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Defying Boredom
Boredom results from lack of challenge. Not the kind of challenge that causes anxiety and suffering. The kind of challenge where you’re working at your creativity peak and you lose hours at a time without realizing it. Mihály Csíkszentmihályi calls this state Flow, where your skill level is matched to the challenge you are taking on.
In this state, we experience excitement and our successes leave us with feelings of accomplishment and satisfaction. When you can work in this state, why settle for anything less?
Confronting the Unfamiliar
New realms open up when you begin a groundbreaking creative project, and along with them new challenges arise. Since you’re onto a new stage, problem solving strategies that worked for you in the past, may not be effective in the ways they previously were. It can be tempting to bolt for the exit when faced with this unfamiliar situation.
It is most important to keep in mind that this is a sign that you’re doing something truly revolutionary. There is no magic bullet to train your brain how to deal with these new challenges. Stay focussed on the task at hand, and what you ultimately set out to make in the world. Everything that appears as a challenge, also presents an opportunity to have creative breakthroughs in your life. By continuing to take actions and remaining committed to overall progress, you will adapt to this expanded world.
Once you’ve broadened what you experience yourself as capable of creating, there’s no turning back. How could there be? Nothing there would be as fulfilling as what you’re doing now. Don’t be surprised if you find yourself in the world of the unfamiliar again. Your experiences may inspire you take take on something even bigger!
Generating Real Value
In a consumerist haze, we often lose track of what really matters. Our daily mental and visual space is cluttered with a never ending array of products. It is great to have a choice, yet, sometimes we can get caught up in a materialistic frenzy. As creatives, we can make the choice to create products that enrich people’s lives and speak to what they really want. Ultimately, these products are often massively successful, by virtue of their personal value to consumers. Ask yourself:
- Am I creating products that are groundbreaking?
- Is this product something that will enrich someone’s personal life?
- Am I making this the way that the buyer would want it to be?
- If I were the consumer, what would I want in this product?
- Will this product have the ability to make someone laugh, cry, or love?
- Is this product going to touch someone’s life?
These revolutionary creations can be things that make our lives easier, and allow us to spend more time doing what really matters to us. Products that bring us together, and allow us to live happy, healthy lives are the ones we love to have and cherish. By creating human products that respect your customers, you not only earn their respect and appreciation in turn, but also fill their lives with warmth and satisfaction.
Growth Through Collaboration
Having recently begun the creation of a community based event, I have experienced the merits of collaboration in the enrichment of ideas. In sharing the responsibilities of this project, everybody begun enthusiastically contributing ideas in from their areas of expertise. Through this process, the project as a whole not only had new actions to take to make the event amazing, it also took on a life of its own giving it extraordinary momentum. Some questions to ask yourself when creating a collaborative project or considering opening up a current project to the community:
- What could the project gain by opening it up to collaboration?
- What might others learn by collaborating on this project?
- What would be possible with more people contributing, that would not be possible otherwise?
- Who, if they contributed to this project, would make a phenomenal difference for the end result?
- By sharing this project, what then becomes possible?
- What could others gain by participating in this project?
Through collaborating, I have gotten great insights into my strengths and weaknesses as a team member. This allows me to work on developing new skills, as well as focus further on the things I can see I am already good at and am committed to attaining mastery in. Working with a group of people also provides a level of accountability outside of yourself, which can be the source of both motivation and excitement.
The Importance of Play
Children have a great sense of play. The world for them is an adventure of constant discovery and magic. As adults, we often get bogged down with things that are “serious” and “important.” We lose a sense of that vibrant, infinite world. Allowing an endless amount of bills, paperwork, and mundane tasks to close down our sense of play and wonder is a disservice to our lives. Yes, those things need to get done, and your life can be playful. Even that part of your life can be playful if you want it to be.
Everything is a game. We are on a rock hurtling through the galaxy at speeds that are, quite frankly, mystifying to even begin to comprehend. That we can have lives in this vast universe is miraculous. Everyday is a celebration, of being alive, of what you can do now that you’re here. If everything is a game, find a game that you want to be playing. If there’s not one you like, make a new one!
Play can be incredibly inspiring and freeing. It gets creative ideas flowing. Fostering a sense of wonderment can open up new pathways for creative pursuits, no matter what your line of work or passion.
Constraints Will Set You Free
Sometimes the easiest way to start is overlooked. Simply, start with what you have. There will always be more resources, money, and tools that could contribute to a project. Extra levels of support can be helpful, they can also create unnecessary complexity.
By using what you currently have, and working within your constraints, you stay agile and focused on your ultimate goal. Some of the most creative solutions are born out of limitations. I see constraints as an opportunity to create new methods of solving problems, and simplify intrenched systems that have become bloated over time.
Starting right now, with everything just as it is, gets the project moving. Other resources can be acquired later, if their presence will contribute to the end result. You may find, upon later assessment, that you didn’t need them anyway. It can be a fun and informative exercise to impose your own limitations. Consider, “How would I do this if…
- I couldn’t spend any money?
- I only had 24 hours?
- the end result had to be digital?
- it had to be understood in every language and culture?
- I could only use recycled materials?
- only word-of-mouth marketing was allowed?
On New Ventures and Being Uncomfortable
When working on a new venture, I experience myself as being simultaneously excited and terrified. In fact, most of my life is spent in this space. What I have learned is that acting in the face of fear, and accepting that the fear will always be there, gives me an immense amount of freedom. Making something new in the world is not a comfortable thing to do. Sitting on the couch and watching TV is comfortable, it’s safe. Being uncomfortable is part of the territory of innovation.
When Apple created the iPod in 2001, people laughed at it. They had CDs, why would they want something new that couldn’t even play them? It was doomed to failure. It didn’t start selling rapidly until 2005. That 4-year time period was not a comfortable waltz to success. It was a time of controversy, development, and evolution. As of January 2010, the iPod has sold over 240 million units and transformed the way we relate to entertainment.
To create alternative energy sources, to develop software that will make peoples lives easier, to speak to millions of people, to stand for new ideas taking root, you are going to be uncomfortable. And that’s alright. In fact, it’s fantastic. Now that you know that what you’re doing will be uncomfortable, you can take the steps necessary to create and deploy!
Transforming “Busy”
Lately, I’ve been hearing an overwhelming amount of this phrase: “I’m busy.” Now, I am surrounded by people up to fantastic things in the world, clearly they are doing a lot in a day. That’s not what irks me. The word “busy” is misleading. What do we really mean when we say, “I’m busy?”
There are two kinds of “busy people.” The first kind is busy making phone calls, busy answering emails, busy attending meetings. The second kind is busy making things, working on creations, and producing results. In the second case, the word “busy” does an injustice to the awesome capacity of what is getting done. That person could say, “I’m creating” or “I’m excited” or even “I’m on fire!” Just please don’t shout the latter in a crowded, public area.
Simply attending to calls, emails, and meetings doesn’t directly contribute to the creation of something. Instead, they convey the feeling of “being important.” By contrast, creating something amazing gives you the actual experience of being valuable to society, because that is the role you created for yourself by making something.
I’m taking on having the word “busy” vanish from my language. I am and will be saying things like, “I had a productive day” and “I’m really excited to do this project!” At the end of the day, this will reflect truthfully upon what’s important to me, the experiences I’ve had and the results I’ve produced.
The Myth Behind Works of Art
It is easy to operate under the common misconception that an artist’s main function is generating creative ideas. Yes, being a generator of ideas makes them consistently able to conceive of new pieces and envision their next masterpiece. Yet, it doesn’t fall from their head fully formed after merely thinking about it. A work of art still involves a substantial amount of, dare I say it, Work. Edison’s saying, “Genius is 1% inspiration 99% perspiration,” is easy to recite and hard to internalize.
I like to think about Michelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel. His talent, skill, and vision were already present. Then, it took him four years of lying on his back painting the ceiling to complete the masterpiece we are awed by today. Was every single one of those hours full of unbridled joy and effortless brushstrokes? Probably not. Did his perseverance allow both himself and others to be inspired by the beauty of his work? Most definitely.
To remove the work from the art is impossible. You can, however, let yourself enjoy the process, and in those tough moments, remember the essence of what you are creating.