Do big ideas make me big?

I’ve been told many times that, "You have great ideas". "You think out side the box". "Someday you are going to be someone great".  I would take pride in this, but doesn’t every body have great ideas? Everybody has at some point had an idea for a new great invention, or a way to end world hunger.  I’m sure thousands of people have an idea that is the cure for aids.

How does someone go about turning an idea in to reality? How does someone make an idea heard? Why do people stop at saying, "your idea is amazing"?  What is so different between someone great and you?

I was thinking about all the things that could make this world great.  Ideas for curing aids, a movie plot that will make people think, or ways to make college free. I started thinking about how great I could be and how everyone would know my name.  Then I realized that everyone has similar ideas. I wondered how many times the cure for cancer has been discovered in the mind of someone driving an old 18 wheeler down the highway. How many times have projects been torn down and turned into an art museum, while the previous tenants move into their house right next to a flower park or a lake? How many ground breaking advances in technology have happened while someone mowed their lawn?

I guess I don’t really know where I am going with this.  I just don’t understand ideas and why sometimes the great ones are ignored  just like the great people who thought of them.