The Knock-Out Question – Don’t Ask It

Don’t ask this question:  ”But what happens if I _________________ and then it turns out that I don’t have talent?”

Oh this question is a tricky one. It seems so, so innocent. Seems so clear-headed, the right question coming from a very careful thinker.

Hogwash! Bam!

Just because we can ask a question doesn’t guarantee that the question: produces any sort of helpful answers, has the potential to produce any answers, or even has the capacity to stimulate further inquiry. “What happens if I, start writing everyday and I don’t win the Pulitzer Prize in 2026?” Hey, that’s a question. There should be an answer, right?

Huge questions are like a rock in our shoe. Rocks hurt. Questions with no real answers cause pain.  Pain of non-action, of ruminative stress, and the pain of indecision. Instead of sitting in the chair, classroom, conference, cafe, studio, or other work space, working our tails off doing our thing, we focused on that damn pain in our foot.

Huge questions can’t be measured, tested, or grasped by the brain beyond speculating. The speculating mind works differently than the specific, get down to work mind. The speculating mind can speculate on practically anything, including speculating on the speculating mind, speculating.

The Knock-Out Question, “But what happens if I _________________ and then it turns out that I don’t have talent?”, really is a shield for other things going on in the questioner’s head. First, the question begs for a guarantee from the future. As I have said before (link), demanding that the future be anything than what it will be is….is nuts.  The ain’t going to sign any contracts. Don’t look for guarantees.

A second thing in this question is an unconscious vision of future rejection and regret. I can see it so clearly now: there I am, up on a stage for the world to see (a.k.a. on television).  I have given “it” my best shot and then the learned judges speak. Of course, today’s long Rogue’s gallery of screaming TV critics come to mind. There I am, the whole world is watching and the judges rip me apart.  Act 2 (1 hour later): I’m at home, crying into the night: “Oh, how I have wasted my life. Oh, how I was sooooo stupid. I should have devoted my life to science, to curing the world’s diseases. Why was I so deluded in thinking I had “talent”.”  Such melodrama. Such use of negativity-laced imagination. Very crafty of our old companions, fear and regret, taking on this new guise.

If we continue to turn The Knock-Out Question over a bit, listening very, very carefully, we hear not a question but a self-statement: “I will only work if I can be in the spotlight of success. I’m actually that great, you know.” A surprising twist here. It is not an underlying inferiority driving The Knock-Out Question, but a little or a lot of grandiosity. “I’ve got to have big results, or forget it. Who do you think I am?”

To get unstuck, we have to learn to reduce our demands for a guarantee from the future, get control of our negativity-biased imaginations, and reign in our grandiosity. We also need to think smaller, like small actions we can take everyday.

How:

1. Drop huge questions.

2. Whenever you have doubts, concerns, good ideas, bad ideas, etc. take some time to slow down and turn inward. Relax and keep inward. Relax some more. Next, bring up your question, your doubts, and see/feel what’s inside of those questions/statements. Turn the questions/statements over in your mind as you would some sort of special object that has captured your interest. Slowly, you will find more about the questions than you ever suspected was there.  (For additional instructions on how to do this work, see our sister blog, Fireball Imagery).

3. List out all of the good benefits that come with being being on the journey (process versus strictly focused on final product) within your field of creativity (i.e. how you will grow; friends you will make; things you will discover, etc.). Really soak in an understanding of the benefits that will come your way regardless if you crowned “Artist of the Universe 2031″ or not.

4. Take a manageable risks. This blows away much of the excuse not to take action because such a huge loss is waiting. Small, steady risks, small potential downside loss.

5. Give some time to your grandiose side. Enjoy the “big person on campus” feeling. Relish it. When you are done, make a date to be grandiose again.

6. Get humble and do the work you need to do to move your creative life forward.

Go Produce the Biggest Pile of Crap You Can

Seriously. Just as soon as you can, go produce a pile of crap. Give your best shot at: writing the worst page of fiction/non-fiction/poetry in the history of the world. Go hit a canvas with the worst materials, horrible colors, and ugly brush strokes ever cursing the eyes of humanity. Or, if photography is your thing, zero in on the most boring-assed subject, with the most boring-assed composition, with the most ineffective lighting you can find. Paper arts, fiber arts, music….no problem. Go and suck at what you do. Sit, stand, recline and do what you do but it must suck.

Better yet, bring over some of your fellow Creatives. Each Creative is given the freedom and god-given right to produce a pile of crap. Compare. Contrast. Share. Combine. Don’t forget to demonstrate your techniques of how you achieved your piece-de-crap. No Creative is free to leave the gathering until they have pushed themselves to create their worst.

Even better than that, show a non-Creative friend/loved one/work buddy/semi-stranger your newly created garbage art. Be sure to showcase/demonstrate with great flourish so no one will fail to appreciate how awful your project is. Leave no flaw go unnoticed, no project-deprecating observation go unsaid. You must use the highest melodrama, gaudy flourish, and whatever poor, poor acting you can muster.

Hold nothing back. Suck, crap, garbage, horrible, shockingly bad, guaranteed to bore, to be laughed at, or never to be thought about again. Ham-up sucking.

If you hold back or if you don’t do this exercise, you will never know what is on the other side of this experience.

Morning Pages or Morning Focusing Worksheet?

Since the 1990s, Julia Cameron has dominated the bookshelves, bookstores, and church basements with her “The Artist Way” series of writings. At the center of each work is Cameron’s two regular exercises for Creatives—the artist date and morning pages. The artist date is not a date with an artist, though that would be good too, but a weekly visit to a creative place such as a gallery, bookstore, creative group, etc. The morning pages, what we will consider here, are 750 handwritten words Cameron wants a Creative to write each morning to kick off the day.

Cameron points to the power of these three pages as a way to dump out and work out inner issues that we may not be aware of but are influencing our lives. This writing is both catharsis and self-discovery. A similar idea was promoted back in the 1930s by Dorothea Brande in her book, Becoming a Writer. Brande asked writers to sit down each morning and let flow the details that bubbled up from their dreams and between waking and sleeping. Brande said the writer would be surprised at the creative ideas and solutions captured in these free association sessions.

Cameron and Brande, of course, point to valuable advice. We all can benefit from conversing with and being open to the offerings of our unconscious. With that said, the Creative has, I believe a more pressing concern each morning.

Every day, we need to review where we are with our creative work, study, and planning. If we don’t take somewhere between 5 to 15 minutes to gather again, our focus on what we want to do, why we want to do it, and how we are going to do it—we go spinning off course. Once we are off course, the probability increases that we are going to stay off course. Trouble.

We have got to stay focused if there is to be any hope that we are to reach any level of our creative ambitions. A Morning Focusing Worksheet can accomplish this. It starts off with a few notes about our vision for our project, the general plan of how to get there, and a paragraph or two of our values and standards we wish to hold during this process. This section of the worksheet can grow each day as we re-read what we wrote the day before and we throw down a few more thoughts. Over time, this section will develop into a well polished and clear view of our creative life.

Having this emerging view at our fingertips is a great help for what comes next: listing what we need to do the rest of the day. This is not an entire things-to-do list of everything going on in our lives, just our creative tasks. That’s where we will do our best to keep our focus.

How to Do It – Your Morning Focusing Worksheet
I recommend doing this on a computer so you can easily revise the big picture elements and update your daily list. Don’t worry about grammar or spelling, just get down a word or two, or a few sentences. On your first day, spend a few extra minutes writing down your vision: for yourself, your creative life, and the specific project you are working on.

Next, write down what you realistically can get done during the day. Don’t over do it. As you think about what you want to accomplish, hold in mind an image/feeling that represents “getting focused.” This can be something symbolic (i.e. a magnifying glass), a role model (i.e. Sherlock Holmes), or an image of yourself on top of your game. Focus your head, heart, and body as well as your intention to make the day a productive one, a creative one.

That’s it.

The next day, the process starts again. Look at your Morning Focusing Worksheet, take the opportunity to say a bit more about your overall vision and goals or refine what is already down in that section. Then make your short list for the day. Pull your focus together with your focusing image. Next, get out there and have a creative day.

Repeat in 24 hours.

How to Create a Worksheet: Here’s what to include:

-Add a title of your worksheet (“Morning Focusing Worksheet” has a nice ring to it)

-Include a photo/illustration of a powerful image of focusing (i.e. a magnifying glass) – optional step

- List of what you are going to focus on for that day (keep it very short!)

- Make room for a slowly growing description of  your: creative big picture goals; your creative standards; vision for yourself; etc.

Build Your Own Robot

Everyone talks about visions and goals. Each is tremendously important for anyone who wants to move forward towards a goal. But lurking right under our nose, not off in some vision of the future or long list of goals is something else.

Here are some clues to its identity. It is: something that runs on its own, something that once it gets going is hard to stop; something that can serve us well; and something we don’t have to fuss with. Something that, if designed right, will get our creative work done and will make us masters of our craft.

A robot, right?

Sorry, only a habit. But don’t underestimate habits. Habits get us to work, tie our shoes, brush our teeth, keep us safe, feed us, etc, etc, etc.  They run a heck of a lot of our lives. You will be shocked to see how much if you take a close look.

Just as we might program a robot to do our bidding, we can train a habit. We do have to hang in there in the beginning but eventually, our robot/habit will be up and running. With one habit in place we will want to create and unleash more. Perhaps one habit is for practicing our craft, another one gets our marketing materials out the door, and another one keeps us plugged into our local creative community. Habits buzzing around as we focus on other things.

Robot Construction in the Privacy of Your Own Home

1. First, give up the notion that the only way to get things done are through the big, the complex, and the difficult. Habits are small, simple, and easy, or at least that is how you should design them. Pick something that you can do most days for 5, 10, or 15 minutes (restrain yourself, don’t pick half-hours, hours, or half-days). Keep the habit time short for right now.

2. Next, tell yourself that you are going to be a loyal teacher of this newly minted habit by teaching it the ropes everyday for three weeks. That’s right, everyday for three weeks. That ‘s the beginning of the process. It is likely you and your pupil will have to keep at it longer, a few months or so until it is solid and very much part of your life.

3. Pick a time of day for working with your habit. If you need a week to test out various times to find the best fit, that’s fine but once you settle on a specific time, stick to it.

4. Also stick to what you want to do with that time. Don’t go switching around; robots can only learn so much (their circuitry is from the 1950s, after all). Keep it simple and direct such as sketch for 10 minutes, write for 10 minutes, try a new piece, etc.

5. Try not to switch locations, either. If you can do your work in the same spot every session, the wiring of this habit will go even faster. Habits like following a steadily deepening groove cut by consistent returning to the: same process, the same time, and the same location.

6. Track on a calendar each day you successfully meet with your habit. If you miss a day, get crackin’ the next day. If you find you can’t do your habit work at the appointed time, do it when you can that day but don’t kid yourself, you were a bit off target for that day. Here is a great online, free habit tracking calendar service (www.rootein.com). It even sends helpful reminder notes when you don’t sign-on and check off that a habit has been completed for the day.

7. Use a timer. Set if for 5, 10, or 15 habit building minutes and put off all other distractions. Go ahead and give yourself license to quit when the time dings. Don’t push your progress. The important thing is to develop a new habit.

8. Repeat, repeat, repeat until it becomes part of your life and you slip into it without much thought. In fact, your day will not feel right with your habit undone.

9. Pick another area of creativity to develop into a habit. Start with steps 1 through 8 and train your habit robot.

Unleash the robots!

Are You H.A.L.T.?

Our creative work lies open to the impact of what runs in our background. Our background is made up of our: mental, emotional, and physical state of being. If we are way out of whack in one of these three areas, we are in trouble. Our background can suddenly become our foreground, totally making our creative energies disappear. Good-bye deadlines; ideas; patience; and more.

A clear, direct way of keeping an eye on our background state was developed in the 1940s by the people who created Alcoholics Anonymous. Support groups and patients at St. Thomas Hospital in Akron, Ohio were taught the acronym, H.A.L.T. Each letter stood for a common human condition that has the power to undermine the strongest will and the best laid plans. H.A.L.T. is still being taught today in all sorts of groups.

H.= Hungry
A.= Angry
L.= Lonely
T.= Tired

Hungry – Trying to be creative when you haven’t taken care of your body is very tough. Your body has a simple charge: get what it needs. The brain alone burn’s up a heck of a lot of energy. Getting your background energy doesn’t mean becoming a glutton, but it does mean taking care in when you eat and what you eat. Optimize your creative time by finding the best fuel for you and keep yourself fed.

Angry – Anger is great at tying up 97% of our thoughts and feelings. That’s 97%; What’s left over for our creative work?

Anger is an important emotion and it can lead to action but it has to be watched carefully. Anger management is good for everyone, even those who don’t have a major problem with this emotion. Practice getting a big perspective every time anger pulls you into a tight focus. Work at “turning down” anger a bit, say from an “8″ to a “5″ on your own internal anger scale. Don’t hesitate to get help with your anger from a friend, a book, a program, or professional help.

Lonely – Probably the single biggest mistake for creatives is doing everything alone which means missing out on the support that is all around us. Surround yourself with supportive people, may that be: support groups, friends, role models, mentors, coaches, therapists, etc. We don’t need to be isolated, doubting, procrastinating creatives. Get friends, get support = more creative energy.

Tired – Like food, the body needs what it needs. Don’t underestimate your need for rest and relaxation. Ignore those suggestions of: “Live on 2 hours of sleep”. Hog wash. Determine your ideal level of sleep as indicated by your body and the freshness of your mind and get it, regularly.

More Initials
If we had been at St. Thomas Hospital in the 1940s, we could have added: S = stress or added another A for anxiety. Both of these common conditions trim away so much of our creative energy we would be shocked to see it all stacked up. We don’t have to live with constant stress or routine anxiety. There are many, many options available to manage and avoid each. Find the best fit for you. Do the work. Release the energy for your creative life.

Get your background in good shape and your foreground will really come alive.

The Pomodoro Technique: Progress When You Have No Time

Links on Pomodoro:

• Everything Pomodoro
• Helpful PC timer Tomighty
• Instructions on how-to-do-it (free download)

Your Declaration of Independence?

Sure, we have New Year’s resolutions but what about mid-year declarations? Try making these and others of your own devising, your declaration of independence:

I declare that I will begin again, this coming week, in small ways to more fully develop my commitment to myself to bring my creativity into the world. I will start small because I enjoy discovering how my creative work can expand, piece-by-piece, in my life.

I declare that I have something to offer to the world, may that be an idea, a product, a reason to go on, help to my fellow creatives, a smile of support, or acting as a role model.

I declare that I have the unalienable right to explore, to experiment, to grow, to be puzzled, and to chase after what I consider important.

I declare that I can bounce back from no’s and from distractions, dips, and dives.

I declare that I can seek others as role models but I do not confuse their lives as my own, nor will I unduly admonish, berate, or in other manner, criticize myself for not being like those other creatives. I have my own path, my own life, my own obstacles, my own strengths,  my own potentials to deal with. Role models provide information, they are not meant to provide me the ground for self-recriminations.

I declare that I have the right to take some time to be creative. While I may face actual or imagined criticism about taking time to be creative, I know that this can be done without harm to others. In fact, as I become more creative, great benefits accrue to those around me as I at last gather my life’s meaning and potential around me, sparking great happiness for me that I pass onto others in countless ways.

I declare that I am free to have many, many what others will call “false starts.”  These are not false starts but are inquiries and experiments that feed my learning about myself and the world of creativity. I can’t grow without them.

I declare that I can follow my own voice.

I declare that I believe in myself.

I declare my independence from guilt associated with not meeting previous deadlines, missing opportunities, or not following through. When the time is right, I can look back at these experiences and learn from them. As of today, I release the burden of carrying this guilt. I face the now and the future.

I declare that I can spend money on the tools of my trade without undue guilt.

I declare a greater allegiance to my inner calling to be creative. While I will maintain my standing obligations, I will let my inner calling flourish.

I declare that, without hesitation, I will step forward to be in the community of my fellow creatives, sharing what I can and learning where I can. Regardless of where I am in my creative endeavors, I have a right to be part of this community.

It is self-evident that I have been called to be a creative and I declare to follow that calling, to the best of my abilities, to whatever, to where ever it calls me.

No! Explored – Don’t get caught by surprise

Regardless of who we are or what our project is, we will get “no!” as an answer more often than “yes!”.

Right now, sit back and consider how many nos you are likely to face about your work. Be honest and be in reality. Twenty? Fifty? More? Now double that number. Got 20? You got 40. Got a 100? Now you got 200 nos. Write this number down and put it somewhere where you will see it next month, next year, and beyond.

Next, go for a walk and repeat the total nos you calculated silently and without fanfare (don’t disturb the neighbors, kids, or small dogs). Remember, no fanfare. You are not trying to drive yourself to depression. Just say the nos as a word, nothing more.

Think of “no” as part of everyday reality, since it is. “No” is waiting for you in your future.

“No” is not a crime, not an arrow aimed only at you, nor is it the definitive statement on your earthly worth, or the last straw. It is a common reaction that most people give to new ideas. It is a word that all creative people face. It is reality.

Take your “No! walk” and make friends and peace with the reality of no. Know in your head, heart, and bones what you will face “No!”. No more surprised reaction when you offer up your idea/project to someone and they say “no.” Surprises are bad. They knock us way off our path, stun us into dumbness, and lead us downward.

How to Be a Good Judo Student

The student of judo expects to hit the mat. Not only again but again and again. In fact, early judo instruction is around how to fall. It covers how to fall to minimize damage and how to fall so you can get back up. Judo students are there to fall and are there to get back up again. Crash!, a student just hit the mat. Falling may not be something the student desired but it doesn’t come as a shock.

How to Be a Good Student of “No!”

Answer these questions by doing the work:

Since you know you are going to get tossed many, many times with “nos”, how can you prepare yourself to soften the blow of hitting the mat?

How can you prepare to get up quickly?

How can you  prepare yourself to almost ignore the falls and fully embrace the getting up?

Note: This is part one of a new series on the nature, art, and science of: No!

Invisible Downside

The downside of not losing weight is having excess weight. Hard to hide that. The visible downside of not stopping smoking is smoking and worse. Can’t hide that. Visible and even dire downsides  can be motivating. Worrying and painful, but motivating nonetheless.

Most people reading this post are working on creative projects outside the daily requirements of work, family, friends, pets, commuting, etc.

Optional projects just don’t have the power of presence that bad habits and nasty conditions. If you have a bad habit or a nasty condition, you know and everyone knows it. If you have an optional project and you don’t do it, who knows? Who cares? As long as you stick to the required stuff (i.e. feeding the dog; showing up for work, etc.), everyone is just fine.

Does not creating have a downside for you?

What is your “pain” if you are not creative?

A Creative is diminished when his/her projects are not born or finished. There is no chance to develop a craft. No chance to learn to be confident or to learn how to solve creative problems. No chance to meet others on the same path. No chance to have trust, hope, determination, and focus pounded into the psyche by the hammer and anvil of creative growth. No chance to see how living one’s creativity touches other people in surprising, unpredictable ways.

What is your downside if you should never create again?

• What will you lose?
• Who could you have been?
• Who could you have met?
• Where could you have gone?
• What could you have given?
• What could you have changed?
• What could you have prevented?

• Who will set-up an intervention to get you back to creative life?
• How and where will you “detox” from the uncreative world?
• Who will do surprise testing to make sure you have creativity circulating in your blood?
• How will you remember to stay on the straight and narrow (dedicating a portion of your life to creativity)?
• How can you weigh-in to see your weekly creativity level?
• What’s your plan for when you relapse into uncreativity?

What is the downside for you? Make it invisible no more.

Take a Wide Road

Some rights reserved by Peter Alfred Hess

There are two types of roads: narrow and wide. The narrow road assumes that your journey will require little sideways movement or much movement at all other than straight ahead. A narrow road is fine for that, getting a person from point A to point B. We all want the fast way to our envisioned goal. No deviations, just straight onward.

That’s fine for our ambitions but reality is not likely to give us anything like a narrow and straight road. Most people’s paths are filled with deviations from the straight line. Frequently, we must zig and zag and move backwards before we complete even the shortest and simplest journeys.

That’s the reality. If we demand a narrow path, any movement other than forward will be seen as a failure. It doesn’t take many failures to crush spirit, inspiration, and hope. A narrow path is just not realistic.

Instead, expect to follow a wide path. A wide path recognizes and leaves room for sideways and backward movement on the way to a goal. If the path is the right size in our minds and our hearts, we can take retreats and horizontal movement in stride. Such movements will be seen as part of our journey.

Do:
Find a good road map to where you want to go.

Don’t:
Force yourself and your reality to fit that road map.
Don’t take deviations as crushers of your spirit or conclusions of your journey.

Do:
Hold your road-map loosely and use it as a general indicator of which way to go.
Be flexible. Be willing to move around obstacles in whatever direction (sideways, backwards, or forwards)as needed. Your goal may seem more distant at these times but it is still there. Navigate life’s inevitable obstacles and soon you will get a better look at it.