Courageously Creative

Be more creative in your own way

Found in Translation: The Right to Be Yourself

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Hearing Spanish in my left ear and the English translation in my right ear, the cross talk was confusing. Have you ever had a mismatch between what you’re hearing and what you’re hearing? It was my first experience using U.N. style earphones with a live translator and I was sitting so close to the people speaking that for the first few minutes there was a disconnect between my ears. Then, suddenly my brain synchronized and everything made sense.

Isn’t art also about getting ideas to synchronize? Through art we can express ideas that often cannot be said with words. When we couple our creative efforts with ideas we can clarify and amply essential messages. Whether visual arts, music or pottery, when our creations are synced with messages, then our ideas can carry beyond the borders of a canvas or the walls of a concert hall, and they can carry more water than any pot. Of course art can stand alone, but when coupled with essential ideas that must be spread, then art becomes a media that adds clarity and increase a messages impact.

I had the honor of producing the “Freedom Kite” painting that is being used by the Pan American Health Organization
to promote and protect health and human rights for Human Rights Day today and beyond.

In the experience I had the opportunity to learn about the essential work being done so passionately by the people at PAHO and by other world leaders who actively use their creativity to protect and promote human rights in their daily job, making the world a better place for all of us. The challenge for all of us is to help people like these by using our strength and our abilities.

In my speech at PAHO, I said: “when we do something we love we often succeed, but we also need the freedom to be ourselves and the freedom to be ourselves is a basic human right.” Creating is all about being yourself too. We are influenced by others but our greatness does not come from copying or fitting in but by being ourselves. What do you think?

Encouraged by the Bottom 10 percent

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"Can" you make it across (click to enlarge)

If you’ve been to Hong Kong, have you noticed the flashing man on the WALK signs look uncharacteristically overweight? Occasionally in NYC, you can see WALK and DON’T WALK lighted simultaneously, but have you ever seen a WALK sign made entirely out of cans of food.

Massive structures are built using cans of food as part of a design competition with the winners displayed at the World Financial Center in Manhattan. The event is sponsored by Canstruction which uses cans of food as a catalyst for change. When the structures are dismantled after November 21st, the food is donated to City Harvest,who uses the cans to feed hungry people.

While most structures are incredible, pointing to one that seemed lesser, I friend surprised me by saying , “if I could do that, It’s not very good.” Conversely and thinking back many years when I first started painting,

Why so angry? (click to enlarge)

I would go to group art exhibitions and feel challenged by the best watercolors yet encouraged by the bottom 10 percent. I would say “I could do that!”

The same sentence, “I could do that” can evoke opposite responses between people. Do you compare your abilities with professional athletes while watching a football game and say, if I could catch that ball, the player must not be very good? Why is our creativity so difficult to accept? Perhaps we could recast our self image on creativity, especially if we see proof that we can do something other creative people are doing.

Which one is your favorite? See more photos of the constructions [Read more…] about Encouraged by the Bottom 10 percent

Put your subconscious to work so you don’t have to

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Fishing for ideas?

Fishing for ideas? (Nha Trang, Vietnam

In the ancient watertown of Hongcun, the Chinese thought of everything – including private indoor fishing holes in the homes along the canal. Just open the gate, add some bait and wait. After the fish swam in for brunch the ancient non-mariners closed the exit. Solving problems with creative solutions is like setting fish traps. Set the bait by defining the problem. Then walk away, and spend some time doing something else like driving, watching a movie, taking a nap, jogging around the block, writing your blog and setting more traps. Keep setting traps by posing more questions. This puts your subconscious to work so you don’t have to. Through heightened awareness, solutions that you never would have noticed start to swim in and all you have to do is catch them. Have you found that when you set a trap, answers fall into your lap?

fish trap

Hongcun aquarium

Is it a MISTAKE to be comfortable with FAILURE?

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Time to celebrate?

Failures cost us virtually nothing when we take photos with our digital cameras, yet failures cost us plenty when our banks make bad loans. Our political leaders fail us when the only agreement they reach is raising our debt ceiling allowing themselves to continue spending.

We hear that our creative spirit can save us all and according to conventional wisdom, to innovate we need to take fearless risks and be open to: “fail now,” “fail today,” “fail this afternoon,” ”fail tomorrow,” “fail often.” A recent Wall Street Journal headline reads
“Better Ideas Through Failure: Companies Reward Employee Mistakes to Spur Innovation, Get Back Their Edge.”

I wonder if even George Eastman would have thought failure has become overexposed. Are we producing an entrepreneurial culture or a culture of failure? Are we getting too comfortable with failure?

Of course we don’t expect to paint a masterpiece the first time we walk across a stage, and we shouldn’t be afraid of trial and error. Are we justifying and celebrating too many of our errors as we say: “At least I got the interview,” “it was an honor to be nominated,” “what a great experience,” “I met so many interesting people,” or “we designed a great product that was ahead of its time.” In our winner take all society; ask Al Gore, barnesandnoble.com or yahoo what second place is like. Remember that we can learn from our successes too!

“Winning isn’t everything. The will to win is the only thing.” described Vince Lombardi in an earlier era. In our acceptance of some inevitable failures, we can’t lose the will to win! Winning is the only option when the game is on, and only after the whistle blows can we allow for acceptance of failure and lessons learned. If you go into a supermarket expecting that you won’t find Key Limes, you probably won’t. When we expect failure, we give up too soon.

Your secret plan

  1. Start without concern about failing.
  2. Play to win! And failure is not an option!
  3. Evaluate your wins or losses for learned lessons.

What was your biggest mistake that you used to make a towering success? Or what is your biggest success and what did you learn?

Do you feel like you’re talking on a Banana Phone?

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Refusing interviews but posing for photos, a group of macaques living at the beach in beautiful Krabi, Thailand, clearly had life figured out. Monkeys are no lone wolves and even these primates know life’s creative solutions can come through collaboration.

Suddenly, several started a loud commotion and in the confusion, one leaped down from her hiding place in the trees and grabbed an unguarded gin and tonic, chugged the drink, slammed the cup down, and staggered

No ice?

back into the trees. Funny to watch since it wasn’t my lost beverage, I noticed they collaborated using a unique common language which sounded to me like a mix of Thai and Chimpanzee.

Do you use a common language with those you collaborate with? Or do you feel like you’re talking on a banana phone with nobody on the other end?
With Twitter, facebook, linkedin, blogs, email, sms, voicemail, fax, and ancient practice of talking in person, we all have preferred modes of communication and each mode has its own characteristics.

Are your messages getting through or do you hear: “I don’t use LinkedIn,” ”I never check voicemail,” or “What’s Klout?“ The first step for us to reach our audience in order to collaborate is to use a common mode of communication, but with so many choices our preferred mode seems different for all of us.
Have you experienced miscommunications from using mismatched technology? Do you have a favorite mode of communications? And what brand of banana phone do you answer ?
Take a moment and count to three before responding – one chimpanzee – two chimpanzees – three chimpanzees – Please tell me your favorite monkey story by commenting, twitter, emails…

Running against the RACE FOR THE CURE

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River runs pink

What risks do you assume when you’re going against the norms? How does it make you feel?

During a short visit to Portland, Oregon last weekend, I decided to defy the time zone difference and stay on Eastern Standard Time by following Ben Franklin’s advice: “early to bed, early to rise.”  Staying downtown, I went for a quiet run along the river each morning to mentally prepare for my meetings.  Because of the light drizzle early Sunday, I expected deserted streets and was surprised to find police activity and thousands of people about.

My route happened to take me toward the starting line of the RACE FOR THE CURE. This yearly event has special meaning for many, what does it mean to you?  Hoards of mostly women wearing pink were walking in the same direction I was jogging. Although it could have been my imagination, I felt their approval and solidarity as I ran in the direction

Race For The Cure

of the registration booths; after all, I do support the cause.    My route took me under their pink balloon arch as I turned left along the river. At that moment I realized turning left wasn’t perceived to be right, and  I was running into the wind.

It could have been my imagination again, but now I felt hundreds of passing women’s disapproval as I ran in the opposite direction of the startling line without a pink number attached to my clothing. Have you ever had an experience like this of going against the norm?

Often when we are creatively inspired and making something new we are headed into the wind. This does not mean we are against the crowd but instead motivated by individual ideals. Courage to be different comes through believing in yourself.  What do you think?