Saturday… (Taken with instagram)
The Pursuit of Possible Impossibilities
Don’t tell me about your problems, tell me about the ideas that you generated as a result of you discovering that a problem existed… Don’t give me the 100 reason of why a thing won’t work, give me the one risky move you plan to make to be the one who does the impossible… Don’t tell me that you are afraid, God did not give you the spirit of fear…
“If we are all really honest with ourselves, the thing that we struggle with the most, for a great deal of our adult lives, is this… Finding a way to blur the line between work and play.”
Three enemies to remarkable art… “Just Get it Done”, “Make it Happen” and “Not Enough Time”
Regardless of what you may think… remarkable art does not happen over night. Remarkable art is usually the product of long hours of serious thinking, play, divine intervention, soul searching and in some cases, a spiritual experience that manifest itself as “art”. Okay, yes… I may have just gone over the top a bit, BUT I think you get my point. Creating (creation) is serious business, however; what I find in most organizations (and when I say most, I really mean A LOT) is that there is far more time invested and attention placed on the “strategy” used to release or share art, than the creation of the art. Here is what usually happens… And if I am wrong, there is a place at the bottom of this post for comments, and I will stand corrected…
1. The Admin Guru’s huddle up in an office or a “creative space” and they dream up some fantastic, communication strategy that requires a dose of remarkable art to get the message across…
2. The same group of Admin Guru’s will then begin the process of strategizing how they will execute on the clever messaging…
3. Then the dreaded “timeline” is created… By the Admin Guru’s…
4. The Admin Guru’s trek off to their respective caves and start thinking away, and doing…
Time elapse…
5. One of the Admin Guru’s (in the third hour) get’s the “epiphany” that the “remarkable art” that needs to be done, has to be delegated to the “remarkable art makers”. This usually includes the Creative Director, Design Guys and Gals and anyone else that is responsible for creating “remarkable art”.
This is where things can get interesting… And this is why I am writing (ranting) this blog post…
The biggest “push-back” that I tend to deal with, when it comes to managing creatives is this…
“They (probably referencing the Admin Guru’s) always finds a way to just “drop stuff” in our laps, with unrealistic deadlines…”
And here is why the Creative Lead is saying this…
Remarkable art does not happen over night. Remarkable art is usually the product of long hours of serious thinking, play, divine intervention, soul searching and in some cases, a spiritual experience that manifest itself as “art”.
Yes… this is exactly what I said in my opening paragraph. And yes, it’s the fuel behind the Creative Leads frustration…
Three enemies to remarkable art…
1. Just Get it Done
2. Make it Happen
3. Not Enough Time
If you are leading creative people, and if you are trying to do creative stuff… I mean the “mind blowing” stuff that gives people “goose bumps”… Make sure that you are mixing the Creatives (the people who make remarkable art) in with the Admin Guru’s. Everyone has their gifts… Admin people do “admin stuff”, and creatives do “creative stuff”. Where things get all out of sorts is when these two gifts are not communicating properly. Bringing the Designers in on the strategic meetings may deliver some pleasant surprises. By leveraging design with the strategy, better expectations can be set, realistic timelines can be established… And perhaps, just perhaps… Some remarkable art can be produced.
The Importance of Play and Creativity…
It’s been quite a while since I have sat down and written a blog. Over the past few months, it’s been “fast and furious” at Kind Intelligence, and my ability to just sit down, reflect, and focus on sharing my ideas has been tough… REALLY tough, and that brings me to the topic of this “ice-breaking” post…
The Importance of Play and Creativity
Over the past few months I have had the opportunity to engage a LOT of people. Some of them were and are directly connected to the projects and initiatives that we are working on at Kind, and some of them have been chance meetings that God has blessed me with in my day to day going to and fro.
The common theme among all of them, which is probably a direct response to my fanatical ranting about the work I do, or my conviction to spark a creative interest in others, is that in each person, when I ask about the creative work they are doing, they generally give me a blank stare and conclude with…
“I really don’t have the TIME to do anything CREATIVE…”
To that end, we usually get into long drawn out conversations about creativity, it’s importance and why the “creative muscle” needs to be exercised for overall health… And YES… I believe that… “The creative muscle needs to be exercised for overall health, AND well being…” Absolutely. And more importantly …
Play.
From the time we are born (til now) we all have a yearning for this most important activity. YES it takes on different shapes over time, BUT play is a fundamental part of our fiber that never goes away. And what’s interesting is this… In times where we let ourselves go, take a vacation (play), go to a park (play), chose to wrestle with the dog, our spouses, children, significant others (play) is when we are our MOST creative. It is at this time that we have let our guards down, not fearing the judgement of others, and truly move into a state of creativity and exploration.
This is what I have found… It’s not “time” that keeps us from being truly creative… It’s “fear”. Fear that if we release an idea, we will be “shot-down”, laughed at or even worst criticized by our peers. However; in contrast, when we are in a state of “play”, inhibition sets in, and we are more willing to step out on a ledge, share an idea or even dream up something that the act of play inspires.
Serious Play is different, and as a creative person, or I like to think that I am a creative person, I find myself needing to climb into a mode of “serious play” from time to time for the purpose of solving a problem, designing a new system, brand or way of doing something. Serious play, in this instance, is the practice of taking out all of your building blocks, your clay, and crayons and throwing it all in the “sandbox” to explore many options and ideas to conclude on some resolve. Making mistakes is common place, looking absolutely silly is the norm, and challenging conventional thinking is an absolute necessity.
This is how I will conclude… Play.
Take time to do it. It feeds your soul, and ignites your spirit. Play is the seed to creativity, and serious play is the seed to solving serious problems, shaping radical new ideas, and doing the things that most call… Genius.
