When the iPad was launched, amid all the huzzahs and hoopla, there were a few murmurs of discontent from the creative community.

“Sure, it looks slick, but you can’t make anything with it.”

“If this isn’t ‘lean back’ media, I don’t know what is.”

‘Lean back’, of course, was a reference to Jakob Nielsen’s well-known distinction between television (‘lean back’ = passive consumption) and the Web (‘lean forward’ = active creation).

So criticisms of the iPad as a ‘lean back’ device were effectively suggesting that Apple was selling out – abandoning its traditional role as the creator of computers for creators, and pandering to the masses, by giving the couch potatoes the ultimate couch surfing device.

Now that the tablet wars are hotting up, the iPad is no longer the only game in tablet town, with the proliferation of different sizes and flavours of Kindle. (Here the line between ‘tablet’ and ‘e-reader’ gets blurred, but the essential form and function – a flat screen for consuming rather than producing media – is the same.)

There’s even a $35 ‘Made in India’ tablet – the Aakash – which is being developed to take tablet computing to people who could never contemplate buying an iPad:

The rich have access to the digital world, the poor and ordinary have been excluded. Aakash will end that digital divide.

Kapil Sibbal, Telecom and Education Minister, India

It looks as though these things are going to be as common as phones, as common as books.

Everywhere you look, people will be surfing, reading, watching, listening: email, websites, books, videos, music; in bed, on the sofa, on the train, on the loo, underwater and in outer space.

So the question posed for creators by the launch of the iPad is only going to get more pressing:

Are these just shiny new objects, distracting us from our real work of creating something meaningful? Or do they offer us something distinctive and valuable, that can help us realise our creative ambitions in new ways?

I’m going to suggest the latter, for two reasons – one of them about you as a creator, the other about your audience.

1. Consumption Is Part of Creation

Since I got a Kindle, I’ve been buying and reading a lot more books: poetry, novels, memoirs, biographies. Books about business, creativity, languages, cultures and social networks. Shakespeare, Milton, H.P. Lovecraft, R.L. Stevenson, David Bowie, Derek Sivers and Chris Brogan.

I’ve spent less time skimming ephemera from the web, and more time reading genuinely thoughtful, fascinating and stimulating writing.

I’ve also taken the time to read some PDF e-books that have been kicking around my ‘to read’ folder for a while. When I’m at the laptop, I’m busy writing, making things and interacting with other people via email and social networks. There’s always something to do, so there’s never time to sit and read a 50 page e-book at the desk.

But reading on the sofa, or a train or plane, is a completely different experience. I have time to slow down and read, not just skim. I’m not in a hurry. I can make notes on the device, and come back to them later. I’m learning a lot. Getting plenty of new ideas.

The iPad has a similar effect, even if you’re just surfing the web. Reading in your leisure time, when you have time to relax, reflect and absorb, is very different to skimming something at work, when you feel like you should really be doing something else.

Is all of this good for creativity? Of course. Because consumption is part of creation.

Garbage in, garbage out. You can’t produce amazing stuff, unless you’re consuming amazing stuff. And a ‘lean back’ tablet will help you do just that.

2. Your Potential Audience Is Growing Exponentially

So tablet computers are making it easier for us to consume digital media, in places more conducive to reading/watching/listening than a work desk. Which is great for creating – but the implications for publishing are even more exciting …

A few years ago, if you were self-publishing digital content – via a blog, newsletter, podcasts, YouTube videos etc – your audience was mainly restricted to geeks.

These days, when the internet has gone mainstream, you can reach a lot more ‘normal’ people (especially if you offer an email subscription as well as RSS). But you’re still reaching them at work, when their attention is divided.

Or maybe on their smart phone, on the commute. But when they get home, they are likely to ditch the small screen for the 30 inch plasma that dominates their living room.

But now there’s a new species in the domestic digital ecosystem. It’s small and unassuming – a mere furry rodent compared to big beasts like the home cinema, hi-fi stack or games console – but it represents a huge opportunity for creators.

Every time someone looks down from the TV and reaches for their iPad, they give you an opportunity.

Every time someone walks past the newsstand and downloads their morning read on the Kindle Fire, they give you an opportunity.

Every time someone browses through the Kindle store, looking for something new and different, they give you an opportunity.

Every time someone puts a low-cost tablet in the hands of a person on the other side of the planet, they give you an opportunity.

As the market for tablets explodes, so does your potential audience. The more people who are consuming digital media, the more people you can reach with your media.

So the game for creators is getting a whole lot bigger – in every sense.

Now, instead of competing for your audience’s attention with spreadsheets, email, and the minutes of last week’s meeting, you are competing with the TV, the DVD player, the PlayStation, the stereo, the bookshelf, the morning paper, and the magazine rack.

Instead of competing with other bloggers in your niche, with Twitter and Facebook, with Foursquare and Angry Birds, you are competing with CNN, the BBC, Mad Men, Kubrick, The King’s Speech, Grand Theft Auto, Beethoven, Lady Gaga, Steinbeck, Picasso, T.S. Eliot, the New York Times, and Wired.

Which raises the bar, does it not?

Because if you’re not as engaging, exciting, educational, entertaining or downright enthralling as the other things on that list, why should people choose to pay attention to you, instead of them?

Daunting? Maybe.

Exciting and inspiring? For a real creator, I should think so.

What Do You Think?

If you own a tablet, do you think it has had a positive or negative effect on your creativity?

Are you excited by the potential of tablet computers to open up your work to new audiences?

What other creative opportunities can you see with the proliferation of tablets?

About the Author: Mark McGuinness is a Coach for Artists, Creatives and Entrepreneurs. For a free 26-week guide to success as a creative professional, sign up for Mark’s course The Creative Pathfinder. And for bite-sized inspiration, add Mark on Google+.

Drawings by Will Kemp

Ever wanted to learn to draw?

Have you daydreamed of just picking up a pencil and sketching?

But inside there is a lingering doubt.

A distant memory of a school teacher who told you once you were bad at art.

An inner critic that holds you back…. Even before you begin.

But what if you could learn to draw?

What if the principles of drawing could help you to become more productive in other areas of your life.

Would you give it a try?

Feel the fear, and draw it anyway.

Productivity is often linked to a fear of failure, an obsession with thinking rather than doing. Of reading one more book or enrolling on one more course until you are ‘ready’.

Learning to draw forces you to face your fears head on and takes you out of your comfort zone.

To draw something, anything, for the first time is scary.

You can feel very vulnerable when your work is out in the open for criticism especially before it is finished.

To get productive you have to push through these blocks, accept it is not going to be perfect and get to work.

A clear sign of procrastination is a blank page so put pencil to paper and the rewards can be fantastic.

To have the confidence to draw out your problems will help you solve them quicker, and to be able to record that view you admired so much on your holiday with a pencil rather than a camera will be priceless.

To be creative you actually have to do something. It involves putting your imagination to work to make something new, to come up with new solutions to problems, even to think of new problems or questions. You can think of creativity as applied imagination.

Ken Robinson, The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything

1. Embracing Mistakes

For a beginner using an eraser is seen as a bad thing, for a professional, it it essential. Mistakes are going to happen every time. Drawing, as with painting is all about refining and adjusting as you progress.

A drawing is never correct the first time. You always have to alter what you first thought was ‘correct’. Areas that you were convinced were perfect sometimes have to be completely repainted or scrapped.

Accepting that whatever you are working on won’t initially be perfect is key to making things happen. Mistakes or “failures” act as a lighthouse guiding a ship into dock. Every tweak adjusts the rudder, giving you a direction in the vast ocean of ideas, initially they will be big adjustments but as you get closer to your destination they will be smaller and smaller.

The trick is to realize that these are all signs of improvement and not to get disheartened.

2. Talent Is Overrated

Beginners often think you need a natural talent for drawing. You don’t.

Drawing is a skill that can be learnt.

Tiger Woods didn’t just pick up a Golf club, swing and hit a hole in one. He practiced and practiced. Don’t give up when your first drawings don’t resemble what you imagined, just see them as a visual diary of your progress.

We often have an in built ‘taste meter’ when we know we can do better, we know our work looks crap, we’re just not sure how to make it better!

This willingness to start something even when you know it won’t be 100% is crucial in becoming more productive.

3. Create More, with Less

To be able to draw a subject accurately you need to fully concentrate, and because of this intense focus, your eyes get tired.

You need to have regular breaks to be able to see the objects correctly. I usually find about 90 minutes is my optimum painting time.

We’re not designed to work for continuous lengths of time, it effects our ability to judge subtle differences and nuances. So work intensely, then make a brew and give your eyes a break.

You don’t get more productive by working more hours, but working intensely in short, focused bursts.

4. The Minimalist Productive

How many new ideas did you have this morning? And how many new articles did you feel you ‘had to read’ before getting started?

Being overwhelmed by the number of options is often worse than no ideas at all.

So tomorrow morning try drawing out your options rather than making a list. The drawings don’t have to be accurate, just a simple stickman will do, but by actually drawing out your issues it can be easier to visualise which direction makes sense.

It is a myth that multitasking makes you more productive. When you are drawing it forces you to focus on the now.

You can’t check email and draw at the same time. So apply these principles to other areas of your work that you try to juggle.

5. Sketch First, Paint Later

Drawing can be extremely effective in working through large scale ideas. And when you start drawing or painting you soon begin to appreciate how a little planning can make a big difference.

The Old masters always made sketches before embarking on a large scale painting. Sculptors make Maquettes (small scale versions of the finished piece) before starting to chisel the marble.

Painting and drawing takes time. And you don’t want to waste your time on a large scale piece if you haven’t tested a few options first.

So think about ideas you are working on and try to work out how you can make a ‘sketch’ of the project. Maybe a novel could be a short story, a jewellery collection could start with just rings. Start small, but think big.

6. A Little and Often

To keep on top of drawing you need to keep a regular schedule, even 5 minutes a day will keep you focused.

This could be on your journey to work, in a lunch break, or in a really boring meeting!

Momentum is key.

The more regularly you draw, the easier it will become.

When I first started my Youtube channel my aim was to post one new video per week. To start with this didn’t seem enough and I was itching to create more or publish more regularly but I forced myself to stick to the rules, one video a week, every week.

If I had decided to try to film one a day or every few days I would have definitely failed.

I’m now at 24 videos in 3 months and counting, this regular but small approach has helped to keep momentum and build the project – what’s more it’s become a habit.

7. Unlocking Your Creativity

Drawing is fantastic at engaging the right hand side of your brain, and if you’re having a creative block, drawing can help to kickstart your mind. To draw accurately you have to fully engage with your right hemisphere of the brain, the left hand side which is more logical and analytical will always try to ‘help’ out by trying to recall memories of objects for you.

It makes assumptions about what it ‘thinks’ is in front of you rather than what actually is there. Learning to draw is actually more about learning to see and discovering a new visual language.

Professor Betty Edward’s states in her book Drawing on the Artist Within:

You will also discover that this new language, when integrated with the language of verbal, analytic thought, may provide the ingredients essential not only for true creativity – that is, new or novel ideas, insights, inventions, or discoveries that have a social value – but also for useful creative solutions to the problems of everyday life.

So next time you find yourself trying to juggle too many things grab a pencil and paper and draw.

You may be surprised to discover the inner artist just waiting to be let out. And your new found productivity will give you the free time needed to indulge in your new creativity!

Over to you

Have you recently faced your fears and learnt a new skill that you’d being putting off for years?

Did you used to draw as a kid but have got out of the habit?

I’d love to hear your story.

About the Author Will Kemp can teach you how to draw. He is shortly starting a new online drawing course for absolute beginners.

So. We have a whole new year spread out before us. Like a pristine sheet of paper.

We can create anything we like, and it feels like we have all the time in the world.

Pretty good huh?

It’s exciting – but like all opportunities, there’s a flipside.

Ask any writer or artist who has spent hours (or days) staring at a blank sheet of paper and they will tell you how paralysing creative freedom can be.

And the freelance life may sound idyllic to those of you who have to report for duty in an office each day, but the freedom to arrange your own time can be just as intimidating as a blank page. (I coach lots of freelancers on this issue – so if you were thinking it was just you, trust me, you’re not alone. )

Paradoxically, the more time and freedom you have, the harder it can be to get started.

Think back to one of those days where it felt like you had all the time in the world to get everything done. So you procrastinated – then found yourself at the end of the afternoon, wondering where the time went.

Look back over the past year – did you achieve everything you set out to? Or did you leave some things till it was nearly too late, so you had to rush them? And were there some things that never got finished at all?

For many people, especially creative types, leaving things to the last minute is a way of life. It’s hard to beat the adrenaline-and-caffeine rush of all-night work sessions as the deadline approaches.

And if you’re happy with that lifestyle, I’m not here to spoil the party. Just like skinning a cat, there are plenty of ways to get creative work done.

But if the magic of deadline magic is starting to wear thin, and you’d rather find a less stressful way of working, I have a little tip for you.

It’s a habit I’ve noticed in a certain type of creative person, who seems to have no issue with deadlines, who never seems to procrastinate, and who gets a hell of a lot more amazing work done than the average person:

Panic early.

Look ahead, work out how much you have to do, and how much time you really have to get it all done. And notice how that makes you feel.

I can almost guarantee you’ll feel a twinge of adrenaline. Not a full-blown panic, but enough of a shot in the arm to give you a sense of urgency about your work.

For example. I’m a ‘morning person’ as far as writing is concerned. There’s a window of about three or four hours each morning, during which I’m more alert and can get more written than during any other time of the day or night.

Combine that with the time I devote to working with clients and doing all the other things I need to do to keep my business running (not to mention family responsibilities), and I know that I never, ever, have more than a few short hours a day to write in.

So if I get to ten o’clock in the morning and I haven’t started writing, it’s time for me to panic. Because I’m on the verge of losing an entire day’s writing. Five more minutes could be fatal!

It works a treat. Some days, that flutter of fear is just what it takes to get me past Resistance (and out of Google Reader) and into creative flow.

It could work for you too. At the start of each day/week/month/year, ask yourself:

1. How much do I want to get done?
2. How much time do I really have to do it in?
3. Can I afford to wait another minute before getting started?

Instead of waiting to the last minute for your adrenaline rush, why not get it while you still have time to put it to good use?

Over to You

Do you ever run out of time to get the important things done?

How do you get yourself to avoid leaving things till the last minute?

Could panicking early help you beat procrastination?

P.S. Last but not least – Happy New Year! I hope 2012 is a creative, productive and rewarding one for you.

About the Author: Mark McGuinness is a Coach for Artists, Creatives and Entrepreneurs. For a free 26-week guide to success as a creative professional, sign up for Mark’s course The Creative Pathfinder. And for bite-sized inspiration, follow Mark on Twitter.

Fittingly, the comment thread turned out to be an inspiration in its own right, with over 100 entries that reminded me what a special group of people read this blog.

We had such a great response that I was glad I’d delegated the difficult task of judging to the artist himself, Mike Kammerling, so that I could simply enjoy the comments for their own sake.

Mike has now chosen the five winners, listed below, who will receive a very limited edition print of his inspiring image, on gorgeous reflective gold card, bearing the words ‘Tinder and Sparks’ and ‘Lateral Action’.

And as a bonus prize and Christmas gift for Lateral Action readers, Mike has kindly provided a hi-resolution graphics file of the image, which you can download for free by clicking here.

You are welcome to share the print with your friends and make use of it in any way you like – printing it, putting it on a t-shirt, using it as screensaver etc – as long as you don’t sell it or otherwise use it commercially.

And Mike’s too modest to say so himself, but I should point out that he has a whole range of creative, funny and inspiring prints on his website, which you can check out here.

So without further ado, here are the winning entries, introduced by Mike.

Thank you to everyone who shared their inspirations for this competition, I’m truly overwhelmed and humbled by the response. It was inspirational in itself to read through your thoughts. To pick people as winners was incredibly hard as everyone had so many beautiful things to say, so I chose responses that spoke to me most directly. To this end the winners are:

• Andrew Halfacre
• Sabrina Luthjens
• Slade Powell
• Wayne
• Daniel

Mike Kammerling
Tinder + Sparks

Winning Entries

Andrew Halfacre

I know this is odd because it also frightens me but I’m inspired by a crisp, good quality blank page, especially if it is in a notebook and even more if I think it would be good to write on with my fountain pen. When ever I see one of these I want to own it and do something with it. They call to me. I have too many. Trouble is, it’s also scary.

Sabrina Luthjens

Things that inspire me:

The grey sea and its smells, the wet wind as it blows
The dark of night turning into orange-pink day
The sound of the first birds as I finish a sentence
The smile on your face when I finally come home

A handshake, a taste
A shiver and drops of sweat
Nature when it’s dying or in full bloom
I have no religion but miracles do happen

Slade Powell

My inspiration comes from a quiet place inside me. If I settle my mind a bit, I can feel this big cavernous space inside my chest that’s not empty, but filled with silence. It’s calming and centering and puts my whole project in perspective, which makes it so simple to get moving on it.

Daniel

Hey everyone!

I just came across this interesting challenge today. The first reaction was to go to the bottom of the page and post my thoughts. But then I realized that too many and random things inspire me so I almost gave up on participating.

But then it instantly hit me – both figuratively and literally – as I realized that one of the most inspirational places and moments for me (as it provides break-through ideas whenever I’m stuck in a project, or generates more pure&powerful solutions when the flow of ideas is already good) is when I am sitting on the toilet. So, there you have it. My place of absolute inspiration in its most purest form. (I did not transform this into a technique or a method, but I embrace the gift whenever the “the calling” happens during a creative process.)

Wayne

At the Edge

I am at my best at the edge
A place of challenge and creativity, curiosity and change
A place both attractive and scary.
A place between past and future, pregnant with possibility

I am at my best at the edge
At the edge I can see all kinds of things I can’t see from the middle – glimpses of journeys that I might take.

My dictionary defines the edge as:

a rim or brink
the point at which something is likely to begin
the area or part away from the middle
a margin of superiority; an advantage
a provocative or discomforting quality

My edge is all of those things and more – more than any dictionary definition could capture

But my edge keeps changing.
It is not always where I expect it to be.
It is different to others’ edges so I am often at the edge on my own or with people I have yet to know.

There is no comfort at the edge.
It’s not possible to be comfortable and at the edge at the same time.

Every so often I need to step back from the edge
into the realm of comfort and complacency.
A place to rest from the rigours of being at the edge.
But soon I tire of this and find myself back at the edge.

Join me at your edge
and together we can create the impossible
That can only happen at the edge.

For more inspiration, read through the 100+ weird, wonderful, funny and practical descriptions of Lateral Action readers’ inspirations on the competition comment thread.

Thank you Mike, congratulations to the winners and a Merry Christmas one and all!

Photo by lulemon athletica

Let’s face it. We all get out of creative shape from time to time.

Just as an athlete quickly loses fitness without training, so your creative stamina will fade away if you don’t work at maintaining it – every week, if not every day.

So when you get out of the discipline of regular creative work, what stops you getting started again?

Is it because of work? School? Home? Family? Other commitments? Gossip Girls? The New 90210 (the original was much better)? Or some other excuse?

Oh I know – you have no time. That’s got to be it.

Your latest novel, blog post, painting, sculpture, business venture or website is just waiting for your time. That’s got to be it, since you used to be creative. You used to find the time but now, life has gotten in the way.

With kids, your job or just something good on TV, your life is too full to create. Well, I’m here to tell you that you do have the time – you just have to find it.

Finding the time is the first step in getting back into creative shape. The second step, is to build up your creative endurance.

Creative endurance is just like athletic endurance. No one ever runs a marathon on their first run – or even their tenth. You have to build up to it by training. That same training is what you need to get back into your creative swing. Sure, it’s going to be hard. Sure, you will struggle, but once you have your creative endurance back, creating will be a whole lot easier and more enjoyable.

Barriers to Building Your Creative Endurance

One of the biggest barriers most people face is the perfection fallacy. We trick ourselves into not creating because what we create is either ‘not good enough’ or ‘not perfect’. Let’s dispel this right now.

Most of the stuff you will create will be awful. In fact, it will take creating all that awful stuff to actually make something good. Doing all this ‘throw away’ work is called practice. Every creative person needs it – from Picasso to Rembrandt to Warhol to Kors (yeah, the guy on Project Runway).

Practice makes us better. It allows us to hone our skills and find our creative voice. As a writer, I throw away countless words, sentences, posts and even book outlines simple because my direction changes or it just did not work. All that creative flotsam and jetsam is still valuable because it’s practice and practice makes me better.

Our second barrier is time. For some reason, no one ever has enough time. You always here excuses like:

When the kids go to school, I’ll start to paint.

I have a deadline at work. After that I will go write.

I just don’t have time to compose my next score because I commute two hours a day

My family comes first and I have to support and nurture them.

You know, my computer sounds funny. I better get that checked out.

Did I miss any?

Go ahead, pick your favorite excuse. Write it on a piece of paper and then burn it. That’s right. Burn it.

Now you have no more excuses.

Didn’t that feel good? It should, because you just got rid of a big barrier. Now let’s look at the six steps to building your creative endurance.

Step 1: Write Down What You Do in a Day

The first step in building your creative endurance is to find time to create.

Take out a piece of paper and write down everything you do in the course of the day. Pick any day you want and start when you wake up and finish when you go to sleep.

Step 2: Look For Gaps and Non-Value-Added Activities

Now, look at the list. I guarantee you that there are activities on that list that add no value to your life. Maybe it’s the one hour commute each way, or watching reality shows, or maybe all those silly work meetings. These add no value to your life. Whatever those activities are, circle them.

See any you can eliminate? C’mon, be honest with yourself. You know there are certain things you either hate to do, don’t want to do or do out of habit. I dare you to pick at least one. Just one activity that you want to either reduce or eliminate so that you can create. I know you want to be more creative and the first step is to find the time. So look hard and be honest with yourself.

Step 3: Schedule 10 Minutes to Create

So you found at least one activity you can eliminate or at least reduce. That’s great. Now you need to use that time to create.

The minimum amount of time you need to build your creative endurance is 10 minutes a day. A measly 10 minutes a day. It’s probably half the time you spent reading this post or the time it takes you to flip through those gazillion cable channels to figure out what to watch.

Once you have picked your 10 minute slot, create a big sign that says ‘Creative Time’ and the time you selected. For those 10 minutes, all you will do is create.

Step 4: Set a Creative Goal

After a couple of weeks of creative endurance building, you now need to set a goal. All athletes set goals – they’re called races. Races are great goals since they bring together like minded people who have the same goals as you – so you all get to have fun and finish the race.

Be realistic in setting your creative goal. Remember, you have 10 minutes a day to work on it and this goal should be no longer than two months out.

Oh, one more thing. Tell your best friend, spouse or co-workers about your creative goal. Actually, better yet, write down your creative goal, along with the date it’s due and hand it to them. Make them post it on the fridge or in a place that everyone can see.

I know that many of you are shaking your heads right now. You don’t want to publicly commit to your creative endeavor. Don’t be afraid of this. You want to create. Your friends and family want you to create. You need their support to keep you on track. It’s just like being on a sports team. Sometimes, you really don’t feel like practicing but you can’t bring yourself to let the team down.

Your creative team needs you as well. All your friends, family, co-workers and yes, even your boss, wants you to be happy and creative – it makes you a better person and in turn a better spouse, father, mother, friend and worker.

Step 5: Publish, Sell or Give Away Your Creation

Once you hit your creative goal, publish, sell or give it away. You would be surprised at how much joy you can bring to someone’s life by giving them a piece of art or sharing a story you wrote.

No art is too small to be art nor to small to make a difference. In fact, you don’t need to be Piscacco to be an artist – you just have to get your work out there for others to enjoy. That’s it. That’s all.

Nothing fancy like putting it in a gallery or anything like that. In fact, at Etsy you can build your own creative store front easily and sell your creations to people all over the world.

Step 6: Expand Incrementally

Doesn’t creation feel great? Sure, you might have stumbled a bit, your first tries were probably a wreck and I’m sure you probably cheated a day or two (come on, admit it ).

The thing to be proud of is that you achieved something. You are building your creative endurance – 10 minutes a day. Pretty soon you will be up to 20, then 30 and then who knows.

Keep up this discipline even when you don’t want to. Challenge yourself to do something creative, anything creative, at least 10 minutes a day. You will be amazed at what you can achieve.

Over to You

Do you ever get out of creative shape? What are the tell-tale signs?

Which of these steps would make the biggest difference to your creativity if you applied it?

Any other tips for getting back into creative shape after you’ve let things slide?

About the Author: Jarie Bolander is an engineer by training, entrepreneur by nature and leader by endurance. His new site, EnduranceLeader.com combines two of this passions – leadership and endurance athletics. By enduring, we conquer our fears, challenges and create magnificent things. You can follow him on Twitter or on Facebook.

EDIT: The competition is now closed for entries. Mike will choose the winners and we’ll announce them here on the blog shortly.

OK the holiday season is upon us, so it’s time for some fun.

Designer and Lateral Action writer Mike Kammerling has kindly created a limited edition of five inspirational prints for Lateral Action readers, which we’re giving away on the blog – so read on for details of how to win one.

The prints feature Mike’s treatment of the opening words of Homer’s Odyssey, as the poet appeals to the Muse for inspiration:

Sing in me, Muse

Whether or not you take the idea of the Muse literally, I think we can all relate to the experience of a certain indefinable something – call it inspiration, the unconscious mind, the creative zone, or whatever – that takes over at certain times and touches our creative work with a little unexpected magic.

As a poet myself, I love Mike’s choice of subject and his treatment of the text. And we’ve debated the idea of the Muse on more than one occasion here on Lateral Action, so I was delighted when he approached me with the idea of giving the prints away on the blog.

For the competition, Mike has created an extremely limited edition of five copies of the print, featuring the name ‘Lateral Action’ as well as ‘Tinder and Sparks’ (Mike’s own brand), and printed on luxurious reflective gold card.

For more detailed shots of the print, visit this page of Mike’s site.

For a chance of winning one of these prints, all you have to do is leave a comment on this post telling us what inspires your creativity.

We’ll leave the comments open for one week, and after that Mike will chose the five winners. (And he’s kindly volunteered to ship these to wherever you live in the world.)

Here’s Mike explaining why he chose these words:

I was reading the posts about Muses on Lateral Action and, drunk on the words, the first line of Homer’s Odyssey came to me. I remember thinking it would make a rather good print, and sat on the idea for a while until it worked its way into a style of its own.

So I thought I would give something back by giving some prints away, since I really owe its existence to this blog. And, of course, my own Muse.

If you’d like one of Mike’s prints to hang on your wall to remind you of that little spark of inspiration we’re all seeking, leave a comment below telling us what inspires you.

Comments will be open until the end of next Monday 12 December. After that Mike will choose the winners, who will be announced here on Lateral Action.

It could be a person, a place, a time of day, a mood, a piece of music or an artwork. It could be something sophisticated and artistic – or something as down-to-earth as the need to pay next month’s bills.

Don’t worry if it’s not something lofty and Romantic – Mike tells me he’s interested in hearing about what really inspires you, however magical OR mundane!

Thanks to Mike for such a generous gift, and good luck with your entries!

About the Artist: Mike Kammerling is a graphic designer, blogger and wide-eyed boy, whose mission at Tinder + Sparks Design is to make business beautiful. You can find more musings on design and creativity at his design blog and on Twitter.

When you set out to earn a living from your creative talent, you will inevitably encounter obstacles.

Over the past week, I’ve been hearing about plenty of these, from students in the process of signing up for the Creative Entrepreneur Roadmap. So I thought it would be helpful to share three of the most common roadblocks to success I’ve been hearing about, and offer solutions to them.

Roadblock #1. Technophobia

“I don’t get on with technology.”

“I’m not a geek.”

“The internet is like a foreign country to me.”

“It feels antisocial to spend all that time on the computer.”

I hear this kind of objection a lot, and to me it’s based on a fundamental misunderstanding of what the internet and related technologies are really about.

Let’s start with the fundamentals:

• People are critical to the success of your creative business.
• Realising your ambitions means finding the right people – collaborators to co-create with you, and customers to buy the finished results.
• The more creative and original your business is, the more picky you have to be about the people you work with, and the people you sell to.

You have high standards, so when it comes to creative collaboration, you want to work with the very best people you can find.

And you are not creating your artworks, products or services for everyone. You are creating them for the discerning ones – the ones with the particular tastes you can satisfy, or the very specialist problems you solve.

So you are looking for a very special class of person. And the chances are these people are not all located in your home town. Even if you live in a big cosmopolitan city, where the odds are better of finding your ‘right people’, it can still be a struggle to find enough of them to keep your business afloat, let alone thriving.

And there has never been a better place, network or system for finding the right kind of people than the internet.

When I started coaching artists and creatives in London in the mid-nineties, in spite of the fact it’s a relatively Bohemian city, finding my ideal clients was like looking for a needle in a haystack. I found some, and they were a delight to work with – but I had to take on other work (psychotherapy, copywriting, corporate consulting) to keep the show on the road.

Today, my websites, courses and newsletters are read by people across the globe. And not just any people – interesting, creative, inspiring and motivated creative people. People like you.

You are my ideal audience, and it’s thanks to the magic of the internet that you are reading this now.

That same magic can help you find YOUR perfect readers, collaborators and customers – people you love to work with. People you love to help and inspire. People who LOVE what you do.

So please don’t be put off by the technology!

Fundamentally, the internet is about connecting people. Yes, we need technical tools to facilitate this, but don’t get hung up on the tools – focus on their purpose, which is basically social. And you’ve known how to be social for years now!

And the tools are getting simpler year after year. When I started my own online adventure six years ago, the technical learning curve was steeper than it is now – I spent a lot of time on html and css forums, which I don’t need to bother with any more. If a poet and ‘people person’ like me can get my head around the technology, so can you.

Roadblock #2. Assuming the Internet Is Only for Digital Entrepreneurs

“But I don’t have an online business.”

“I sell real products, not ebooks.”

“I’m a local business, what use is it to me to have an audience all over the world?”

Again, I hear this kind of statement a lot. But, surprisingly, in some ways online marketing is simpler and easier for people selling physical products or artworks than it is for those of us selling digital products and online consulting.

Firstly, remember what I just said about the internet – it’s an amazing tool to help you find the right customers and collaborators for your business. And people are just as important to bricks’n'mortar businesses as they are to purely online ones.

Secondly, if you’re creating information products and using content marketing to market them, then you face tricky decisions about what to charge for, and what to give away for free.

But if you’re selling stone sculptures, or ceramics, or running live classes in your studio, it’s fairly obvious you can’t make those available as a free download from your website.

So that frees you up to be generous and have fun creating digital marketing content to promote your physical products/artworks or face-to-face services.

Thirdly, you may have noticed that most local businesses are clueless about online marketing. Even if your customers are not the most web-savvy people, they probably at least use Google to search for products and services – and even a modestly popular and link-worthy website should make it relatively easy to outrank most of your competitors on local search.

And when customers land on your site, they will likely be impressed if, instead of the usual ‘brochure site’, they see original and engaging media content, as well as signs of live interaction with other readers, in the form of comments, subscriber count, and links to busy profiles on Twitter, Facebook etc.

Finally, you may be surprised what new opportunities open up for your business once you set out your virtual stall and plug in to worldwide creative networks.

When I started blogging back in 2006, I was simply looking for coaching and consulting clients in London. I’d never have dreamed it would lead to me delivering coaching sessions and courses to students scattered around the globe. Or to partnering and running a business with people I’d never met in person. Some days I still have to pinch myself.

This part is the hardest to picture in advance, since by definition you don’t know what unknown opportunities may be out there for you. But if you do take the plunge and start attracting an audience and growing your network online, be prepared for unexpected and magical things to happen…

As networked technology becomes ever more integrated into our daily lives, the boundaries between ‘online’ and ‘offline’ will continue to blur and fade away. So one of the best things you can do for your business – wherever it’s located – is to embrace social media tools as a means of getting yourself found (and recommended) by your ideal customers.

Roadblock #3. Letting the Pressure Get to You

Working for yourself is hard. Knowing that the buck stops with you brings a unique type of pressure. Responsibility is the price you pay for the freedom and opportunities you enjoy as a creative entrepreneur. But it doesn’t have to crush you.

It’s obviously important to take care of yourself for personal reasons. And when you’re running a creative enterprise, there is a compelling business case for doing so: you are your own biggest asset.

Unless you are grounded, happy and energized, you won’t be able to maintain the high-level creativity that is the true source of value for your business.

So how can you do that? Here are three ways that work together and reinforce each other.

Firstly, you need some kind of daily practice that keeps you grounded and in touch with your body, your feelings and the physical environment.

It could be a formal meditation practice, or a body-centred discipline like yoga or tai chi. It could be physical exercise, making something with your hands, or even just a quiet stroll in the fresh air.

And when I say ‘daily’ practice, I mean every single day. Skip a day, and you could easily find yourself not having done it for a month – and feeling more anxious and less grounded as a result.

Secondly, make sure you have several hours of ‘digital downtime’ – with no connection to the internet – every day. And yes, that includes the phone – I call this ‘put-the-phone-down-time’.

And thirdly, spend plenty of time with people who care about you, who are fun to be around, and have nothing to do with your business.

Do all three of these, regularly, and you’ll find yourself much better equipped to handle the ups and downs of running your own business. Not only that, you’ll retain that vital spark of creativity and enthusiasm that will bring you a constant source of great new ideas – and make you a remarkable person to do business with.

If you’d like to be first to know when the course is offered in 2012 – and to receive plenty of free education to help you succeed as a creative professional – sign up for my Creative Pathfinder newsletter here.

Photo by raneko

A few years ago I felt like a liability to my business.

I was working as a consultant, running coaching and training programs for large corporations. I worked really hard to do a professional job and project a professional image.

I had a smart suit, smart shirt and tie, and carried a smart briefcase. We had a professional logo on our business cards, brochures and slide deck.

And I’d learned enough business lingo to understand what people were talking about, and couch my suggestions in terms they understood.

But I had a secret.

I was a poet.

In case you’re wondering, this isn’t the kind of thing that will help you bond with a group of middle managers or warehouse foremen on a wet Monday morning. So I kept it quiet.

I also tried to keep a lid on my flights of fancy during training sessions. But they kept slipping out – I’d get bored with the usual corporate anecdotes, and illustrate my point by drawing an analogy with aliens, or cavemen, or those little creatures that live in volcanic chimneys at the bottom of the ocean and aren’t dependent on sunlight for their energy.

One time this happened, I noticed the blank stares and asked the assembled managers:

Tell me honestly: Do I seem a bit strange to you?

They all nodded, smiling sympathetically.

I finally took the hint, took off the suit and went to work in the creative industries. It was a relief to ‘come out’ as a poet and start talking about my creative enthusiasms to people who actually shared them.

I remember my first sales call under my new identity – to Chris Arnold, creative director and founding partner of an ad agency.

When I told Chris I wanted to help his team develop their creativity, he was pretty blunt:

Chris: Do you do anything creative yourself, or are you one of these consultants who just tells other people how to be creative?

Me: Well, I write poetry…

Chris: [Bursts out laughing] I’ve never had a sales call from a poet before! Why don’t you come in for a chat?

What had once been a liability was now an asset.

Reveal What’s Already There

I was by no means the first creative person to discover the benefits of revealing a little more of the ‘real me’.

The Beatles did pretty well as loveable mop-tops, but they became a lot more interesting when the took off the matching suits and let down their hair.

Kraftwerk released three experimental albums in the so-called ‘Krautrock’ style before getting into their electro-pop stride with Autobahn, appearing on stage immobile behind synthesizers, their voices distorted by vocoder effects.

The technical term for projecting an image like this is ‘branding’. Now you probably hate the word ‘brand’ as much as I do, because of its horrible advertising associations.

But I’m not talking about dreaming up some tacky marketing gimmick. Just being aware that when you go out into the world as an artist, creator or small business owner, you inevitably project some kind of public image – and it’s in your interest to make sure it’s an image you’re comfortable with, that communicates what you’re all about.

And the thing is, if you’re a creative person, chances there are already aspects of your character or your business that would make you fascinating and charming to the right people – if they knew about them.

So rather than try to concoct an artificial ‘brand’ based on the way you think you’re supposed to be, I suggest you have a good look at what makes you genuinely unique and different – and find a way to communicate that to your audience.

When you focus on revealing what’s already there, instead of adding on something extra, your branding becomes a revelation.

A Creative Brand Is Born

Jarie Bolander had a decent website going over at TheDailyMBA.com, writing about innovation, entrepreneurship and technical management. Jarie really knows his stuff, and he was putting out some solid advice. But he felt he wasn’t reaching his full potential and couldn’t put his finger on what he needed.

This was the scenario Jarie emailed me, for one of the Orienteering sessions for my Creative Entrepreneur Roadmap program.

Looking at his site, I was impressed by his writing and passion for his subject. But I agreed that he wasn’t quite grabbing his readers by the scruff of the neck.

Then I read this:

I am an Endurance Athlete: Which means I spend a inordinate amount of time working out. This frustrates my wife to no end since she can’t figure out why I am not rail thin. The truth is, I eat like crap. I’m working on fixing that but it’s hard as hell since that is one of the benefits of working out so much.

Now I was intrigued. I felt I had a glimpse of a real person, full of enthusiasms and energy, who was probably a lot of fun to be around. Even the fact he could be frustrating was endearing – at a distance.

“So what exactly is endurance athletics?” I asked him.

It’s basically any athletics event that is so demanding you have to eat while you’re doing it in order to finish.

Now I was fascinated. I’d never done anything like that. I didn’t know anyone else who had done anything like that.

Why would you want to do that?

What’s it like?

How do you get through it?

Is it popular?

Are you mad?

The questions kept coming. This is a genuinely fascinating subject – even if, like me, you have no intention of ever doing an endurance athletics event yourself.

And as Jarie pointed out, “Being an endurance athlete is great training for managing innovation and technical people.”

1. Sometimes, it’s just not your day: There are days that seem to drag on and go nowhere. Your heart is just not into it and you want to stop. This struggle makes you stronger if you don’t let it kill you.
2. Attitude is everything: I have competed with blind people, one-armed people, one-legged people and even people in wheelchairs. All had a great attitude. They took what life gave them and ran with it. No excuses. No complaints.
3. We are all in this together: The best part about competitions are the complete strangers that cheer you on and your fellow athletes. For some reason, it always happens when I want to give up or stop. Encouraging people allows us to prop each other up. It’s infectious. Their success is our success.

When you put it like that, endurance athletics is the perfect metaphor for leadership – or come to that, for achieving anything significant. It demands commitment, persistence, practice, cameraderie, a sense of humour and the ability to endure pain for long periods.

“Jarie”, I said to him, “you have to do something with this”. We batted the idea back and forth via email and some coaching sessions, and worked it up into a new identity for his next venture:

EnduranceLeader.com was born.

Once he took this aspect of his character and placed it centre stage, several things happened for Jarie:

He got to paint his site in snazzy colours

The Endurance Leader logo and theme isn’t designed for harmony. It’s jazzy and snazzy and in-your-face, like the sight of athletes running past in day-glo running kit, proclaiming how fit and active and pushing-the-limits they are, compared to the rest of us bumbling along on in our comfort zone on the pavement. Like it or not, you notice it.

His creativity was unleashed

Jarie found endurance athletics-themed ideas for articles pouring out of him, including:

• The Endurance Athlete’s Creed
• 7 Leadership Mantras Honed By Endurance Athletes
• 52 Marathons in 52 Weeks: on the Road with Endorphin Dude
• 3 Letters Every Endurance Athlete Dreads and So Should You

He has a sustainable source of energy for his business

One of the biggest challenge facing creative freelancers and entrepreneurs is simply keeping going, month after month, in the face of distractions, obstacles, pain and adverse conditions.

And if Jarie doesn’t know about that stuff from running, cycling and swimming ridiculously long courses in all weathers, I don’t know who does.

So not only does the Endurance Leader brand give Jarie the chance to enthuse about one of his favourite topics, it allows him to harness all the learnings he’s gained through his athletics for the benefit of his business – and his audience.

How to Reveal Your Own Creative Brand

Here are some questions to help you identify the quirky, fascinating, charming or plain odd aspects of your personality or company that can help you reveal a more enticing image to your audience:

What are your passions?

Have you ever been the odd-one-out in a group? What made you different?

Do you have a secret passion, that you only reveal to trusted friends?

What stories do your friends keep repeating about you?

Do you ever bore your friends and family with your enthusiasms? Is there another group of people who could be charmed by them?

What do your customers or clients say about you – especially when they are referring new business to you?

Who Can You Be Now?

Who or what are your favourite creative personalities or brands?

Have you ever reinvented your public image?

How do you like the idea of revealing a new dimension of yourself in your communications?

But the changes have created some amazing new opportunities for writers – and CJ Lyons is living proof.

CJ is a Pediatric ER Doctor turned bestselling author of ‘thrillers with heart’.

In this audio interview I talk to her about how she published her novel Blind Faith direct to Kindle and promoted it to her audience of passionate fans via her website and mailing list.

She asked her readers to help her ‘make a dream come true’ by breaking into the Amazon Top 20. In the event, they responded with such enthusiasm that her novel reached No.2 on the New York Times Bestseller List, selling well over 200,000 copies.

As you can imagine, those legions of enthusiastic fans didn’t come from nowhere overnight. CJ worked really hard to attract them – and deliver such a great experience that they were only too eager to snap up her latest book.

CJ took The Creative Entrepreneur Roadmap course in January 2011. I’m always thrilled to hear students’ success stories, so I was delighted when she told me what she’d been up to with the ideas from the program.

I was even more pleased when she kindly agreed to share her story. By the end of the conversation I was buzzing, and I know you’ll feel the same way after spending some time with CJ.

In the interview CJ explains:

• How she found time to write novels while working a punishing schedule as an ER Doctor
• A very unusual way to promote a book (the paper variety)
• The wrong way – and the right way – to build a mailing list of thousands of readers
• Why it pays to be generous to your fans
• The path she followed to reach No.2. on the New York Times Bestseller List – with a novel she published direct to Kindle

To listen to the interview – and to be first to know when I shortly open The Creative Entrepreneur Roadmap to a new group of students – enter your email address in the box below and hit the magic button.

Email:

We respect your email privacy

(If you can’t see the form, click here to get your copy of the interview.)

To see what all the fuss is about visit CJ’s fiction website CJLyons.net. And for writing tips and advice visit her No Rules Just Write website.

I’ll shortly be opening the doors to a new group of students for The Creative Entrepreneur Roadmap – an in-depth course shows you how to succeed as an independent 21st-century creative.

If you’d like to be first in line when the doors open – and to listen to CJ’s success story – just enter your email address in the form and hit the button.