Tag: creativity
3 step-process to curb fear of creative self-expression
We are creative beings. Even while only sitting and thinking – you are actually creating, but some people need that final nudge – to translate their idea into a physical reality. They are afraid of expressing themselves creatively, and sources of this fear can be numerous: fear of other’s people approval, not being original enough or not meeting some type of criteria (deadline, aesthetic or functional purpose) for what they want to produce.
Most self-help teachings will tell that you need to face your fear, “take the bull by the horns”. But it can be counterproductive – and you can end up being chased by the angry bull, not trained and fast enough to escape this seething fury.
And I believe that there is the key – before facing your fear, prepare and arm yourself with any additional weapon that can help you fight this raging animal.
- Acknowledge your fear. By this I mean that you should be frank with yourself and admit you are somehow scared to publicly express your creativity. As mentioned above, fear is an angry and hungry beast that craves your self-doubt, pessimism, lack of clarity and unreachable perfectionism. Your fear can endlessly haunt you, wanting more, but you don’t have to be the one to feed it: once you accept its existence – it’s much easier to equip yourself and prepare a battle field into your advantage.
- Turn your fear into curiosity. Examine your thoughts carefully: what are you actually afraid of? Right down your thoughts. Is there any credible truth behind those statements? After all these are just thoughts. Thoughts can be changed. And what would happen if you begin to enjoy your creativity? People will think and talk, no matter what you do. But how would your life improve if you give your creativity a chance? Like writing a book or painting? You create for the sake of your own life experience, passion and joy: replace your negative thoughts with more empowering affirmations that will open the door to more inspiration and creative outlet.
- Take meaningful action. If you are still lingering on the edge of insecurity, think of ways you can improve your creativity: what else you need to know? What additional information would help you? Do your research, ask questions, observe other people who did similar things – what actions they have taken..do you need any skill? Educate yourself, take classes, go to workshops…Instead of feeding your fear, feed your creativity, enable it grow, flourish and materialize into something you will enjoy. That’s the sure way for your environment to enjoy your work as well.
I hold it true that thoughts are things
Endowed with bodies, breath, and wings,
And that we send them forth to fill
The world with good results – or ill.
That which we call our secret thought
Speeds to the earth’s remotest spot,
And leaves its blessings or its woes
Like tracks behind it as it goes.
It is God’s law. Remember it
In your still chamber as you sit
With thoughts you would not dare have known,
And yet made comrades when alone.
These thoughts have life; and they will fly
And leave their impress by-and-by,
Like some marsh breeze, whose poisoned breath
Breathes into homes its fevered breath.
And after you have quite forgot
Or all outgrown some vanished thought,
Back to your mind to make its home,
A dove or raven, it will come.
Then let your secret thoughts be fair;
They have a vital part and share
In shaping worlds and moulding fate —
God’s system is so intricate.
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Daily verse with purpose: Anthony Jay
4 reasons why creativity is good for your business
During my research I came a cross interesting study from 2014. It was delivered by independent Forrester Consulting group and focuses on the impact that creativity can have on business results. Now, when we think of business performance and innovation first things that come into our mind are productivity and technology, but what about the most important part of human resources – creativity? Well, this study tries to answer some of these questions.
During the study, many senior managers that come from corporations across a diverse set of industries were surveyed and interviewed to give their quantitative and qualitative overview of how creativity impacts business results (you can read the report here).
In general, the study confirms what I always truly believed: creativity is a resource and skill that can be nurtured in organizations with aim to recharge business performance in terms of key business indicators, like innovation rate, revenue growth, market share and talent acquisition.
Key findings in this study also include that:
- Despite the perceived benefits of creativity, 61% of companies do not see their companies as creative.
- More companies that foster creativity achieve exceptional revenue growth comparing to their peers.
- More creative companies enjoy greater market share and competitive leadership.
- More creative companies win recognition as a best place to work.
- Companies put creativity on the business agenda.
- Creativity thrives with leadership support.
What also we can learn from these conclusions is:
- In any kind of work and entrepreneurship creativity is becoming a vital currency for us to monetize our competitive advantage.
- Creativity can help us moves forward on the leadership ladder in our industry.
- Business that encourages creativity is a healthier working place.
- Business that encourages creativity is more attractive both to customers and potential coworkers.
How creativity is treated in your work place? Please share in the comments bellow. And as an inspiration for your creativity at work I’ve included a poem to keep you motivated and on track:
Team Work by Edgar A. Guest
It’s all very well to have courage and skill
And it’s fine to be counted a star,
But the single deed with its touch of thrill
Doesn’t tell the man you are;
For there’s no lone hand in the game we play,
We must work to a bigger scheme,
And the thing that counts in the world to-day
Is, How do you pull with the team?
They may sound your praise and call you great,
They may single you out for fame,
But you must work with your running mate
Or you’ll never win the game;
Oh, never the work of life is done
By the man with a selfish dream,
For the battle is lost or the battle is won
By the spirit of the team.
You may think it fine to be praised for skill,
But a greater thing to do
Is to set your mind and set your will
On the goal that’s just in view;
It’s helping your fellowman to score
When his chances hopeless seem;
Its forgetting self till the game is o’re
And fighting for the team.
Are you ready to enter a new relationship? 9 luscious ways to seduce your reader with your writing!
You as a writer and author, while building your audience are becoming a brand. And your writing is your best branding and marketing tool that exists. Words, emotions, message you transcend through your writing is that magnet that attract readers who share your values and point of view. But once they jump into your writing boat, you and your readers began to interact and build certain relationships; things become different, and a little bit complicated. But you as a writer, don’t want the status: It’s complicated. You want the status: Engaged.
Think about it for a second:
When you are in a relationship with someone and you enjoy it:
- it is a person you are looking forward to see;
- it someone you care about and like spending time with;
- it’s probably someone who shares your values as well;
- you interact on the basis of mutual trust.
Even classical marketing is moving from brand oriented marketing to marketing that is oriented towards building relationships.
To truly understand what kind of impact is your writing having on your readers you can ask yourself these questions:
Did my writing enabled me to build meaningful connections with my readers?
If not, what can I do to emulate the positive dynamics of such relationships?
- It has to be a content your reader likes spending time reading;
- It has to offer something of interest that makes your reader want to expect fresh content and read it again;
- That content deals with topics your reader cares about and shares his values.
In order to achieve these objectives you can apply certain tactics through your content:
- Offer your readers opportunity to know about you and don’t be afraid to show your vulnerability. In that way you are engraving that human component in your writing and building foundation for future relationship.
- Offer understanding, compassion; be helpful through your writing.
- Use catchy anecdotes and funny stories that are amusing and captivating.
- Show you’re interested in their perspective on things, even if it doesn’t agree with your own.
- Don’t be afraid to repeat yourself. What I mean is that pretty much the same message you deliver you can say in different ways and modes of expressing. People digest information differently. I remember while I was working with students, the more graphics I used, the students at the class were more ‘tuned in’ with the information, absorbing it in with wide open eyes, not wanting anything to miss. So use visuals as well, audio features, retell what you have to say in different ways.
- Be chatty. Start a conversation by asking questions.
- Always spice up everything with your quirkiness, with something that makes you different and that can enrich your content to the level it is worth remembering and sharing.
- Let your readers know that you are accountable and professional, but throw some ball once in a while. Add some playfulness in your writing because too much of serious approach can be sobering and counter effective.
- But never go across the line of NOT being you. What ever you write, be true to yourself because dishonesty leads to mistrust and deceit and like in any relationship, your reader might just break up with you and your writing (remember: rebound can be painful 😉 ).
Why does this written doe bound through these written woods?
For a drink of written water from a spring
whose surface will xerox her soft muzzle?
Why does she lift her head; does she hear something?
Perched on four slim legs borrowed from the truth,
she pricks up her ears beneath my fingertips.
Silence – this word also rustles across the page
and parts the boughs
that have sprouted from the word ‘woods.’
Lying in wait, set to pounce on the blank page,
are letters up to no good,
clutches of clauses so subordinate
they’ll never let her get away.
Wislawa Szymborska
3 reasons why you should have a purpose statement
We are much familiar with mission and vision statements that companies develop in order to communicate their business much clearer to customers and business associates.
Now, I will not go here in detail what mission and vision statements are, but if you think more clearly, we all as individuals “project” ourselves and with our behavior, actions, language (both verbal and body) we communicate who we are. In one of my recent posts I suggested that we should revisit our core beliefs from time to time, as they change with our maturity and conditions around us. This time I propose, just as your business or company can have mission and vision statement, for you to develop your own purpose statement. I believe, by developing our own purpose statement (that encompasses both your mission and vision in life) we can:
- become more effective; it helps keeping you on track with your goals and plans;
- develop personal leadership; by referring to it and internalizing its meaning, we make choices that serve our values and discard the things that contradict them.
- stay motivated to achieve our goals.
In this post, I talked about thinking in reverse, which literally means having the end goal in mind: what do you want to achieve, in what sense do you want to contribute, what are your values and how your goals you want to achieve align with your values…all that in sum, represents your purpose.
By looking in front of us, that kind of thinking becomes more powerful, more influential in any further decision-making than by being chained by baggage of the past that doesn’t help us.
There is something powerful about writing these things down. And I mean writing by hand on paper: it’s like you are breathing life in those words, you are declaring what you want, who you are and everything becomes more real, and more probable to happen.
I don’t think it should follow any specific format or length, but it has to be relevant to you, to be your motivation in further life decisions.
Some ideas how to start:
- Write about the project you’ll have in near future and think of outcomes you wish to achieve; what steps you can apply to get you closer to completing a successful project?
- Collect all the notes, pictures, quotes, poems that inspire you, that you identify with and let that be your guidance in developing your purpose statement.
Of course, there is a flip side that we should all be aware of: life has unfortunately that ugly side of face – frustration, full of trials and errors when is so easy just to give up. For a real passionate purpose you are ready to work hard and endure long enough to get where you want to be. It’s like drudging through the drudgery as writer Joshua Fields Millburn refers to it. It is part of the process and your purpose statement is there to remind you who you are and who you want to become.
Look at developing your purpose statement as a journey to self-discovery. Nobody can and no one expects from you to have figured all out at once, but it’s a step forward. Purpose can change and evolve with you, or you can have multiple purposes. And why not, as long as they don’t contradict your core values?
Life has loveliness to sell,
All beautiful and splendid things,
Blue waves whitened on a cliff,
Soaring fire that sways and sings,
And children’s faces looking up,
Holding wonder like a cup.
Life has loveliness to sell,
Music like the curve of gold,
Scent of pine trees in the rain,
Eyes that love you, arms that hold,
And for your spirit’s still delight,
Holy thoughts that star the night.
Spend all you have for loveliness,
Buy it and never count the cost;
For one white singing hour of peace
Count many a year of strife well lost,
And for a breath of ecstasy
Give all you have been, or could be.
Sara Teasdale
Experiencing a creative block? Dare to compare!
Every one once in a while we face a challenging situation to solve some problem, find an answer to a question; brainstorm an innovative idea. And that got me thinking: what if we challenge ourselves even more? What would happen with our creative flow? Now, I’m not thinking about putting pressure on ourselves, yet we all know we can ‘move’ ourselves towards productive creativity through certain exercises, but creativity is still kinda unpredictable.
What I mean by challenge, I mean challenging us by comparing the problem to something else.
In poetry is very well known technique called similes. Its purpose is to compare two things, so examples of simile poems include any poem that makes comparisons using the words “like” or “as.” Two things compared don’t have to be alike (in poetry usually they are not), and they create different images in our mind, making correlations and connections that doesn’t actually exist. If we apply this to our creative thinking, we are training our creative muscle; it gives us an opportunity to conceptualize different solutions and approaches in problem solving.
Examples of similes in poetry might include something like:
Your eyes were dark as a night without moonlight.
Blank page is like an empty canvas where I paint with my words.
So next time you have trouble getting in your creative mood, try this exercise:
You write down your question/problem and try to find a simile….”My problem is like I…..and finish the sentence. The idea is here for you to challenge yourself to find a similar problem in a completely different life area.
If you have a trouble finding inspiration to start writing, for example, try to remember how it felt when you were trying something else new: a sport, travel, diet, even reading a new book, or developing a new habit? How did you manage to start a new activity? What made you want to stick to your new routine?
Write down your similes and try to analyze them. What of the written ideas you can translate in a given problem? As you brainstorm and think of your answers, probably this will trigger even some emotional response that can act like a drive for generating a flow of new ideas.
You might not get the desired outcome all at once, but using this effective brainstorming tool can distract your attention from a problem. In this way, making distance in your view, will help you get more objective and consider some approaches that might actually work.
3 steps to tap into your intuitive inspiration
Creativity is sometimes hard to grasp: an undefined, unfathomable idea that drives action to make something, introduce change or solve problem. I believe there is a lot of correlation between intuition and creativity. Intuition is also that unexplainable part of us, the “knowing” that goes beyond our rational mind, and is rather deeply rooted in the subconsciousness. It’s sort of a guidance system.
For a normal functioning in our societal organized life we need both: instinct and reason to make the best possible decisions for ourselves, our businesses, and our families.
Hence for a creative part of us, empowering our intuitive nature can be a great advantage.
Here, I propose 3 steps to get more acquainted with your intuition and how to use it for improving your creativity skills:
- Spend more time with your best friend (you) and learn more about him/her.
What I mean by this, in reality the only person you can really rely on in this life is you! Our busy and noisy environment can disguise our true needs, values and purpose. By living a life set on autopilot we forget that we are the ones who can fly the plane. Take time to be alone with yourself and listen what your body and mind tells you. Self-exploration can be easily translated through any kind of self-expression. It can be dancing, writing, painting, singing, or any kind of playing or sports..you are tapping into “your spirit” (inspiration). Life and joy speaks through you and leads you directly to your own unexplored creative possibilities.
The very act of expressing yourself connects you with your true creative being. That sacred moments of alignment with who you really are, it’s invigorating, improves your health, decreases stress levels – which is prerequisite of any productive creative action.
- You are part of nature -what it has to tell you?
Now, I have a confession to make: I’m a tree hugger 🙂 It sounds silly (to some of you maybe even stupid) but I like spending time in nature, especially near water and in the woods. I grew up by the Danube river where is a huge park, overpopulated with birches and willows, and this is like I have that engraved need for green surroundings. And every year, in May (now has become a sort of ritual) I like to go to my home country and visit my parents’ weekend cottage, where they have a small orchard and my favorite cherry tree is waiting for me. Still like a kid many years ago, I like to climb it, swing on one of its branches and enjoy the taste of first cherries in the year: sweet, sour, vibrant with life and color. That kind of silence offers me a chance to ‘reset’ my brain, to take a different perspective on life. And also, my geology studies taught me to even more respect nature and value it hold for us. For me is a habitual thing to spend some time during the day in some natural environment. Even here in the Hague, just a stroll through the park during windy and rainy day can do wonders. It helps me in my clear thinking, and offers connection with life on more subtle levels. Spending time in nature can help you sharpen your instincts and keep you grounded. We relate instincts to animal behavior, but in a way we are “more sophisticated animals”. I suggest you try to find some green oase that can help you ‘calibrate’ your senses to better perceive natural sounds, scents, fresh air, and rest your eyes from artificial colors. It awakens an intuitive part of you.
- Make it a meaningful daily practice
To be receptive of creative energy, you have to make it a regular part of your daily life. Along the way, you will discover so much about yourself, how to be more open and aligned. And gaining inspiration you need with time will become easier and more frequent. It’s like an unhoned diamond that with each day you polish, your inner genius shines and sparkle with more intensity.
Become your own most precious gem – an initiator of creative life force within you.
If with light head erect I sing,
Though all the Muses lend their force,
From my poor love of anything,
The verse is weak and shallow as its source.
Making my soul accomplice there
Unto the flame my heart hath lit,
Then will the verse forever wear–
Time cannot bend the line which God hath writ.
But now there comes unsought, unseen,
Some clear divine electuary,
And I, who had but sensual been,
Grow sensible, and as God is, am wary.
It comes in summer’s broadest noon,
By a grey wall or some chance place,
Unseasoning Time, insulting June,
And vexing day with its presuming face.
Such fragrance round my couch it makes,
More rich than are Arabian drugs,
That my soul scents its life and wakes
The body up beneath its perfumed rugs.
Such is the Muse, the heavenly maid,
The star that guides our mortal course,
Which shows where life’s true kernel’s laid,
Its wheat’s fine flour, and its undying force.
Inspiration by Henry David Thoreau (an excerpt)
How to ‘stage’ your environment for a productive creativity
There are two essential elements in every creative process: time and space. Considering time – we all have the same amount of time in one day. And I couldn’t agree more with the saying: “We manage activities, not time.” When it comes to creative process, as described in some of my previous articles, the moment when a creative outburst will happen is sometimes unpredictable: it’s up to us to be responsive and adaptive to it; turn on our antennas and pick up the signals of creativity as it comes along.
This second element, is one that we have even more control over: space. We make or clutter our space – for anything we do. In this article I go in length about the importance of simplicity for a productive usage of time and executing our tasks. Clean, minimalistic space is a prerequisite in my opinion for developing a fertile conditions for a productive creativity. Removing distractions: visual, acoustic and physical clutter is often an overlooked reason why we procrastinate, don’t react upon given creative urge.
You know the situation: you have an interesting idea, but you have some chores to do, you can’t find paper and pencil to write it down, then you think like “OK, I’ll get to it later”…but later never comes and the creative impulse is gone. Decluttered space gives us the chance to be proactive with our ideas, ready like an alert athlete on the start line to “run” our creative race with best results.
There is an intrinsic relationship between what you do and the place you work. Room that is stuffed with unnecessary things, desk with piles of paper, books, gadgets that we don’t need for our momentary work can bring tension and anxiety and in times acts as an obstacle to our creativity.
But that’s not all. Cleaning your desk and purging stuff is the easy part. Emotional baggage that we all carry and our psychological clutter is also something we need to “clean” from time to time.
Zen masters often refer to something that’s called “a beginner’s mind”. A beginner’s mind is open to many possibilities while expert mind recognizes only few. Now, I try to approach this philosophy from two angles. One, is to be open-minded as much as possible and try somehow to avoid previous experiences to block our view of possible creative processes:
“I’ve tried this one, it didn’t work!”
“It’s out of my reach!”
“I don’t have the skills to do this”…
That kind of internal dialogue should be turned off and we need to detach from previous experiences – especially the bad ones. In a way is a “de-conditiong” the psyche, which allows you to reconnect with your true nature. The second angle of tackling this topic is living in the present moment, without dwelling on the past and future which can distract you from your direction in the creative process.
It’s interesting to note that many writers and creatives have faced creativity block throughout their life. During the most of the 1910s, Rilke had suffered from a severe depression. In the early 1920’s he moved to Switzerland, where he meets Werner Reinhart, a merchant that acted as his patron. He purchased Château de Muzot in Veyras, a thirteenth-century manor, (no gas or electricity) to support Rilke to live there rent-free and focus on his work. Rilke closed himself for days, where without any distractions coming from the outer world, he wrote Sonnets to Orpheus and completed the Duino Elegies in “a savage creative storm” as he used to say, during three weeks in February 1922.
Starting form scratch with your creative work, you need open, clear, bright space (both physically and in your mind) to focus on your raw elements and possible arrangement patterns. Your attention needs to be hostage-free from any distraction, noise, stuff intruders and information pollution. This will increase your chances for innovative thinking, your ability to recognize the opportunity that will not hide behind the curtain of unnecessary things. Being adaptive in dealing with surprise is being able to take advantage of serendipitous, potentially valuable ideas.
The Sonnets To Orpheus: Xix by Rainer Maria Rilke
Though the world keeps changing its form
as fast as a cloud, still
what is accomplished falls home
to the Primeval.
Over the change and the passing,
larger and freer,
soars your eternal song,
god with the lyre.
Never has grief been possesed,
never has love been learned,
and what removes us in death
is not revealed.
Only the song through the land
hallows and heals.
9 questions to ask yourself to know if your creative flow is on the right track
The moment after you had your breakthrough idea, what happens? Sometimes, with steady persistence we continue on refining our creative solution, we try to implement our idea and sometimes the idea bulb turns on just in another minute to disappear in open air like a deflated balloon.
Why do we give up on some ideas?
In my experience, answer might be hidden among these statements:
- I lack discipline and persistence (which might be due to distractions, preoccupation with other things or even due to health reason – simply you don’t feel good).
- It requires more effort from my side than I thought. Certain things ask for constant investment of our time, money, energy.. it just seems too difficult, especially if it’s not ‘a one time thing’ but it needs some kind of repetition and maintenance.
- The end goal is not clear. What do I want to achieve? What’s the value of what I’m doing? If we don’t recognize an instant gratification, it’s a rather a creativity killer than inspirational flow of ideas.
- And the all time famous: fear of failure. “It will not work, I can’t do it, because…” endless reasons we find why we don’t keep up with implementing our idea. Self-doubt is also one of those thirsty worms that creeps into our mind and simply sucks out any creative optimism we might have!
I have found that once I manage to connect my creative pursuits with what I want to achieve goes beyond my own satisfaction and gratification, has meaning and contributes to something larger than myself, I’m more motivated and I manage to put aside all reasons why not to do something.
Now, to keep on track creative project I ask myself simple questions:
- Who else can benefit from my work (is it community or business oriented, for example)?
- What’s the purpose of my idea (solution, project..)?
- Do I have all the resources that I need?
- Is what I do, in alignment with who I am and my beliefs?
- How can I simplify the process (solution)?
- Am I focused enough, or are there any distractions I can remove in order to be more concentrated?
- What action I can implement to move forward with my project?
- Does it bring me joy and fun?
- Does my idea foster beauty and harmony (how does it appeal to senses, what kind of atmosphere it produces)?
You know, when I started this blog a few months ago, I was thinking: “You are crazy, you are starting a blog about poetry, literature and writing and you don’t have a degree in literature or English language. English language is not even your mother tongue!” Yet I wanted to share my amazement about the benefits that poetry brought into my life. So I began to cheer myself: “But I do know about creativity. I do know about the business and management. I am a creative person. I tried many different things. People can learn from me. And I can learn from them.”
So, “Business in Rhyme” was born and I have even more passion to write about the connection of creativity and poetry than at the beginning. There is still much what I want to share, contribute and learn – it’s a journey I’m looking forward to.
How do you keep your creative flow on track?
”There is a voice inside of you
That whispers all day long,
‘I feel this is right for me,
I know that this is wrong.’
No teacher, preacher, parent, friend
Or wise man can decide
What’s right for you–just listen to
The voice that speaks inside.”
~Shel Silverstein
Business in Rhyme 