’t necessarily directly connected.
The handy, online Free Dictionary provides the following definition:
Train of Thought
A succession of connected ideas, a path of reasoning, as in You’ve interrupted my train of thought; now what was I saying? This idiom, which uses train in the sense of “an orderly sequence,” was first recorded in 1651, in philosopher Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan.
It’s also very easy to lose your train of thought (as I did in the description above)! You start thinking or talking about a certain topic, and halfway through, you realize you’ve forgotten what your original intent was – you could be thinking of something entirely different by now! The next time this happens to you, just figure out where you got off at the wrong stop and and jump back on the train!