G’Day!

Thanks to the Sydney Morning Herald for featuring The Accidental Creative in its list of good podcasts for small business owners. There are also a few other gems in their list worth checking out.

Rest, Rabbit. Rest.

I am a fan of children’s books. No joke. Love them.

My friend Ben often brings children’s books to work to teach simple principles or illuminate some problem that’s been going on in the organization. There is a clarity that emerges in the midst of these short parables or no-frills proverbs that often touches something deep and primal within us.

A children’s book that I came across in the past year (and have since passed on to others) is called "Rest Rabbit Rest." The book is about a rabbit who is unable to be still because of all of the obligations in his life. He is constantly turning even the simplest task into a complicated and anxious demonstration of futility. He works to make processes more efficient so that he could fill his "saved" time with more activity. His life is scheduled to the minute, and any little distraction becomes a huge issue.

There is a direct correlation between rest and creativity. The more we are at rest - mentally and physically - the more prepared we are to recognize creative accidents when they occur. Many opportunities are lost every day because we are not in a position to receive them. When we are constantly "on" we are incapable of filtering the noise to get to the signal. Great becomes inseparable from good, and novelty is mistaken for creativity. When we are prepared, rested, and focused we are better able to recognize the truly great moments of creative intuition.

How are you at resting? It’s Monday - after the weekend. Are you going into your work week relaxed and ready, or exhausted from a weekend of recreation and over-scheduled activity?

Rest rabbit, rest!

Podcast Interviews

So…we’ve been working to line up some interviews for the AC podcast. Thus far we have confirmed Steven Pressfield (author of several books including The War Of Art), Stephen Nachmanovitch (musician, author of Free Play) and Joe Myers (author and entrepreneur.)

We have requested interviews with a few others, but I am curious if there might be others from whom you’d be interested in hearing. Please vote in the comments.

UPDATE:
We’ve just confirmed David Allen of Getting Things Done, and the inimitable Seth Godin as well.

No matter what…

No matter what has happened, no matter what IS happening, no matter how you see yourself or what others tell you, no matter if you’ve succeeded marvelously or failed miserably, no matter the box you’ve built around yourself or the corner you’ve painted yourself into, no matter the dependencies you face everyday, no matter the people who depend on you, no matter that you are free or imprisoned, no matter whether you even believe me or not…

…what happens from here on is completely your call. You can choose how you engage this life.

Engage. Live. Create.  

Fear

"To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong."
Joseph Chilton Pearce Writer and Philosopher

Cause And Effect

I was at Circuit City picking up a gizmo. I used my credit card in the self-swipe device and went to sign. When I did, I saw my hand and I saw the little squiggly lines that were being generated, but there was no connection between the two. None. My signature looked like a 3 year old’s drawing.

I turned to the cashier and asked what I should do, and she said not to worry about it. The signatures aren’t that important anyway.

?!?!?!

Digg it?

So…here’s a shameless plea…

If you can find it in your heart to make it over to Digg and…well…digg the AC podcast, we’ll be forever grateful.

DIGG the AC Podcast!

Wiped Clean

So…yesterday my hard drive started making this…let’s call it “unusual”….sound as I was working. (It was sort of like a mocking cackle.)

Being somewhat Mac savvy and certainly thoroughly experienced on my Powerbook G4, I took matters into my own hands. I did a hard re-boot and waited for that happy Apple to appear.

Nothing. More mocking cackle. Black screen of death.

I then threw the matter to our IT guys, who informed me that there was nothing we could do. Well, almost nothing. We did try freezing the hard drive for a few hours to see if that would bring it back to life, but to no avail.

The long and the short of it is that I lost 6 months of my digital life. (Yes…I know…no backups. Very stupid.) Six months. All of my writings. All of my learnings. All of my work.

Then I realized something - I wasn’t really all that upset.

I’ve lost data before and been VERY upset. EXTREMELY upset. Not so this time. Hmm…

In fact, there was something freeing about this whole thing. I’ve been on a simplicity kick lately and one of the primary targets of my efforts was to be my now deceased Powerbook. Looks like that’s all been taken care of for me.

I’m still in the middle of this whole ordeal. Every six minutes I’ll suddenly realize something else that I’ve lost and it’ll sting for a minute or two. But for the most part, I feel really good. It’s made me realize how much of my life is on that stupid machine. It’s made me realize how dependent I am on technology to get by. It’s made me realize that complete dependability on any kind of machine is foolish.

Most of all, though, it’s made me realize that what I thought was so important and critical to me wasn’t really, and that’s a good feeling.

So…quick poll for all of us:

Just because…

Total time waster. Yet funny. Very funny.

PacMan (via Agenda, Inc.)

Fun thought of the day…

If you want to be on the cutting edge, you must be willing to bleed.

Until you are, you are simply playing at what you do. If you want to do something truly great, however, you must be willing to put yourself out in the open - exposed and unprotected - and behave as if you have nothing to lose.