How do you think about being creative versus the business aspects of a creative career, such as marketing?

Do you see them as separate, even mutually exclusive?

Do you think of creative expression as something more “spiritual” or “pure” than sales or business?

Many creators probably don’t think much about the value of marketing to get their ideas and creations out to a wider audience, to have more impact and success.

> Continued: Marketing Yourself And Your Creative Work: Don’t You Deserve a Wider Audience?

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As an entrepreneur, writer or other artist, success may be furthered by – even depend on – connecting with your ‘tribe’ of people who can support and benefit from your work.

Coach Molly Gordon explains,

Marketer and blogger Seth Godin defines a tribe as “a group of people connected to one another, connected to a leader, and connected to an idea.”

In the case of your tribe of just-right clients, you are the leader, responsible for giving them care and guidance.

Not in a patronizing way, but to the extent that they depend on you to do good work and to lead them toward things that match their needs.

You and your just-right clients are connected through your work, the way you market that work, and the sales conversations you have.

(Selling is a conversation. But you knew that, right?)

Finally, you and your tribe of just-right clients are connected to an idea.

> Continued in her article: Challenges of connecting with your tribe.

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Mixed-media and glass artist Ginny Ruffner recovered from a near fatal car accident and a coma for five weeks and was confined to a hospital for five months.

A description on her site ginnyruffner.com about the documentary about her: A Not So Still Life says, “Doctors were convinced that she would never walk or talk again, but true to her indomitable spirit, she transformed a potentially tragic accident into a career of even more imaginative creations.

“From pop-up books, to room-sized installation pieces, to public works, Ruffner’s art has blossomed and continues to expand.”

Here is a clip from the movie.

Video: Artist Ginny Ruffner: a not so still life

In her review – ‘A Not So Still Life’: Ginny Ruffner documentary draws you in – Moira Macdonald says it is “an inspiring tale of rehabilitation and recovery. About 20 years ago, Ruffner suffered a severe head injury in a car accident; family members, in the documentary, tearfully recall that she was near death, and that the idea of her walking and talking again seemed an impossible dream.

“‘My mind was like a big empty house that you know you used to live in,’ reminisces Ruffner in the film, in a slurred but quite intelligible voice, of the weeks and months following her accident, as she struggled to remember what and who she was. Characteristically, she transformed her struggle into art: As she slowly learned to walk again with the help of a cane, she created a series of playful animal sculptures with ‘balance’ as their theme.”

In her article Ginny Ruffner’s art blooms at Bellevue Arts Museum and on film, Gayle Clemans notes “Ruffner’s determination and her humorous, philosophical approach to life served her well during her lowest point. She is reluctant to dwell on ‘the big, bad time’ of the early 1990s, when she was in a nearly fatal car accident that left her in a coma for five weeks and then unable to walk or talk.

“Now, almost 20 years after her remarkable recovery, Ruffner is mobile, vocal and very active despite some lingering limitations. She says that the experience ‘has made me more creative. There are some things that I can’t do physically, so I have to find ways to find solutions, to be more creative.’

“Her work has gotten increasingly large and complex. Like many contemporary artists, she hires specialists to help her realize her artistic goals, saying, ‘When I can’t make something, I find people who can. It’s the smart thing to do.’”

Book: The Imagination Cycle, by Ginny Ruffner.

The documentary “A Not So Still Life” and many other inspirational movies for personal growth are available to members of the Spiritual Cinema Circle.

This image of Ruffner at work in her studio is from The GLASS Quarterly Hot Sheet post: 3 Questions For … Ginny Ruffner.

Beliefs and thinking and our creative lives

The parts of her story I particularly appreciate are Ruffner’s “philosophical approach to life” and her willful rejection of opinions that she would never walk or talk again.

How many people in vulnerable physical or mental conditions get authoritative opinions from medical experts that are incomplete or downright wrong about the person’s capacity to deal with the condition? How many people just accept what “the doctor” says as the most valid truth?

People like Ruffner don’t just accept, they stay actively in charge of their own lives and health as much as possible, demonstrating how much impact thoughts and beliefs can have on our physical being.

Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) is a growing field that looks at how that works. It is “the study of the interaction between psychological processes and the nervous and immune systems of the human body. PNI takes an interdisciplinary approach, incorporating psychology, neuroscience, immunology, physiology, pharmacology, molecular biology, psychiatry, behavioral medicine, infectious diseases, endocrinology, and rheumatology.” [Wikipedia]

The placebo effect is not to be dismissed as “only mental” – it is another experience in which beliefs and emotions can have profound impacts on our body and health.

Here are a couple of related books:

The Balance Within: The Science Connecting Health and Emotions, by Esther M. Sternberg, MD.

Molecules Of Emotion: The Science Behind Mind-Body Medicine, by Candace B. Pert, PhD.

The Biology of Belief, by Bruce Lipton, MD.

Also see articles by Morty Lefkoe. A profile by the Institute of Noetic Sciences notes that he “made a series of discoveries that allowed him to help people make permanent changes in their emotions and behavior” through his Lefkoe Belief Process.

You can try his belief change process free at ReCreate Your Life.

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You started out loving your chosen career – at least in the beginning. But over time, you and your calling, well, you just grew apart.

And just like a relationship that’s gone bad, it can be hard to walk away from a career or a small business into which you’ve put so much time and effort to say nothing of the financial investment.

Take my friend Donna.

After earning her master’s degree in social work some fifteen years ago, she went into private practice as a family therapist.

For the first five or so years, Donna got a lot of satisfaction out of helping others.

For the last ten though, her work has felt more like a burden.

So what keeps her there? …

What I’m talking about is getting in touch with the one thing that should really scare the heck out of you – namely, never getting to experience what your life would be like if you pursued your true gifts and passions.

> Continued: What to Do When You Fall Out of Love With Your Work.

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“I used to drink several cups of coffee a day, but I kicked the habit a long time ago because I found that caffeine made me too jittery and unfocused.”

That is a quote by Steve Pavlina, author of one of the most popular, and financially successful, sites and blogs dedicated to personal development, StevePavlina.com – and author of the book Personal Development for Smart People: The Conscious Pursuit of Personal Growth.

He notes on his site, “When I drink coffee, my activity level soars — I barrel through tasks in rapid succession.

“But at the end of the day, I have to admit I didn’t accomplish anything of major value. Caffeine causes me to overload on busywork like email, web surfing, socializing, and other unproductive tasks.”

Health risks from caffeine

Deanne Repich, founder of the National Institute of Anxiety and Stress, writes in her article The Dangers of Caffeine for Anxiety Sufferers that over forty research studies “have shown that excessive caffeine can be harmful to your health,” and can cause Rapid or irregular heartbeat; Restlessness; Nervousness; Insomnia and other symptoms.

Repich notes these are “fight or flight” reactions, which are “designed to protect you from harm. Excessive amounts of caffeine can trigger the body’s fight or flight response even though no real danger exists.”

Those body reactions can also stimulate or increase anxiety.

Paraliminal CDs

Pavlina writes that he “missed the action boost that caffeine gave me” but has found that Paraliminal CDs by Learning Strategies Corporation “have done a beautiful job of filling this void. After every session I enjoy a lingering aftereffect that usually lasts a couple hours.

“The Paraliminals provide a noticeable concentration boost that allows me to steadily flow through my work while still maintaining my priorities — that delightful state of flow.

“For me this effect translates directly into practical, down-to-earth results. During a period of a few weeks when I used Paraliminals once or twice a day, I completed several key projects that required a lot of focus and concentration, definitely much faster and at a higher level of quality than I would have otherwise.”

The image is for one of several Paraliminal programs: Peak Performance.

Paraliminal programs make use of Holosync audio technology by Centerpointe Research Institute. Visit the site to get a free demo CD.

Also see articles by Bill Harris, the Centerpointe director, about the technology.

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“You wait until the last minute to buy Christmas presents. You put off seeing the dentist, or getting that thing checked out by the doctor, or filing your taxes….

“Perhaps the stakes are higher than choosing to play Angry Birds instead of doing sit-ups. You might have a deadline for a grant proposal, or a dissertation, or a book. You’ll get around to it. You’ll start tomorrow.”

From post “Procrastination” – on http://youarenotsosmart.com/.

That site and the video are for the book: You Are Not So Smart: Why You Have Too Many Friends on Facebook, Why Your Memory Is Mostly Fiction, and 46 Other Ways You’re Deluding Yourself, by David McRaney. http://amzn.to/pafKAv

Related book: Your Own Worst Enemy: Breaking the Habit of Adult Underachievement – by Kenneth W. Christian, PhD.
http://amzn.to/qQyPqo

Related post: Adult Underachievement: Kenneth Christian, Ph.D. on living up to the “gifted” label – or not
http://highability.org/72/kenneth-christian-phd-on-living-up-to-the-gifted-label-or-not/

Procrastination may often be self-limiting – but is it possibly, sometimes, a matter of careful consideration? It can be one of those easy to apply labels we use to criticize or self-criticize for not “seizing the moment” as quickly as many “high achievers” do.

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By Marie Forleo

Are you one of those people who have a lot of passions and have trouble knowing which one to choose?

When you’re multipassionate, it can get hairy fast. For example, when it comes to your website, do you put everything under one umbrella or keep them separate?

This, my friend, is a struggle that I’m intimately familiar with.

Not being able to just choose that ONE THING to do with your life can be really frustrating and painful. Both for your psyche and for your net worth.

Continued: Should You Combine Your Many Passions or Choose One?

What if you aren’t getting the acting jobs you want, or the writing assignments, or not enough people buy your paintings?

What do you do when your primary creative endeavor does not support you enough emotionally or financially?

Psychologist and creativity coach, Eric Maisel, PhD warns that this can have emotional consequences: “We get anxious because we fear failing, because we fear disappointing ourselves, because the work can be extremely hard, because the marketplace may criticize us and reject us.”

See my related article Managing Creative Anxiety: Change Your Thinking.

What brought this topic to mind was an article by Lisa A. Riley, MA, LMFT, a Creativity Coach and licensed Marriage & Family Therapist, who notes that we invest a lot of money, time and energy into training for a chosen creative profession, “hoping to actually be able to make a living doing the very thing we felt passionate about when we first embarked on that path.”

But, she adds, “In the state of our economy, creative professionals are having more and more difficulty finding jobs that match their qualifications.”

Continued: Diversifying Your Creative Work in a Challenging Economy.

Cynthia Morris

She says on her site Original Impulse: “Others dream of finally putting on paper the story they’ve been wanting to tell for years but have been afraid to begin.

“With me, they stop merely dreaming and they start writing.”

Her new Daily Writing Impulse, is a monthly or annual subscription to daily email prompts, which “spark your writing so that you’re eagerly setting aside 15 minutes each day to enjoy your writing fix.”

See more (including video) on the Inner Writer page: The Daily Writing Impulse.

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Eric Maisel provides helpful ideas about fear vs anxiety over success. He wrote:

Hello, everybody:

Yesterday I addressed the Tri-Valley branch of the California Writers Club on the subject of “overcoming creative anxiety.” I described 24 sources of anxiety in the lives of creative people and 22 anxiety-management strategies.

In the question-and-answer period that followed, a fellow asked, “Can you tell us a little bit more about ‘the fear of success’?”

In fact, I had used the phrase ‘the anxiety of success’ in my talk; and it struck me that the phrases ‘the fear of success’ and ‘the anxiety of success’ were very different one  from the other. Language is so interesting!

‘Fear of success’ is a future-looking idea: it is about your relationship to the success that might come your way one day. ‘Anxiety of success’ is a now-looking idea: it is about your relationship to the success you are currently experiencing.

Whereas ‘fear’ and ‘anxiety’ may be relatively interchangeable words in some sentences, ‘the fear of success’ and ‘the anxiety of success’ are not interchangeable.

Both are real and both are problematic; but they are different. It is the difference between an addict worrying that at some point in the future he may encounter a trigger that causes him to slip versus suddenly finding himself surrounded by temptation right now.

‘Fear of success’ can be dealt with cognitively: you notice how your thoughts are weakening your resolve and you replace those self-sabotaging thoughts with thoughts that serve you.

The anxiety that arises from actual success, on the other hand, must be dealt with behaviorally. You must do something with the new offers coming in, the fan mail, the interview requests, the invitations to excess and distraction.

Try not to fear success. It is true that success may bring with it some new anxieties, but what aspect of living doesn’t?

Let’s raise a glass to [a year] filled with our successes. May all the hard work that each of you is doing pay dividends. If we all cross our fingers for each other, that will amount to thousands of crossed fingers!

Best, Eric

P.S. Don’t forget to take a look at my class on overcoming creative anxiety at dailyom.com. Start it when you like and pay what you want.

[From an issue of his newsletter: Dec 20, 2009]

His related book: Mastering Creative Anxiety: 24 Lessons for Writers, Painters, Musicians, and Actors from America’s Foremost Creativity Coach

Eric Maisel is also author of the Meaning Solution Program.

Related:
Articles by Eric Maisel
Managing anxiety articles
Anxiety Relief Solutions site

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Artwork at top: Fear of Success, by toastedghost. Used by permission.

Eric Maisel, fear of success, success anxiety, creative anxiety