Wake up your creativity. I am not talking about music or art, although that may apply to. I am talking about getting out of your own way. About dropping old stories and patterns and creating new ones. About creating outcomes of your choosing, on your terms.
Part 1 – What would 20% more mean to you?
Part 2 – Slow down to create more.
Part 3 – Now is the time to lead.
Part 4 - Reevaluate and succeed

You Have the Answers, But…

You really do, inside of you. They may be deep inside. They may be well obscured. But those answers are there. You just can’t always get to them. Most people I meet don’t really know how to slow down, get quiet, and let them come out. They have to learn that. That is normal. It’s understandable. It’s OK. Then to, it is learnable.
There’s the problem of noise. The inverse of the uncluttered mind. Let’s say you would like to improve an important relationship. Let’s face it, it’s about half way busted as it stands today. You remember how it used to be and have a pretty good idea of what you’d like it to be going forward. Your question: How can I make my relationship with X better?

Flesh out the Questions

Now, you are moving towards your own creativity. You see, it’s not just a simple question. There are a whole bunch of questions inside, around, behind, and in front of that one. Maybe start with why this is important in the first place. It may be related to taking business to a higher level. It may be for your own peace and sanity. It may be because you care about someone. It will be because you believe you will feel better in the having of it. It could be because of a sense of obligation, guilt, or who knows what.

Of course, the problem solver’s brain wants to skip all that and go straight to: What should I do? Odds are you would be starting to bypass your creative opportunity. That is probably what you have been doing already. Is that working as well as you would like it to?

The fact is, you may not be ready for the solutions. You may need to sit back and listen a good bit more first. Listen to what is inside. Listen for the noise so you can begin to filter it out. That means asking the inner part of you a whole lot of questions and listening for answers.

Filtering out the Noise

So, let’s say you are ready to take this relationship project on. In a way you never have before. Presumably, this is really, really important. Better slow down and "open in" enough to get that straight from the gitgo.

The energy our words and actions are riding on is always most important. Let’s say I am trying to clarify my questions. And, find some answers. From a place filled with internal noise, what should one expect? I ask people what they’d like to achieve or what their questions is. And they want to start telling me a whole lot of things like what the other person must be thinking. That wasn’t the question. It becomes clear they are filled with frustration, often anger, hurt, desperation, feelings of being unappreciated or disrespected.

That is what I am calling noise. Feelings aren't bad or wrong. They simply are. The primary value in them, at least in this context, is that they are a direct pipeline to what we are thinking. Feelings indicate thoughts.

So, let me get this straight. (A little dialog with myself here to make the point.) I am sitting here spewing my frustrations, disbelief, hopelessness, hurt, whatever it is. I mean, I am not screaming in anger, but my temperature is up. All that judgment, all of those thoughts – those are what I am carrying around with me pretty much all the time. It is in my face more sometimes than others, but I am carrying it around inside of me all the time. That’s the noise. So, I am supposed to stop in the middle of the spewing and find all the questions and answers around: How do I create the relationship I would like with X? That just won't work.

Go to Sleep to Wake Up

If you can’t allow the answers. If a lot of things seem harder than they need to be. Start thinking about creating without the noise. Start thinking about getting in a place to receive, and then acting on inspiration.

I started today with the idea of “Wake up to your creativity”. I borrowed that from an article I read recently. In line at the supermarket, Time Magazine had a special edition out on the science of sleep. I have since read it cover-to-cover, and found it really interesting. The articles are scientifically based, drawing on the many sophisticated monitoring and measurement tools now available. The particular chapter on creativity really resonated.

The article discussed mental processing, prioritizing, how different parts of the brain work and so forth. One headline makes the point I care about here: “You, Uncensored.” Think about that. This article effectively says that when we are truly asleep and out of our own way, our creativity comes to life.

The same concept applies fully while we’re awake. If we can let the noise “sleep”, we can put ourselves in place to find a level of answers and grace not often realized. It’s all a process – learning, practicing, and building the skills to experience life in an entirely new way. It's transformational, both in getting to that understanding and where you can go with it. It is all there for you!

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