What if creative thinking created success?

Some great examples of creative thinking creating success...

http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20130219101019-5506908-what-if-creative-thinking-created-success

Computers identify what makes abstract art move us

ECSTASY. Joy. Sadness. Despair. The sweeping lines and blocks of colour in abstract art prompt us to respond emotionally in ways that we do not really understand. Now computers are getting in on the act, and the results could add a new dimension to the weird world of artificial creativity.

 

 

 

The pioneering abstract painter Wassily Kandinsky (whose work is pictured) suggested that the emotional effects of abstract art are "objective, determined by the characteristics of the colours and their interactions". If that is true, machines should be able to get a handle on those emotions, too.

It turns out that they can. A team led by Nicu Sebe at the University of Trento in Italy used machine vision to analyse 500 abstract paintings at the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Trento and Rovereto. The system measured how colour is distributed across each work, as well as the occurrence of different shapes or outlines. Using data on how 100 people responded to the paintings, the system then worked out what emotional impact these elements had. For example, black, spiky features tended to correspond to the bleaker end of the emotional spectrum, whereas bright, smooth features were more feel-good.

 

To test the system, the team gave it other artworks to scan and asked it to predict the typical viewer's emotional response on a sliding scale, from extremely negative to extremely positive. Nearly 80 per cent of the time the system came up with a score that matched the average response of 100 volunteer viewers. The study was funded by a CARITRO grant and was presented to the ACM Multimedia conference in Nara, Japan, at the end of October.

 

James Wang of Penn State University in University Park, Pennsylvania, says that the work opens the door to using emotional data in the creation of more advanced machine art. At the conference, he presented a similar system which predicts the emotions that certain images are likely to arouse.

Wang trained his system using a set of photos that had already been tested on viewers to determine the typical emotional response - for example, disgust, excitement, anger or joy. The system analysed the photos for shapes and complexity, and so learned how such features might be associated with those emotions.

 

Simon Colton of Imperial College London, who studies the intersection of creativity and computation, says such projects could help the AI artist that he has developed, called The Painting Fool, add an emotional dimension to its work.

 

Given the ability to recognise what aspects of an image elicit emotion, The Painting Fool could choose a basic theme for a piece, scan the web to find strongly emotional images, then use the results to inspire a swathe of pieces, he says. The system could even analyse its own creations to choose the most poignant piece.

 

Colton says that computer-generated art "can do things that no one can do", like sampling every tweet on Twitter for inspiration. Artificial creativity means that anyone can own original, unique art, he says.

 

Wang has potential applications in mind, too. The work could help us search for images using emotional keywords, and blogs might be supercharged with pictures designed to arouse particular feelings, for example.

 

The work could also protect children using the internet. "You might not want children to look at pictures that contain a lot of anger, fear, disgust or violence," he says.

 

16 November 2012 by Hal Hodson

 

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21628916.000-computers-identify-what-makes-abstract-art-move-us.html

Three Insights from the Cutting Edge of Compassion Research

Several weeks ago, a who’s who of thinkers and researchers convened at a conference in the mountain town of Telluride, Colorado, to explore the science of compassion. Their discussions revealed growing consensus that the biological, physical, and behavioral properties of compassion—the feeling we get when confronted with suffering, infused with the urge to help—have evolved to help us survive.

http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/three_insights_from_the_cutting_edge_of_compassion_research

This guys is amazing!

TEN TIPS FOR CREATING WHEN YOU HAVE A DAY JOB - Zaaron Crosby

OVERVIEW

Whether you’re a professional Artist trying to pay the bills or a person working

in a career outside your creative passions, day jobs are part and parcel of most

people’s life experience but they needn’t exist at the expense of a productive,

meaningful life as a creative individual.

Creative work gives us insight and enriches our lives but it comes at a price.

Creating can throw up all sorts of insecurities and anxieties which can lead to

blocks and procrastination hindering our creative flow. Now add a 12-hour

working day, which feels as though it’s robbing you of your sanity and what

little spare time you have.

Creating under these conditions with zero energy is near impossible. So what positive actions can we take to redress this balance, become more productive, create more meaningful work more regularly and maybe even start enjoying our days a little more?

Below are 10 ideas which you can commit to right now.

TIP ONE:

ESTABLISH CREATIVE RITUALS WHICH LEAD TO CREATIVE

HABITS

Establishing an automatic but decisive pattern of behaviour at the beginning of

your creative efforts is a great way to avoid the possibility of turning back or

giving up. By making the start of creating automatic you replace doubt and fear

with comfort and routine.

Get in the habit of creating. Some of the most successful creative individuals

are the most productive. They simply create more often than most. Commit to

“Create every day” and start developing your creative mussels. After a while

you will establish creating as a habit ingrained into your DNA.

TIP TWO:

BRING WORK CONCEPTS TO YOUR CREATIVE LIFE

Our day jobs can teach us some valuable lessons about turning up and getting

the job done. In our day jobs we are remunerated and set tasksand targets to

achieve, we perform these tasks dutifully and in the majority of cases get the

work done. How often can we say that about our art? When was the last time

you spent every day painting, writing, rehearsing or otherwise engaged in your

passions? Turn up daily and get your creative work done.

TIP THREE: GET UP EARLY

Starting your day an hour or two earlier is a fantastic way to get your creating

done before your day jobs starts. It’s amazing how good you will feel knowing

that you have honoured your art and your day can start with a blast of

creativity. You will also take advantage of the creative benefits of dream state

first thing in the morning.

One word of warning; working on your art first thing can sometimes make

your day job seem dull and uninspiring. When you finish creating pat yourself

on the back for a job well done and return to your day ready to experience the

wonders of the world focused on being the best you can be.

TIP FOUR: BE HONEST

If you’re not creating regularly whilst maintaining a day job, then the odds are

you won’t fair much better if you had all the hours of the day available. Life is

always going to be busy. There are always going to be aspects of your life which

seem to invade your creative time, space and energy but your job is to be

honest and look deep into what’s holding you back. Work (and time) is often

just an excuse for a lack of creative endeavour.

TIP FIVE:

UNDERSTAND THE VALUE OF YOUR TIME AND HOW YOU USE IT

Your time outside your day job is incredibly valuable. Know where it goes and

decide how you spend it. A useful tip is to break your day down into 100

points. Some of these points are spent sleeping (33), some are spent working

(33) and others are spent creating (?). With 100 points to spend per day

committing 4 points (1 hour) to watching TV means a comprise needs to be

met. What are your priorities? Where are your points being invested?

TIP SIX: LUNCH TIME ADVENTURES

Everyone has at least 30 minutes for lunch, most have an hour. This is a

perfect opportunity to visit an art gallery, research your next novel, contact a

few agents or anything else which would support and/or develop your creative

work.

TIP SEVEN: COMMUTE TIME

Most people spend at least 20 minutes commuting to work (I spend 1:30 daily).

A good use of this time is listening to audio books or organizing your creative

schedules / plans. I currently drive to work and can get through a book a week.

If you take public transport, pen and paper are essential to catch those amazing

ideas which come and go daily.

TIP EIGHT: STOP THE TV MADNESS

We sometimes find ourselves investing so much time on some very average

programs under the guise of unwinding. Try turning off the TV for a week and

invest the points in your art. It’s amazing how much you can get done. If you

use this time to write two pages of a book every day you will have a first draft

completed within 6 months!

TIP NINE: WORK, ART BALANCE

You do not have two opposing lives in conflict; the office worker and the

actor, the accountant and the painter; you have one life and the challenge to

develop a healthy work, art balance. Try and focus on the positive aspects of

your day job and use your creative nature to make your day more interesting

and productive. Like most things in life, you get out what you put in. If you

want your day job to be more meaningful then put more energy into doing it

well, engage in the challenges that arise and improve your own situation

through the creative gifts you possess. Try to avoid those negative thoughts

which do not serve your situations. They will only develop into negative energy

and resentment towards your day job. If all else fails find a new job! Maybe you

could find something which is more in line with your art or supports your

creative direction by providing flexibility around hours.

TIP TEN:

FIND MEANING IN YOUR ART AND PURPOSE IN YOUR DAY

A day job may not provide meaning but it does provide the means. Viewed as

part of the creative process your day job can provide many opportunities to

engage with people and find inspiration through life experience. Friedrich

Nietzsche once said “He who has a why to live can bear almost any how”. The

same could be said for working a day job, your art is your why and your day is

the how.

We generally feel better about ourselves when we’re making a positive

contribution to something beyond ourselves. To feel truly motivated towards

our day jobs, we have to believe what we're doing matters in someone sense.

Purpose is a source of fuel not just for higher performance, but also for

thinking more creatively about how to overcome obstacles and generate new

solutions during our days.

Find meaning in your art and purpose in your day!

ABOUT ZAARON CROSBY

Zaaron Crosby is a Visual Artist interested in all aspects of creative expression,

including painting, photography, sculpture and mixed medium. He has spent

the past 15 years Career Coaching within the recruitment industry and is the

owner and director of the online art gallery, Artless Impact,

www.artlessimpact.com.au, which provides a medium for ethically minded

people to purchase sustainable, ecologically sound, fair trade artworks.

Trained as a Creativity Coach, Zaaron runs the Creativity Coaching practice

“think.feel.dream”, www.thinkfeeldream.com.au and is passionate about

working with creative individuals and the creative process. His main work as a

creativity coach is based around Artists with day jobs and people who work in a

career outside their creative passions but still wish to pursue a productive

creative life.

zaaron@thinkfeeldream.com.au

http://www.thinkfeeldream.com.au/

http://creativitycoaching-thinkfeeldream.blogspot.com/

http://www.artlessimpact.com.au/

New Creativity Web Page - A must for all creative souls!!

I was recently asked to write for a new web page run by Eric Maisel, Leading Creativity Coaching.  For all those interested please have a look at http://ericmaisel.com you can also see some excellent Advice from Creativity Coaches around the world at

http://ericmaisel.com/ten-tips-library/ ..

This site is a must for all those creativity people wishing to explore the world of creativity more deeply.

What you see is not what you get

For all those Visual Artists interested in how we see the world this article is a must..

The grand delusion: What you see is not what you get

16 May 2011 by Graham Lawton

Your senses are your windows on the world, and you probably think they do a fair job at capturing an accurate depiction of reality. Don't kid yourself. Sensory perception - especially vision - is a figment of your imagination. "What you're experiencing is largely the product of what's inside your head," says psychologist Ron Rensink at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. "It's informed by what comes in through your eyes, but it's not directly reflecting it."

Given the basic features of your visual system, it couldn't be any other way. For example, every 5 seconds or so, you blink. Yet unless you're thinking about it, as you probably are right now, you don't notice the blackouts because your brain edits them out.

Blinking is just the tip of the iceberg. Even when your eyes are open they're only taking in a fraction of the visual information that is available.

In the centre of your retina is a dense patch of photoreceptor cells about 1 millimetre across. This is the fovea, the visual system's sweet spot where perception of detail and colour is at its best. "When you move away from the fovea, visual acuity falls away really quickly, and colour vision disappears," says Rensink. About 10 degrees to the side of the fovea, visual acuity is only about 20 per cent of the maximum.

What that means is you can only capture a tiny percentage of the visual field in full colour and detail at any one time. Hold your hand at arm's length and look at your thumbnail. That is roughly the area covered by the fovea. Most of the rest is captured in fuzzy monochrome.

And yet vision doesn't actually feel like this: it feels like a movie. That, in part, is because your eyes are constantly flitting over the visual scene, fixing on one spot for a fraction of a second then moving on. These jerky eye movements are called saccades and they happen about 3 times a second and last up to 200 milliseconds. With each fixation your visual system grabs a bite of high-resolution detail which it somehow weaves together to create an illusion of completeness.

That's remarkable given that during saccades themselves, you are effectively blind. Your eyes don't stop transmitting information as they lurch from one fixation to the next, but for about 100 milliseconds your brain is not processing it.

Look in the mirror and deliberately flick your eyes from left to right and back again. You won't see your eyes move - not because the movement is too fast (other people's saccades are visible), but because your brain isn't processing the information.

Given that you perform approximately 150,000 saccades every day, that means your visual system is "offline" for a total of about 4 hours during each waking day even without blinking (Trends in Cognitive Sciences, vol 12, p 466). Yet you don't notice anything amiss.

Exactly how your brain weaves such fragmentary information into the smooth technicolour movie that we experience as reality remains a mystery. One leading idea is that it makes a prediction and then uses the foveal "spotlight" to verify it. "We create something internally and then we check, check, check," says Rensink. "Essentially we experience the brain's best guess about what is happening now."

In conjuring up this "now", the visual system has to do something even more remarkable: predict the future. Information striking the fovea cannot be relayed instantaneously to conscious perception: first it has to travel down the optic nerve and be processed by the brain. This takes several hundred milliseconds, by which time the world has moved on. And so the brain makes a prediction about what the world will look like about 200 milliseconds into the future, and that is what you see. Without this future projection you would be unable to catch a ball, dodge moving objects or walk around without crashing into things.

There's another huge hole in the visual system that can render you oblivious to things that should be unmissable. The jerky movements that shift your fovea around the visual scene don't happen at random - they are directed by your brain's attentional system. Sometimes you consciously decide what to attend to, such as when you read. At other times your attention is grabbed by a movement in your peripheral vision or an unexpected noise.

The problem with attention is that it is a limited resource. For reasons that remain unknown, most people are unable to keep track of more than four or five moving objects at once. That can lead your visual system to be oblivious to things that are staring you in the face.

The most famous demonstration of this "inattention blindness" is the invisible gorilla, a video-based experiment created by Daniel Simons and Christopher Chabris at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Viewers are asked to pay close attention to a specific aspect of a basketball game, and around half completely fail to see a person in a gorilla suit walk slowly across the screen, beat their chest and walk off again.

Creativity chemical favours the smart

THERE may be more to creativity than simply letting the ideas flow- brain measurements of a "creativity chemical" are revealing a complex interplay between ingenuity and intelligence. While high levels of the chemical in a certain part of the brain seem to increase creativity in really smart people, the reverse is true in those of average intellect.

N-acetyl-aspartate is found in neurons and seems to be associated with neural health and metabolism. Rex Jung at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque and his colleagues already knew that high levels of NAA in the left parieto-occipital lobe, which coordinates sensory and visual information, were associated with intelligence.

To investigate whether NAA also plays a role in creativity, Jung's team measured NAA levels in various regions of the brain in 56 men and women aged 18 to 39. They also tested the volunteers' general intelligence and, more specifically, their capacity for divergent thinking, a factor in creativity that includes coming up with novel ideas, such as new uses for everyday objects.

Overall, volunteers' creativity scores correlated with levels of NAA in a brain region called the anterior cingulate gyrus (ACG), which regulates the activity of the frontal cortex - implicated in higher mental functions. But while low levels of NAA in the ACG correlated with high creativity in people of average intelligence, in people with IQs of above 120, the reverse was true (The Journal of Neuroscience, DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.0588-09.2009).

Jung speculates that if there is less NAA to regulate frontal cortex activity in "average" brains, they are freer to roam and find new ideas. In highly intelligent people, however, tighter control over the frontal cortex seems to enhance creativity. Perhaps this is because they are more likely to come up with new ideas anyway, and the tighter control allows them to "fine-tune" that ability.

"People say you have to let your mind wonder freely to be creative," says Jung. "For people of average intelligence, perhaps it's true that you need to utilise more areas of your [frontal cortex] for something truly novel and creative to emerge, but in more intelligent folks, there's something different going on."

Paul Howard-Jones of the University of Bristol, UK, agrees that different cognitive processes may underlie creativity in people with different IQs. "This backs up behavioural evidence for a threshold in IQ, beyond which the relationship with creativity changes," he says.

However, both Howard-Jones and Kenneth Heilman at the University of Florida caution that, since we don't fully understand how NAA affects neurons, Jung's conclusions remain speculative.

Heilman adds that it would be interesting to test whether NAA also correlates with a facet of creativity known as convergent thinking - the ability to bring lots of individual factors together into a single idea.

Jung also believes his findings could shed new light on what made the brains of creative geniuses like Einstein tick. "I don't think his IQ was ever tested, but it was likely around 120 - high, but not stratospheric," he says. "I would have loved to see what his ACG looked like, as IQ alone did not get him there, in my opinion, but rather intelligence plus creativity."

May 2009 by Linda Geddes

Meaning Making - Part 1 - Aligning thoughts with intentions

"What you think determines how you feel. It is up to you to get a grip on your mind so that you do not make yourself miserable.

A thought you have is not some sort of truth. It is just a thought. It may have arisen for no good reason whatsoever. A cloud passes in front of the sun and you think, “Life is meaningless.” What sort of thought is that? Why should you feel obliged to countenance it? Why even give it the time of day? It is a terrible mistake to take thoughts at their face value, as if they arrive from on high. They just come from you, with all of your warts and agendas.  

If a thought serves you, you keep it. If it doesn’t serve you, you reject it. If you think, “I’m spending the next two hours making meaning,” you keep it. If you follow that thought with, “But maybe I’m on the wrong track and maybe I’ve made a mess of my life,” you reject it instantly, without muss or fuss. You say, “Wow, that follow-up thought was a whopper! The heck with it.” - Eric Maisel

Should Creativity Be Exhausting? - ERIC MAISEL, PHD

Who doesn’t wish that he would create more deeply and more often? Who doesn’t have a list as long as his arm of reasons and rationalizations why he’s produced only two paintings in two years—and neither of them quite satisfactory? Who doesn’t wince a bit as he thinks about his productivity over the past decade and feel a little blue as he tallies the ledger sheet of time lost versus time well spent? Virtually all the people I know, coach, or train are painfully aware that they haven’t fought the good fight often enough—the fight to prove the exception and to completely exhaust themselves in the service of their creative work. As you say, a little more exhaustion might be just the right thing!

It is good if we try harder to honor our ambitions and our inner obligations. But maybe you aren’t ready to take those vows. Maybe you have doubts about the wisdom of exhausting yourself in the service of your creative work, especially considering how exhausting life itself can feel. Maybe you think that you’ll be visited by some demon if you work that hard, maybe by Beethoven’s bouts of nervous irritability or Dostoevsky’s anxiety attacks. Maybe you doubt that you or your efforts matter enough to be worth such an expenditure of energy.

Those are legitimate worries, because devoting yourself to your creative work in the way that I have in mind can indeed take its toll on your physical and psychological health. Nevertheless, there are excellent reasons to commit to making the Herculean effort of exhausting yourself in the service of your art: that this is your time on earth, that this is your chance to create worthy things, that this is your opportunity to conceive a startling idea when, an instant before, nothing existed.

Many religions demand arduous practices like fasts and confessions from their flock. But it is for the clergy class of each religion that the hardest practices are reserved. As a member of the clergy you may be asked never to marry, never to have children, never to own worldly possessions, never to speak except to praise God. With respect to creativity, each of us is a member of the clergy class. We are each penitent and priest. Shouldn’t we demand of ourselves that we be as dedicated in our own way as any monk or priest? Is it too much to ask that we exhaust ourselves in the service of our creativity, since we are creativity’s leaders as well as its practitioners?

If the only reason you have for trekking across the desert is that has occurred to you to give it a shot, the obstacles that the desert presents are bound to wear you out in short order. But if you are crossing the desert with high purpose, because you have a vital message to deliver, a lost love to find, or a pledge to keep, you will go further and maybe arrive at your destination. Your high purpose does not guarantee success: the desert may still win. But your high purpose might make all the difference. Say, “Let me exhaust myself in the service of my painting. Isn’t that a key place where I’ve decided to invest meaning?” Remind yourself of your intentions and your ambitions; and then exhaust yourself in their service.

A while back I attended a book club meeting of San Francisco coaches where my book The Van Gogh Blues was being discussed. There was a hunger in the room to better understand the language of meaning that I’ve been promoting in books like The Van Gogh Blues and Coaching the Artist Within and to come to grips with phrases like making meaning, investing meaning, shoring up meaning leaks, maintaining meaning, and the like. I explained some of my ideas: that all meaning is subjective; that each of us must step up as the sole arbiter of meaning in our life; that each us must nominate ourselves as the hero of our own story; and so on.

It is encouraging to me that we are beginning to better understand what our basic attitude toward the universe must be: I am here; I have principles and ideals; I have desires and needs; I am not separate from or immune to the facts of existence; and, as a bottom line, I must make my meaning or experience a meaning shortfall. One of the ways that we honor our pledge to make personal meaning is to do the work required of us, even if that effort exhausts us. If it exhausts us, then we rest; but we do not let the fear of exhaustion prevent us from making our meaning.

One day soon, exhaust yourself in the service of your work. Start at sunrise and go until midnight, getting tired, confused, crazy, anxious, frayed, sad, and whatever else befalls you as you struggle to create. When, after several hours of doing battle, you can’t muster another thought or another brushstroke, scream, cry, feed the cat, do anything you like, but do not even think about throwing in the towel.

Paint a suite of paintings in that single day. Paint the painting that defines your genre or that integrates all that are, the painting that you’ve been meaning to start for years. Even if you can’t reach your goal, making that effort is remarkable and courageous and deserves a reward. Exhaust yourself in the service of your work and then reward yourself, at the very least with the compliment, “I worked hard, I didn’t fall apart, and I’m proud of my efforts.”

ERIC MAISEL, PHD, is the author of more than 30 books and is widely regarded as America’s foremost creativity coach. He trains creativity coaches nationally and internationally and provides core trainings for the Creativity Coaching Association. His books include Coaching the Artist Within, Fearless Creating, The Van Gogh Blues, and many others. His websites include http://www.ericmaisel.com/ and http://www.brainstormthebook.com/ and he can be reached at ericmaisel@hotmail.com.

Main findings from Don’t Give Up Your Day Job - "Artists incomes—low and intermittent"

Main findings from Don’t Give Up Your Day Job

An economic study of professional artists in Australia

Read full report here

Artists—who are they?

·    There are about 45,000 practicing professional artists in Australia.

·    The term ‘practicing professional artists’ includes artists who are currently active or who have been active in the past five years; the ‘professional’ aspect limits the survey to those artists who operate at a level and standard of work and with a degree of commitment appropriate to the norms of professional practice within their artform. This excludes hobbyists and amateurs.

·    The biggest group is musicians with about 12,000; the second largest group, with about 9,000, is visual artists. Dancers make up the smallest group, with less than 1,500.

·    This survey covers the following categories of practicing professional artists: writers, visual artists, craft practitioners, actors, directors, dancers, choreographers, musicians, singers, composers, and community cultural development workers.

Artists incomes—low and intermittent

·    The survey income figures are for the 2000–01 financial year and are earned income excluding interest and dividends, etc. The figures show gross income before taxes.

·    Typically, artists have multiple job-holding patterns. An artist works in a ‘principal artistic occupation’ which can include rehearsal, practice, preparation and career administration.

·    Many artists have ‘arts-related’ work including teaching in the artist’s artform or writing about the arts. Many also have ‘non-arts’ work which includes paid work unrelated to any artistic field.

·    Artists were asked about their earned income for the 2000–01 financial year. Since most artists earn low incomes and a very few earn high incomes, the income statistics presented in the report concentrate on median income. This is the income in a distribution which is the half-way point, so that half earn above the median income and half earn below that figure.

·     Half of the artists in the survey had a creative income of less than $7,300 in the 2000–01 financial year. (The unusual distribution of artists creative incomes with many low incomes and few high incomes resulted in a mean creative income of just over $17,000.)

·    Total median incomes (‘arts incomes’ plus ‘non-arts incomes’) in 2000–01 ranged from $35,800 for musicians to $22,600 for both craft practitioners and community cultural development workers. The median income in 2000–01 for all artists in the survey was $30,000.

·    Only about a quarter of all artists work at their principal artistic occupation as employees on a permanent or casual basis being paid a salary or wages. The remaining three-quarters work as freelancers or as self-employed.

·    Female artists earn considerably less than male artists. The median ‘creative income’ of male artists in 2000–01 was $9,400 compared with $4,500 for female artists. Median total income (all ‘arts work’ plus “non-arts work’) for men was $35,000 and for women it was $23,600.

·     About half of the artists in the survey had experienced some period of unemployment in the five years preceding the survey, and half of those had applied for unemployment relief.

Free 4 Week Creativity E-Course

Your creative project is sitting there, gathering dust and you promised yourself you would start afresh tomorrow. Tomorrow life gets busy and those little mundane tasks start to consume your day. You don’t create and this feels wrong, you are disappointed and frustrated. Why is it so difficult?

               

This 4 week Creativity Course is designed to provide some fundamental insights into the Creative Process and the Creative Personality. Anyone can complete this course, whether you are a seasoned artist wanting to be more productive or simply an individual wanting to explore your creative nature more deeply.

Over the next 4 weeks you will cover a number of subjects related to creativity which require some time to reflect, some tasks to complete and some questions to answer. So buckle up and get ready to experience a whole new world of possibilities… get ready to Think hard, Feel deeply, Dream big.

To register Email for more information to freecourse@thinkfeeldream.com.au

An Artist’s guide to surviving a “9 to 5”

If only I could commit to my art full time, then I would be more productive and happy. Well you may have more time on your hands but if you give up your day job to pursue your dream career as an artist, be prepared for some strange happenings.

The truth is, the majority of people who give it all up to pursue their art are faced with a whole world of different challenges which prevent them from creating regularly and deeply. Indeed most people find they’re just as productive as when they held a full time day job… how strange! So what’s going on?

Creative work gives us insight and enriches our lives. Creativity is part of what makes us human, but it can also be very difficult and extremely challenging. There’s a lot going on inside most creative people and creating can throw up all sorts of insecurities and anxieties which lead to blocks, procrastination or other avoidance tactics which hinders the creative process.

Now add a 15 hour working day, which feels as though it’s robbing you of your sanity and what little spare time you have. This daily chore seems to consume your motivation and you ultimately leave your art for another day. Instead you switch on the TV to relax and unwind over a beer, and the resentment builds.

Creating under these conditions with zero energy is near impossible. So what positive action can we take to re address this balance, become more productive, create more meaningful work, more regularly? (and maybe even start enjoying our days a little more!)

Below are 5 ideas which you can commit to right now!

1.       Get up early

Starting your day an hour or two earlier is a fantastic way to get your work done. It’s amazing how good you will feel knowing that you have honoured your art and your day can start with a blast of creativity. You will also take advantage of the creative benefits of dream state first thing in the morning.

Once word of warning! Working on your art first thing can sometimes make your day job seem dull and uninspiring. When you finish working on your art pat yourself on the back for a job well done. Before you jump into your day job its worth saying out loud “I return with strength!” or words to that effect. You’re ready to take on your day and experience the wonders of the world.

2.       Understand the value of your time and how you use it

Your time is incredibly valuable.  Know where it goes and decide how you spend it. A useful tip is to break your day down into 100 points. Some of these points are spent sleeping, some are spent working and others are spent creating. You only have 100 points everyday so if you decide to spend 5 points watching TV they have to come from somewhere, what are your priorities? Alternatively if someone asks for your time, decide if you’re willing to invest these points. If not say no!

Some tips on reclaiming more points include

·     Get organised the night before your morning art sessions to get straight into your work first thing. Try getting up 1 hour early, it really is the best way to ensure your work gets done. (4 points a day)

·     Everyone has a least 30 minutes for lunch, most have an hour. This is a perfect opportunity for you to take yourself on an artist date, visit an art gallery, research your next novel, contact a few agents or anything which supports and/or develops your creative work (4 points a day)

·     Most people spend at least 20 mins commuting to work (I spend 1:30 daily). A good use of this time is listening to audio books or reading. I can get through a book a week listening in the car. (6 points a day)

·     Stop the TV madness – we sometimes find ourselves investing so much time on some very average programs under the guise of unwinding. Try turning off the TV for a week and invest the points in your art. It’s amazing how much you can get done. (6 points a day)

·     The internet is an amazing tool for research, networking and connecting with artists around the world. But is your time on the net productive or just time wasting? (2 points a day)

3.       Keep a notebook, journal and/or scrap book

When you get an idea write it down! (write it then and there). Dream journals (writing your dreams down as soon as you wake up) are also of great value and spark lots of creative ideas. Explore those ideas and concepts and let them evolve. Scrap books of inspiring ideas or quotes and images can also provide a source of energy and focus.

4.       Make use of your creative nature at work

You do not have two opposing lives; you have one life and a choice to make of it what you will. One of the greatest truths I have learned is that if you want to change your experience first you must change your attitude. If your work is boring, find ways to make it interesting and challenging.

Ultimately the trick here is to try and focus on the positive aspects of your day job and use your creative nature to make your day more interesting and productive. After all, like most things in life, you get out what you put in. If you want your day job to be more meaningful then put more energy into doing it well, engage in the challenges that arise and improve your own situation through the gifts you possess.

If all else fails find a new job! Maybe you could find something which is more in line with your art or supports your creative direction by providing flexibility around hours?

5.       Be active in the art community

Socializing with colleagues has long been recognized as important for creativity. Connecting with the art community and starting or joining a group is often the best way to generate ideas. Creativity is at its peak not in moments of solitary genius, but during exchanges with trusted colleagues.

It’s always a great help to have like minded individuals to provide support as well as give you the kick that is required to hold you accountable to fulfilling your creative goals.

Taking a course is also a great way to network. You may even learn something new! J

New Prints available at Artless Impact

For those interested in owning a unique piece of art, I recently uploaded a new series of WA bush photography from 2004 - 2006. Eco Prints can be purchased from http://www.artlessimpact.com.au/

 

"My Anti-Creativity Checklist" by Youngme Moon

I'm busy researching "creativity in business" as part of a recent project and came across Youngme Moon's Anti-Creativity Checklist.. Have a look at this and see if you recognise anyone in YOUR organisation? :)

The best book in the world!

Ok, maybe not the best (if there is such a thing) but once in a while you stumble across a book, by chance at the right time in your life!! And after reading it for many years it becomes like you had always know it.

If you haven’t read “mans search for meaning” by Viktor Frankl then invest the day or so it will take to get through his story. It’s only 100 odd pages (the first part is focused on his experiences in the concentration camps of Germany) but it is compelling and life changing! It has and continues to be a source of inspiration and of great insights.

One of my favourite passages from the book is below.

“... We stumbled on in the darkness, over big stones and through large puddles, along the one road leading from the camp. The accompanying guards kept shouting at us and driving us with the butts of their rifles. Anyone with very sore feet supported himself on his neighbor's arm. Hardly a word was spoken; the icy wind did not encourage talk. Hiding his mouth behind his upturned collar, the man marching next to me whispered suddenly: "If our wives could see us now! I do hope they are better off in their camps and don't know what is happening to us."

That brought thoughts of my own wife to mind. And as we stumbled on for miles, slipping on icy spots, supporting each other time and again, dragging one another up and onward, nothing was said, but we both knew: each of us was thinking of his wife. Occasionally I looked at the sky, where the stars were fading and the pink light of the morning was beginning to spread behind a dark bank of clouds. But my mind clung to my wife's image, imagining it with an uncanny acuteness. I heard her answering me, saw her smile, her frank and encouraging look. Real or not, her look was then more luminous than the sun which was beginning to rise.

A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth -- that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way—an honorable way—in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment. For the first time in my life I was able to understand the meaning of the words, "The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of an infinite glory...."