Month: February 2012

Skill Of The Creative

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The simple paperclip can be a doorway to a creative moment
The simple paperclip can be a doorway to a creative moment
Photo: Flicker – chrisdlugosz

The ultimate skill of the truly creative person is their ability to survive change no matter how varied it may be.

Acquiring and then expertly utilizing already structured knowledge is the attribute of the very learned.

The creative person is uniquely interested in newness.

That, coupled with a passion for what they do, fires a gut-drive infused with persistence that sustains a vision that never changes.

It’s different than a dream.

It makes the timeline from start to finish,  even if it’s very long (and it often is), seem more bearable.

Even when it looks like failure is following failure yet again this drive wins out because it won’t let them give up easily.

Another word for a creative person like that is “entrepreneur”.

In the 1920’s, and for many years after, Napoleon Hill interviewed one hundred and twenty-five of the most financially successful men of his day.

Know what he discovered? The top two attributes for their success was their persistence and determination. Not intelligence or connections. Too bad Hill himself never nailed down exactly what the nature of persistence and determination was and how to get more of it into your life. He instead got wrapped up in laws and lists of principals. More head brain work for you to do.

All that is a far cry from finally finding out what exactly it is that allows some to survive long periods of discomfort and to maintain a motivation through it all. For creatives who want to ‘make it’ on their own terms it’s as essential as air.

More power to you.

David's signature in what looks-like handwriting. Sort of.

Quotius #10

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There’s a thing I often like to point out about belief. It’s the fact that it can only be developed two ways:

1) Through blind faith, which is usually based on a compelling argument, or

2) Based on some sort of tactile hard evidence.

This forms the basis of an observation.

There are two types of people in the world: There are those who can believe in something without actually seeing it and there are those who need hard evidence of its existence before the investment of their belief is forced out of them.

As today’s world shifts more and more towards the cynical belief in anything not proven with absoluteness seems increasingly rare. Yet it still exists. It exists for one reason.  People require some semblance of hope just to carry on. They seek it everywhere. It’s as essential as the air we breathe.

As a student of entrepreneurship I know that things must be created and shipped even though they may not be perfected. Tweaks can be made latter. “Run it up the flag pole and see who salutes it” as the great copywriter Gary Halbert once said. That kind of productivity is scary. It can lead to many failures. But it can also lead to successes too. You just need to have the gumption to proceed.

Consider the mobius and how it elegantly demonstrates the duality principal yet again.

Belief, in its usual form, looks a lot like just another’s personal perspective and indeed it is. But, on the other hand, if you can get some sort of hard evidence then consider that a bonus.

It can disperse the strength of resistance and make the road forward more attainable.

More power to you.

David's signature in look-like handwriting

 

 

Music attribution: Creative Commons License The Annual New England Xylophone Symposium by DoKashiteru is licensed under a Attribution Noncommercial (3.0)