The creative process is one of figuring something out that has little to do with gaining popularity. Politics, conversely, is all about popularity. Politics is about getting enough people to like you so that you can do things to perpetuate the trend of people liking you. Creativity is about solving problems.
Read MorePANIC
Panic’s horrible grip may be one moment away from the abyss. There’s no pretending otherwise, and there’s nothing pleasurable about it. But if you survive, remember the feeling. Someday that recollection may be the best way for you to differentiate what’s simply hard from what’s genuinely mortal.
Read MoreDéjà Vu
Sensations are visceral; we “feel” them more than “think” them. Our senses tend to be most receptive when we experience events that have meaning to us, that connect us to clarified values and moments of unexpected opportunity and experience.
Read MoreCLOUD WATCHING
The ability to see something different from the person directly next to you offers clues about how you might regard acts of creative invention, or at least appreciation.
Read MoreFIVE REASONS TO AVOID ARTICLES THAT LIST THINGS
Not too many years ago short-form non-fiction was called a magazine article. Then the world melted into “listicles”.
Read MoreNUANCE
Nuance is all about how that attention to detail plays out in concert, about how subtle, tiny interactions among elements can contribute to profound differences.
Read MoreGO FARTHER -- 2014 COMES TO A CLOSE
In the news section of our website you can follow tales of our exploits. Here on the blog the topic generally concerns the many ways to think about being creative, from what fuels creativity, to how we lose it, to engaging it in diverse and surprising—or even simply reliable—ways.
Read MoreSTORY
Story means everything, even if everything doesn’t look like a story. How we think about what we do is the essential architecture of all stories, and the onus is always on storytellers to make them sing.
Read MoreWHERE IT COMES FROM
Where does the mass of what we know come from? Sometimes the wellspring simply surprises me, and other days I nod my head in respectful remembrance. The balance of each day is an accumulation of past experience, and to forget our sources is to forget ourselves.
Read MoreUBIQUITY
Ubiquitous ability to create things of all sorts may be a profoundly positive trend, but the cultural challenge it presents requires careful consideration. Without a deep appreciation for a professional class of creators, the average quality of many things may rise tremendously, while professionals—those people who actually move various disciplines forward—gasp for air.
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