What becomes possible when you own “creative”?
Use it as a noun or an adjective. Use it as a title. Use it as a source of inspiration. Let it express your very reason for being.
What happens to your work, your process, and your own view of yourself when you dare to declare yourself a source of new stories and solutions?
Not that you asked, but I can tell you that claiming “creative” changed everything for me.
If You Want to Be a Writer, Write. If You Want to Be Creative, Create.
The secret to owning “creative” is in the act of creating, of course. (If only it were that simple!)
My husband nearly threw himself into the Atlantic the morning of our wedding because he found writing his vows so frustrating. (We blame fear of writing, not cold feet!) He’s the last guy to give writing advice. But it’s the non-writer who can put it most plainly: If you want to write, write!
He suggested that when I was a bored hourly employee and when I was stifled at my salaried management job.
Later, he might have said something about “just write” when I was forcing myself through various marketing and website design biz ventures, but I couldn’t hear him over the pounding of my scared, success-starved heart.
How “Just Do It” Really Works for Creatives
“Just do it” fits nicely on a tee shirt, but it’s not advice that will change your life until you’re ready to hear it. And do it.
When my second child arrived, I saw how ragged my dreams and my reality had become thanks to a four-year-long entrepreneurial experiment. I’d learned too much to force myself into momtrepreneurship times two kids without making fundamental changes to my approach.
That’s when I realized I had to source my entrepreneurship in something other than “I have to make money for my family and be available to them at the same time” (the fundamental drive of the mom entrepreneur).
I had to devote myself to work that satisfied more than my need to be the super mom who makes the dinner and pays for it too (even though both those things still had to happen).
And so, even as my mothering responsibilities increased, I traded the identity of mom entrepreneur for “creative entrepreneur.”
Suddenly the professional title I gave myself didn’t indicate that I was an over-scheduled, under-rested woman who negotiated contracts during diaper changes. What I called myself was inspiring and invigorating rather than draining.
How Will You Connect the “Entrepreneur” and “Creative” Dots?
Yes, my daughter's birth made me realize that I wanted to leave the mom entreprepreneurs’ playground and find a place in the creatives’ studio, but realizing and doing are two different things.
Finally, I was able to listen to that wise husband of mine.
I wanted to write, I always had. I was going to write my way into the creatives’ circle. Enough with thinking they'd never admit a fraud like me who had the hopes but not the word count to prove she wanted to be Diana Gabaldon someday.
But what about you?
Writing isn’t the only way to step into the “I create things” arena, but it’s the way that is most immediately useful to the entrepreneur.
We know that creating content is essential for marketing your business and that words and stories are still the most important way to do that.
By learning how to write your book - even if it’s not the sort of trade non-fiction aimed directly at your current clients - you’re gaining skills related to story architecture, idea sculpting, and platform building that are indispensable for the entrepreneur.
Enter Sovereign Reality, Enter Tracking Wonder
Last summer when I was juggling client work and trips to the beach with the kids (it was supposed to be a vacation), I somehow stole an hour for a webinar for anyone writing & publishing a book led by Jeffrey Davis of Tracking Wonder. I'd known Jeffrey as an esteemed colleague and as a dad from the preschool and knew I loved his work, but this experience was somehow different.
I still felt like a fraud as I tuned in, there amongst the "real" creatives doing the work to become "real" authors. But over the next hour, I was filling my journal not only with Jeffrey's practical advice, but with scraps of plot and character names and ideas about the bigger themes that my novel needed to explore.
Sovereign Reality, the trilogy of novels, became real to me. And the entire concept of “sovereignty” began to take shape as the backbone of my professional work.
On that summer afternoon, I stepped on to the path. I had a work in progress. I was going to be an author. I had a new perspective on my dreams and what I had to offer to my business.
I really was a creative entrepreneur.
Making the Commitment to Creativity, Story, and the Book that Matters
By October of 2014, I found myself surrounded by a select tribe of Jeffrey’s dedicated writers at the Your Brave New Story Authors’ Intensive at Mohonk Mountain House. Immersed in my story and the importance of my compatriots’ books, I felt every bit as alive and fearless as I did in those blissful moments after childbirth - even though I was only at the very beginning of my fiction writing journey.
That's the thing - writing a book is a journey and you need a tribe and you need a guide to support you. Jeffrey offers that all year long through various programs and consultancy options, but especially with the Your Captivating Book mentoring program.
If this really intrigues you, email me - act by April 30 and I can get you a special discount and maybe even a free initial consult with The Book Papa himself.
One final reason to think about writing that book that has been holed up inside you and to do it with Jeffrey's help: he's about more than just books and authors... He is distinguishing himself as a major voice for doing business as UNusual and speaks directly to the needs of the business artist, AKA, the creative entrepreneur.