A simple, inexpensive creativity support system
May 29, 2008 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Comments Off
For quite some time I’ve been diligent about always having index cards and 4 x 6 yellow pads on hand to take notes on new business ideas, my self-awareness and personal development, my insights, ideas, observances, and experiences, etc. Its all in long-hand writing; digital doesn’t cut it for me when I’m writing from the heart. I’ve found writing these pages an extremely valuable practice supporting my creativity and growth.
However, I never labeled, titled or dated these pages, and when I filled a notebook I just stuck it in a basket where they accumulated. I sometimes reviewed what I wrote but usually found it to be too much trouble to find what I was looking for. I hate paper, files and clutter and love simplicity and minimalism. So I felt pretty good about the fact that I was actually saving the notebooks instead of getting rid of them.
But then I read a wonderful book, “The Creative Habit, Learn It and Use It For Life”, by Twyla Tharp. She wrote about the importance not only of taking notes, but of organizing, categorizing and saving them. Her system is to start “a box” for each choreographic project that provides a comprehensive archive of ideas, video, photos, music, inspiration, learning, design - and all the myriad elements that comprise her dance creations. Its a system she finds indispensable to her craft and she highly recommends it to anyone committed to creativity.
I consistently do creativity exercises, for myself, and with my clients. But when it comes to process and practical habits development, I tend to gloss over it. It always felt too much like office work and not enough like being creative.
But Ms Tharpe writes so compellingly and persuasively about the critical importance of “the box” to creative development that I decided to follow my strong impulse to try it out. Before I began, I made a few decisions about how I should approach “my box” so that it would be enjoyable, applicable to my specific needs and not a dreary task. To that end:
- It would be more generalized rather than project specific.
- It had to be simple, made from stuff that I had on hand, with no trip to office supply store required.
- It had to be done on the porch, in the sun, away from computers, phones and any other electronics distractions.
So the photo below is the result of three surprisingly enjoyable hours spent putting together my “box”. And I expect that my investment in practicing the creative habit will pay off in many unexpected ways over time.
The materials:
- old plastic file storage box
- old metal 5-section file holder that fit in box
- large clips
My box categories:
- Content and community
- Self-awareness and personal growth
- Dreams and imagination
- New skills and abilities
- Creativity
Tasks:
- Tear pages from notebooks and clip them together in categories
- Label categories in “my box” and file pages
- Enjoy the sense of satisfaction and completion
I highly recommend that anyone interested in creativity and personal and professional enrichment make their own version of “the box”. So many ideas are wasted because they’re not converted to content that can be shared, reviewed, embodied or somehow brought to life because they’ve not been made tangible. This has been my experience and I see it happen repeatedly with both individual and business clients.
So my request of you is to value all of it and use this system. Its simple, its enjoyable and its a great beginning to your lifelong creative habit.
Heck, maybe there’s a “creativity box” photo contest opportunity here? Gotta run..need to get the idea written down and into my box!
Default response
May 22, 2008 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Leave a Comment
I recently posted about how changing beliefs is an easier response than trying to change external conditions over which we have little or no control. There’s a lot of mass-marketed self-help, new-age type advice and even coaching schools of thought that make light of unwanted beliefs that drive our experience in the wrong way, and that tell us to simply will and affirm these pesky “gremlins” away.
But anyone wanting a greater life experience through awareness has been challenged to change what I call the default response to change triggers. You can be in the midst of performing a mundane activity and suddenly realize that you’ve been mentally dress-rehearsing an unwanted scenario for the past 10 minutes and you wonder “where did that come from?”. Or you immediately regret something you said or did and can’t even imagine what possessed you, although it has a kernel of familiarity.
But just like we can re-boot, re-program and de-bug our computer operating systems, we can do the same with our infinitely complex neurology and neurochemistry by identifying the old instructions and replacing them. And we have the advantage of having feelings that will point us to these operating system beliefs, or “code” because they’re well hidden and were chosen by us, either consciously or unconsciously, as fail-safes.
There’s no one-size fits all formula for how feelings, default responses and beliefs track together and keep us stuck in a cycle. But I do often get asked to provide examples; so I’ve charted some that I’ve seen come up in myself and in others and that I know, once identified, can be cleared and followed by transformation and surprising positive results for both individuals and organizations. Its not a matter of will, but of choice.
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Strategy
May 14, 2008 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Leave a Comment
I’ve always been quite proud of and grateful for my skill, talent and experience in strategy. The ability to figure out all the angles, possibilities, scenarios and methods for problem solving and decision making served me very well in both my professional and personal life. Or so I thought.
Because over the past year I’ve shifted as I’ve realized that my being strategic about certain aspects of my personal reality was a (lifelong!) habitual, albeit sophisticated, attempt to control when non-resistance, or willingness to let go, accept and receive, was the better response. And these old habits, particularly when they’re connected to safety and survival needs (my specialties), tend to sneak back in and get the ego involved when I least expect it, during meditation for example.
But gradually, and sometimes in leaps and bounds, there’s a great sense of ease and relief in letting go of attempting to control through strategic means that which we don’t have control over and in fact never did have control over.
So for the past days I’ve been going through a lot of my material, and books, and notes to try to synthesize, re-frame and present this material visually and creatively to maximize its value to my readers and clients. I wanted to come up with a compelling diagram or clever map that would provide a starting point to answering the question: when is strategy the correct response and when does it counter-direct? The harder I tried, the less I accomplished and the worse I felt until I finally realized that I was being strategic…again.
So I allowed myself a few minutes of stillness to see what came up and this came up:
Relief.
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self-awareness, solo professional service firm, source
RedShift Update & Sorry For Email Problem
May 5, 2008 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Comments Off
Thank you subscribers and readers! Please accept my apologies for problems with my email blog services. I’m not sure what went wrong because I test carefully. I’m really hoping I get it right second time around.
Over the past few months I’ve made a lot of changes to my web site and blog to increase the appeal and value of the programs that I offer and the content that I write.
The next big step in my “re-launch” is to make the move next month from working at home (9 years!) to having an office and conference room facility in Belmont, MA. This will allow me more opportunities to work in person with clients and with groups from a great central location.
I’ve found that being a solo professional service provider is an evolving process. Like any other life or business direction, what can be right for a long period, eventually may not be enough. I decided to follow the impulse to change and grow, even though its taking me from my “work from home” comfort zone. Its the right time to shift my focus from what I want to “what my practice wants from me”. And that is to work with as many people and organizations as possible to help them find new ways to thrive in a changing world and to enrich their lives through independent, creative work.
Thank you again for your support.
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Not Knowing “How”.
May 1, 2008 by Mary Wynne-Wynter · Comments Off
I’m noticing increasing individual and collective asking of others in private, business and public life that they answer the following: “How…how are you (or am I) going to do that?”
In one of my last jobs as an employee, a contract came in for strategy consulting for a major retail client and was assigned to me. I was pressured by my manager to communicate “how” I was going to do it and my answer, explaining my experiential process, was not the answer my manager wanted to hear. During that time period, another strategy project was requested by a financial services client. The manager and another consultant determined that using a “thought tool”, that someone in the company had read about, was “how” that project would be done. The general consensus was that I would surely sink and the other consultant would succeed.
In the days that followed, I spent a fair amount of time staring at a large blank whiteboard, doodling around with some terms that kept popping into my mind, thinking about experiences and learning that seemed to fit, following my intuition about what to research and who to interview, and playing around with some patterns, inter-relationships and visuals. Strategies began to emerge for potential large-scale client opportunities and the project was deemed a big success. The other project proceeded much more definitively than mine in a step-by-step path to meet the goal; and then it hit a wall because the final recommendations were pretty much common sensical, small, incremental improvements for the client that did not justify their investment. Concessions had to be made to the client.
So now, a decade later, I think: could I have done better answering “how will I do it”? Probably not to the satisfaction of the person asking. What I have learned is to be vigilant (the “V” in D.R.I.V.E.), and to help others be vigilant, about the negative power and creative buzz-kill in insisting upon asking: “how?”.
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creative process, leadership, solo professional service firm