Related to visual or fine art.
Give it to a friend or hide it in a Geocache. This is a lot of family fun!
Inspired by the STORY conference, and the piece I wrote for the official attendees notebook (on Little Free Libraries), I decided to start telling a very amazing Story of my own. It begins this summer, and unfolds a bit at a time.
Officially, nothing has happened … no advertising or promo blitz… but if you want to poke around, you’ll see some new things. Actually, if you don’t want to poke around and sniff out the new, semi-hidden stuff you won’t much care about what it is in the first place.
Since creativity is married to curiosity you get your creative juices going on adventures, mysteries, discoveries, and treasure hunts of various kinds. It’s hard if not impossible to have one without the other.
I’m up to something, and you can start to find out what it is. But, yes, it’s all up to you. And I’m not worried about spreading the word because it’s the anti-release…A good Story doesn’t need the same kind of advertising. It grows its own legs and walks the Story around for you.
There will be more revealed throughout the summer. Stop back when you can.
one more thing, by way of introduction (anti-introduction)….
The first phase has everything to do with “the letterbox”. You know, that old thing that holds bills and circulars, political flyers, and sometimes the random greeting card.
When was the last time opening the mail was magical?
Perhaps Now?
(There is a contest running all summer. See if you can find the tab under “Spark My Muse!”)
Today is about stealing.
Jeff Goings will tell you today that the 6th habit of great writers is their propensity to steal. I agree. They (we) don’t always realize they (we) do it, but at least a bit is stolen.
We all have hidden influencers, as much as we have recognized models we admire or even imitate.
The brilliant thinkers of the ancient world told of the Muses. The daughters of the gods gave mortals inspiration. Creativity was borrowed. Co-opted. It was not a product of spontaneous generation. It neither started nor ended with a human. Genius wasn’t characteristic of a person, but of an influence.
There is but one true source for creation and creativity Theos …deity.
In Christianity, a monotheist Source.
It’s all a heist, my friends. A beautiful heist. The more personal of twist we put on the process and delivery the less it’s identifiable as stealing.
Now, it’s your turn:
Do you agree?
Who or what have been your biggest influencers?
And what are some of your possible hidden influencers?
Photo Credit: Emre Ergin via Compfight
I wanted to call attention to a fascinating article from my bud, Ed featured at Prodigal Magazine.
Launching from a tumultuous topic that men should “bring in the bacon” Ed talks about cultural constructs, expectations, and his upcoming fatherhood. He also touches on something I’d like to highlight here today. That is, the nature of the artistic personality type. Creatives.
Recently, I watched the season finale of the drama series MADMEN. Megan is married to wealthy ad man Don Draper. She pursues a career as an actress for the love of it. She doesn’t need the money, unlike many of her aspiring thesbian friends. Still, failure is difficult to handle for her.
Whether the stakes are one’s livelihood or one’s artistic ambitions an artist desires to succeed. This time, Megan’s mother rues the fact that Megan has an artistic temperament but not the artistic talent…
But maybe this insight from the artist’s mother doesn’t reveal the whole story…maybe the talents are just unidentified or underperforming at the moment. Maybe the niche hasn’t been discovered or one hasn’t found “the zone” for their artistic endeavors. All the angst that comes with that is immense. Finding our way as creatives is the “epic hero journey” (a la Steven Pressfield) that involves mostly struggle.
Do you have “the artistic temperament”?
What has it cost you?
Photo Credit: Royce Bair via Compfight
• Beauty
• Hope
• Creativity
• Truth (Revealed within all quality artistic expressions)
• Justice
• Love