Fred Mandell | Author | Artist | Speaker |

Paradoxes

2012-02-01T09:00:00.001-05:00

In this bloutcher (where Art, Life Change and Leadership intersect)

Paradoxes
The Coach's Studio; Where OutRaGEouSLY Creative Coaching Happens

Paradoxes

The dictionary defines paradox as a statement that is seemingly contradictory or opposed to common sense and yet is perhaps true.

I have spoken before about being both lost and found at the same time. A paradox? When I am doing my art I am lost because I have a sense that I do not know what I am doing or where I am going. I push myself beyond where I have been and so I have no compass. Yet I am found because I know that this is the journey I am meant to be on.

But there are many more paradoxes in my life.

I seek coherence and practice disruption. That is the nature of creating art. In so far as art is language, it is also story, narrative. Perhaps in a very different language than we are familiar with, but language nonetheless. So we must always seek new forms of language that disrupt and reinterpret old language. Living in this paradox is also in the nature of growing as a human being. We grow more whole by disrupting our comfortable but incomplete selves.

In the process of creating art I both believe and am permeated by self doubt. I believe in what I am doing but am invaded by self doubt in my ability to pull it off. I don't think this is confined to art.

And so I succeed and fail at the same time. I try, fall short (fail), try again, and again, and again until I realize a small redemptive success. At least in my eyes. I believe success and failure are the ying and yang of creativity.

Sometimes I create by doing nothing. I daydream. I sit and wonder and stare, hands folded on my lap. I am very still. I am doing nothing. And ideas seep in. A pathway opens up. Imagination begins to play. It is all a wonder and magic. There I am doing nothing and creating at the same time.

I honor my antecedents by breaking with them. I study the work of the great masters. I am captivated, mesmerized, seduced by Rembrandt, Vermeer, Velasquez, Goya, Soutine, Kollwitz, de Kooning. I want to be able to do what they do. Of course, it is hopeless. I know I can't. I am humbled by their work. I breathe it in. And yet...something different comes out of me.

So how about you? Where does paradox show up in your life? What form does it take? Think of at least one paradox in your life.

Then let me know. Shoot me an email with your thoughts.

Then we can think about why paradox is important in our lives and what role it plays and possibly how paradox sparks creativity, growth and wonder.

The Coach's Studio; Where Outrageously Creative Coaching Happens

We're live!

We launch February 29th

Check it out here!

And receive a special introductory offer.

We are working on a first come, first serve basis.

Or, if you have questions, shoot me a note by replying to this email.

Tagline 2012

2012-01-11T11:00:00.001-05:00

My Bloutcher
Where Art, Life Change and Leadership Intersect

Tagline
2012
An Overt Promotion

Tagline

As you can see I have added a tagline to my bloutcher. Now granted this tagline still leaves a pretty broad canvas. It is, however, more descriptive than let's say "All About Chocolate" or "The Economy and American Humor" or "Your Mamma's Guide to Politics."

I've added this tagline because it hopefully weaves a string of cohesion through my various entries. Over this past holiday I eyeballed past bloutchers, asking myself, what holds the bloutchers together? Why do folks continue to read it and send me many amazing thoughts and responses? And "Where Art, Life Change and Leadership Intersect" just bubbled to the surface. So there you have it. This is where I spend most of my time--at this intersection. It gives me license to travel the open road. From your responses I sense that I am not on this trip alone. I hope we will continue to share the journey.

Let me know what your 2012 tagline is!

So What's Up in 2012?

I am going to be focusing on two things:

Coaching for Life Change Artists. I am very excited about this program. I have joined forces with my co-author Kathy Jordan and coach extraordinaire Donna Krone to create a totally engaging online training program for coaches based upon our book Becoming a Life Change Artist. This program has been a response to the many inquiries we have received asking for training on the tools, concepts and techniques in the book. So voila! Personally, I think this program will change the way you look at EVERYTHING. To see an overtly promotional description of the program check the PROMO section below. Let me know if you are interested or know of others who might be. We are aiming to launch on February 29th.

My Painting. This one has me frightened because it raises the question: What if my vision outstrips my talent? Well, to begin--my "talent" is still being developed. I am a student. Is this too large an aspiration for this stage in my development? My vision is to

create a three dimensional visual experience--using both sides of the canvas laced with words, images, annotations--that chronicles family history using the traditionally two dimensional form of painting on canvas. There is a principle floating around that says you should begin with the end in mind. Well, broadly speaking, I just stated the vision, the end I have in mind. However, I have no idea how to get there or what it will ultimately look like. Do I proceed anyway? Or, do I develop my talent further before undertaking such a project? So I look to another principle. I am a believer in the principle that you develop your talent by doing the thing you want to develop your talent in. You may do it badly at first, but you will never get to do it well unless you first do it badly. So I'm off and running, uneasiness in the pit of my stomach, but off and running nonetheless. Here are photos of sections of a couple of canvases I have begun to work on. Unfinished, for sure.

Overt Promo:

Are you a coach?

Do you consider coaching an art form? A creative process? An empowering relationship? An act of co-creation?

Then I am excited to extend an invitation to you to sign up for The Coach's Studio. This highly engaging, interactive, content rich program is design to help you help your clients see their lives and possibilities in entirely new ways. You will notice changes in your own creative growth as well. We will show you how to take many of the creative secrets of the Great Masters of Art and apply them to your coaching relationships and practice.

Along with co-author Kathy Jordan and coach Donna Krone, CPC, we have created this program specifically for coaches in response to the many requests we have received to develop a training program that shows how to apply the tools, techniques and concepts from our award winning book Becoming a Life Change Artist to their practice.

Don't take it from me. Nationally recognized author and executive coach Richard Leider has said of Becoming a Life Change Artist that it is "one of those rare books that change the way you think about, well, everything." We have now brought the same perspective to our online training program.

Here is what you receive:

9 topic online, self paced, interactive, content rich training program, designed to be completed over a 10 week time frame
Access to the Life Change Artist Community Forum
4 scheduled teleconference calls with Fred, Kathy and Donna
"Skills at a Glance," showing which creati ve skills and exercises to use in various coaching situations
License, upon completion, to use all material with clients. Use of Life Change Artist Logo affiliated with your website
Affiliate status so you can earn additional revenues by referring other coaches to the program
A special rate to bring clients through the program
A right to use The Coach's Studio pre-formatted workshops

Sound interesting? Well, here are the many benefits of the program:

Client Benefits:

You can take your clients through parts or all of the program
Clients will view change and challenge as a creative opportunity
Clients will have a framework for developing their creative skills
Clients will have access to fun, interactive exercises which move them toward deep personal insight
Clients develop new imaginative capabilities and gain fresh perspective
Clients are emboldened to take appropriate risks
Clients deepen their appreciation of the pow er of collaborative relationships
Clients connect with a deeper self

Economic/Practice Benefits:

Coaches realize the savings and convenien ce of participating from your own office
Coaches gain access to the collective wisdom of experts and the group
Coaches can realize potential expanded revenue sources from existing clients, acquiring new clients, conducting group programs, affiliate fees
Coaches can leverage marketing position as a Life Change Artist licensee
Coaches have access to new and unique portfolio of tools, concepts and resources

Professional Benefits:

Meet like minded professionals and fellow travelers
Learn best practices
Enjoy fun and highly interactive exercises
Control the where and when through flexibility and ease of use
Find collaborative opportunities
Expand your professional network

Personal Benefits:

Stimulates new levels of personal and prof essional creativity
Enhances your personal confidence
Connects your creativity to your spirituality
Energizes you personal relationships

And what exactly is the offer?

We are making the full program available for a limited time period to a limited number of coaches initially at $398.50. This is half the full price of $797 when we go to a full launch. The program kicks off on February 29th. This special offer will end when we launch the program.

If you are interested or have questions please send me an email at famandell@verizon.net

My Life in 69 Seconds

2011-12-13T09:00:00.000-05:00

My Life in 69 Seconds

So here's how it happens. Someone sends me a link to a video which shows different famous artists morphing into each other. I think it's pretty cool but don't do anything about it.

Then that in-between-time rolls around--between Thanksgiving and New Years--and I find myself reflecting about the year just ending, the upcoming new year, life, getting older, what really matters. You know it. You probably experience similar stirrings. And then the video comes back into my thoughts and I wonder what my life would look like in a flash. Not quite a flash, but if a video were to show my life, one second for each year I have been alive. The question I am asking myself is: Who am I looking at in each of these images? So here it is: My Life in 69 Seconds. Click here.

Here's my question for you. Assuming you have one second for each year you have been alive, what are the ways you might represent your life? Then assume you have unlimited time. How might you best represent your life? I'd love to hear what you come up with!

Thanks to Matt White for his masterful job of putting together My Life in 69 Seconds. Here's his link:

Happy, healthy, creating holidays and 2012!!

Cezanne Turns Leadership on Its Head

2011-10-27T08:30:00.001-04:00

In This Bloutcher

Cezanne Turns Leadership on Its Head
Announcements
Conundrum

Cezanne Turns Leadership on Its Head
Several years ago I decided to enroll in a drawing class. I had been very involved with sculpture but had virtually no drawing experience. I realized that if I wanted to grow as an artist I had to confront my lack of training in drawing. Actually, I was quite petrified since I thought my lack of drawing experience would expose me as a fraud.

The class was called "Drawing from the Live Model" and each session began with 90 second drawings of a live model who shifted positions at what seemed bewilderingly rapid intervals. The idea was to capture the basic gesture of the pose and not try to render the full form of the model. We then progressed in the same session to 5 minute, 10 minute and 20 minute poses, culminating in an extended 40 minute pose during which we were expected to make progress toward a recognizable drawing of the model, although we were discouraged from thinking we had ever "completed" a piece.

Our instructor would make the rounds, observing our struggles. When he stopped to critique an individual student's work the student would vibrate with anxiety as the instructor's blunt remarks revealed the inevitable truthfulness of his sharp eye and tongue.

Perhaps because I was a new student, he did not pounce on me right away. Several times he paused in front of my easel but did not comment. I went about my business, struggling to render what I saw before me: the model posing on the platform.

Then he struck. He stopped in front of my work for longer than usual. He folded his arms across his chest, shifted his eyes between my drawing and the model and extended one hand, palm up as though he were making an offering. "What are you trying to do?" came his question, clearly tinged with genuine puzzlement.

I tried to explain that I was trying to draw on the paper what my eyes saw. I realized I had a ways to go but if I were able to see the model clearly I would be able to draw it accurately.

My instructor reacted as though I had lit a match to Vesuvius. "No, no, no," he erupted. "Think Cezanne, follow Cezanne, understand Cezanne. For you, Cezanne should be the beginning and end. You do not see in order to draw. Cezanne teaches us just the opposite. You draw in order to see! Drawing is searching. It is discovery. Start over. Start with Cezanne. If you take anything from this class it is this: You do not see in order to draw, you draw in order to see."

That was a mouthful. And totally liberating. Cezanne and my teacher buddied up to cause nothing less than a revolution in my understanding of drawing and art in general. What possibilities this shift opened up for me! I now had permission to roam over the surface, to experiment, to explore different shapes, different relationships. As my hand embarked on this new journey, it became looser, more relaxed, more animated. Precision became less important than discovery. In that moment I felt as though I had rediscovered art.

So what does this story have to do with leadership? Over the years I have had many discussions with individuals who aspire to grow as leaders. Often these individuals would ask: "What would you suggest I learn in order to be a better leader? I need to learn in order to lead." My response would often involve a combination of some reading suggestions, a call to become a keen observer of other leaders and the encouragement to seek "stretch" assignments. I still believe that this is sound advice

But Cezanne has totally turned my thinking on its head. Now I share a different perspective. Just as Cezanne advised that you do not see in order to draw; rather you draw in order to see--I now suggest that you do not learn in order to lead, rather you lead in order to learn. I am not speaking here about technical learning--that's basic. I am talking about the deeper learning and insight that builds on wisdom and contributes to one becoming a more humane and effective leader.

Peter Senge has been a long time champion of the notion of the learning organization and the learning leader. Warren Bennis, author of numerous best selling books on leadership, speaks about ongoing self reinvention as a necessary quality of leadership in today's rapidly changing world. Management guru Peter Drucker wrote eloquently before his death about his belief that today's leaders cannot lead by knowing. The complexity of today's world does not allow one person to know all things. Therefore, Drucker believed that today's leaders must learn to lead by asking questions.

For a long time I thought one needed to develop an area of expertise before assuming a leadership role. I realize now, though, that there are at least two kinds of learning. The first is what might be called technical learning, the kind that is necessary to develop baseline competence in an area. The other kind of learning is even more critical and important. It is the development of leadership wisdom, acquired by constantly reinventing oneself as one learns the lessons of leadership. This kind of learning requires a far more rigorous, almost ruthless process of self honesty and discovery. The kind that Cezanne believe led to great art.

Announcements:

Not too late for you and/or friends to sign up for The Life Change Studio at Esalen Institute in Big Sur that I will be co-facilitating with Nancy Fernandez Mills. Whether you are going through or anticipating going through life changes large or small this program will help you tap into new levels of energy, commitment and creativity. For a description click here.
I am also excited to be speaking at the first Poetics of Aging Conference (November 16 to 19) in San Francisco. A really impressive line up of speakers. Check it out here.
The International Positive Aging Conference in Los Angeles December 6th through the 9th has grown from a modest idea to an international phenomenon in just 5 short years. The conference taps into the amazing energy of people doing cutting edge work not only in shifting the paradigm of aging but in developing innovative programs and initiatives to create new realities on the ground. I will be leading a project entitled The Telling; Second Generation which chronicles on a real time basis these emerging themes through creative expression. Come and catch the spirit!! Click here.

Conundrum:

George Braque once said: "You can explain everything about painting except the part that counts." What did Braque mean? And can we apply this same thought to our lives?

Lost and Found

2011-10-06T08:30:00.003-04:00

In This Bloutcher

Lost and Found
Announcements

Lost and Found

I recently gave a talk at the BIF7 Innovation Summit. The idea is that each of the storytellers had fifteen minutes to tell his or her story. The story tellers included such outstanding creative thinkers as Dan Pink, Richard Saul Wurman, Len Schlesinger, Sebastian Ruth. I spoke about the "Middleware of Personal Innovation," that is the core creative skills one needs to develop in order to transform their personal vision into reality. In my talk I referenced the personal experience of being lost and found simultaneously. I said, "When I am creating I am both lost and found and I believe there is no better place to be."

After the talk lots of folks came up to me and asked what I meant by being both lost and found at the same time. How can you be both?

When I am creating I am lost because I am working on the edges. I do not yield to the path previously taken. I am frightened, not knowing what will come next, what to do next. I am filthy from failed attempts, deep in the forest without a compass. I am Theseus without Ariadne's string. I battle despair, wrestle with the angels of doubt. I am a madman. And I see no way out.

When I am creating I am wondrously found. I am mindless of time, overcome by a strange, intoxicating exhilaration triggered by the tiniest of brush strokes, a spit of color. the struggle for truthfulness. I am where I belong, where I am meant to be, on the journey. Pursuing the questions. I am the cartographer of my own land, navigating an internal terrain of my own making--I am found, my coordinates always changing but traceable by the heat of wonder. I am found if not by others at least by myself.

And how is this different than the experience of engaging in life change? Personal reinvention? I do not believe it is different. We are all simultaneously lost and found--as long as we are on the journey, creating and recreating ourselves.

Listen to some of the great artists. They were on a great journey. And they also recognized the pain of feeling lost and found:

Paul Cezanne--It took me 40 years to find out that painting is not sculpture.
Henri Matisse--It has bothered me all my life that I do not paint like everybody else.
Willem de Kooning--I work out of doubt.
Paul Klee--I paint in order not to cry.

In our best moments, we, like the great artists, are both lost and found.

Announcements:

Becoming A Life Change Artist; 7 Creative Skills to Reinvent Yourself at Any Stage of Life has just earned the prestigious Mom's Choice Award. The award honors excellence in family friendly media, products and services. The esteemed panel of judges include educators, media experts as well as parents, librarians, performing artists, authors, producers, medical and learning professionals and scientists. That's cool! Congratulations to my co-author Kathleen Jordan who just became a second time grandma with the arrival of Addison Kelly Livermore, 6 lbs, 13 ounces.
Get the word out: I will be conducting a 5 day workshop at the Esalen Institute with co-facilitator Nancy Fernandez Mills in breathtaking Big Sur November 13-18. The program is called the Life Change Studio and is appropriate to anyone currently going through a life change or contemplating one. Check it out here.
If you would like to discover the poet in you, consider attending my wife Karen's Esalen program "Calling Calliope; Finding Your Poetic Voice," also November 13-18. For more information, click here.
Also for anyone interested in and committed to changing the way society thinks about aging, please join up at the Poetics of Aging Conference November 16-19 in San Francisco. I will be speaking about What the Great Masters of Art Can Teach Us About Living the Second Half of Life with Creativity, Vitality and Meaning. This should be fun, informative and thought provoking conference. To learn more about it, click here.
I will be doing an author's talk at the Andover Book Store on October 20th. Join us at 7 pm. Click here for directions.
Please consider attending the 5th Annual International Positive Aging Conference in Los Angeles, December 6-10. This conference is chock full of interesting ideas, organizations, leaders from across the globe who share their innovative ideas for leveraging the creativity and talents of folks in the second half of life. I will be conducting a program called The Telling; Second Generation. It will engage participants in creative but mysterious exercises that capture the essence and challenges of aging. Learn more, click here.

Import Export

2011-09-14T09:00:00.003-04:00

In this Bloutcher:

Import Export
Announcements

Import Export
If you walk down the nondescript Rue de Lancy in the St. Martin-Canal area of Paris and stop at number 54 you will find yourself in front of a shop owned by one Mr. Bhandari Lalit. There is no sign indicating the nature of its business. However, when you look through the window you are greeted by a random army of bric-a-brac, piles of fabric, purses, statuettes, banners, lamp shades, necklaces, bracelets, wooden boxes, etc. And when you enter the shop you must sidle along the narrow aisles in order not to knock the goods from their shelves. Mr. Lalit sits behind a pile of goods which threaten to topple onto his head. You get the sense that Mr. Lalit manages to barely scrape by. And then an immediate smile crosses his bronze face, his gray mustache bobbing with animated anticipation, as he greets you.

I did not know Mr. Lalit when we stumbled across his shop. My wife and I encountered him by total serendipity as we made one of our daily meanderings through the streets of Paris during our five week stay.

During the one hour we spent in his shop rummaging through his "goods" Mr. Lalit laced our time with an intriguing family narrative. Here is some of what we learned.

In his earlier years, Mr. Lalit held a modest position as a buyer with an import/export firm in India. He came to Paris in 1981 to explore the possibility of starting his own import/export business. Within three months of arriving he brought his wife and two daughters to Paris. They had two more children after moving to Paris, another daughter and a son, twins. Mr. Lalit's business did "okay." He began investing in small properties in Paris. A four flat here and another there. Today he owns several of these types of properties. Mr. Lalit says he is not a rich man, but as he put it: "I'm okay. When the kids finish school I will sell all the goods you see around you and spend my time between here, India and visiting my children. I intend to do something for society in India. Perhaps open a medical clinic. I think it is important to give something to society."

Mr. Lalit's children each attended elite colleges in France and placed in the top tiers. Then, one by one, they pursued their Master's and Doctorates at Columbia, MIT and Georgia Tech. Their son and youngest child is finishing his undergraduate degree at Ensae, a prestigious institute in the fields of statistics, economics and finance. He has already been accepted by Stanford and Harvard for a Master's degree. Each of the children has specialized in fields such as Mathematics and Finance, Mechanical Engineering, Aeronautics and Pure Mathematics. They all wish to stay in the United States because, in Mr. Lalit's words, "that's where the opportunity is." Mr. Lalit says the schools in France are free. In the United States they are expensive but they are the best in world "without question." He indicated that his children want to get a good education, good training and then start businesses of their own. I asked him where they got their desire to start their own business. His smile broadened as he said "they are like their old man."

My encounter with Mr. Lalit triggered many thoughts. I began to wonder how his children might fare regarding their entrepreneurial aspirations and then I began to think how the U.S. was going through such a wrenching time and how that might impact those aspirations.

We may be under the impression that, of course, the United States is the world leader in innovation and therefore the children of Mr. Lalit have made the right choice. But I also wonder whether the U.S. will remain the best choice for them. The truth is that we are not uniformly considered #1 in innovation and we risk falling further behind. There are many studies related to which countries are the world leaders in innovation. Different studies use different criteria. And while the U.S. comes out #1 in a Boston Consulting Group study, it falls further back in most studies. The U.S. is ranked #3 in the Legatum Institute study with Denmark at #1 and Sweden at #2. And according the the well respected INSEAD analysis the U.S. ranks #7 behind Switzerland, Sweden, Singapore, Hong Kong, Finland and Denmark. This trend is troublesome, especially since Thomas Friedman has suggested that innovation is one of the key ingredients of the U.S.'s "magic sauce."

It is also hard not to be swept up in The Great Introspection we are experiencing as a nation regarding our direction. When we look at the enablers of innovation--education, opportunity (perceived and real,) diversity, access to capital, ease of doing business--we find ourselves in roiling waters. Mr. Lalit believes the U.S. has the best universities in the world. Yet, we are faced with a vocal anti-intellectual, anti-science crowd that undermines the core values of education. Our public schools are in disarray and in need of innovation themselves. And just when we need bold, creative thinking and action we are at risk of shrinking from it. The long shadow of 9/11 has morphed into a new kind of xenophobia that threatens a vital source of diversity and ideas. We are who we are as a nation because successive waves of immigrants have contributed cultural richness and intellectual vitality to our nation.

Having said this I must confess we often confuse the enablers of innovation with where it actually comes from. After all, innovation comes from innovators. And innovators come from unsuspected places, such as small shops on nondescript streets in Paris run by the Mr. Lalit's of the world. Our challenge is to link and align the enablers with the suppliers. Let's just say, like Mr. Lalit, we as a nation are in the import export business. We import diverse talent and we export ideas and innovation. And if we are to succeed, we need to welcome the Mr. Lalit's childrens of the world and provide them with the supporting enablers so they, and we, can succeed.

Announcements

November 16th-19th the Poetics of Aging Conference will take place in San Francisco. The mission of this cutting edge conference is to counter the mainstream understanding of aging as decline and/or disease with a more expansive, humanistic, and creative – that is poetic – vision and approach. I will be speaking on the 19th. Check out the conference and join us! Check out the conference here.
I will be a Story Teller at the BIF7 Innovation Summit September 19-21st. This unique, high energy summit brings together folks who care about innovation--leading organizational leaders, doers, thinkers, writers, artists, consultants, in what Mashable has called "one of the top 7 places to watch great minds in action." Check out BIF7 Innovation Summit here.
Think about treating yourself to the unique splendor and power of an Esalen Institute learning experience. Join me and my co-facilitator Nancy Fernandez Mills at Big Sur for a 5 day program of The Life Change Studio November 13-18. Regardless of where you are in your life this program will help you get in touch with your creative powers and be inspired by the possibilities in your life. Check out the program here. If you have ever wondered if there is a poet in you consider taking my wife Karen's amazing 5 day workshop, Calling Calliope, Finding Your Poetic Voice, at Esalen also from November 13-18. Take a look at Karen's workshop here.
I will be presenting a special program "Living Your Next Phase of Life with Creativity, Vitality and Meaning" at a Fidelity Client Appreciation Event, Providence, RI on October 4th.
I am also working with Rockland Trust, Hanover, MA to create a special retirement workshop to be held on October 19th.
If you or anyone you know would like to hear me talk about my book (co-authored with Kathy Jordan) Becoming a Life Change Artist; 7 Creative Skills to Reinvent Yourself at Any Stage of Life, come to the Andover Bookstore, 89R Main Street, Andover, Massachusetts at 7 pm on October 20th. Spread the word! Check out the bookstore here.
And finally but not leastly, we are in the process of receiving feedback from our piloteers for our Life Change Artist online training program. This program will initially be designed for coaches and then for organizational leaders and educators. So far we have been hearing "there's nothing like this out there!" If you want to be alerted as to our progress, just drop me a note.

Please spread the word on any of these events/items to folks you think might have interest in them. Also, if there is anyone you think might like to subscribe to my bloutcher please pass it on.

Still in Paris

2011-08-30T08:55:00.006-04:00

In This Bloutcher

Still in Paris
Announcements

In 1965 I spent 9 months in Paris, studying philosophy before heading to graduate school in Chicago. The French were still using newspaper for toilet paper back then and men wearing berets carrying their baguettes were everywhere. Today the baguettes remain but the berets have been replaced by scarves, even on hot summer evenings.

Back then I took a six week trip into southern France, across the great Valadolid plains of Spain into Portugal. Franco was still in power and silly pointed hats of the guardia civilia could be seen even in the remote towns. I drove a deux cheveau which means two horses because it purportedly had only two horsepower and sipped petrol at the rate of 60 miles a gallon. The deux cheveau had such an odd appearance that it made you think a Dr. Suess character would pop out any second. Of course, you could read a novel driving at full throttle up the hills and if you got into a head on with a Vespa you would lose for sure. One night I pulled over and slept in a field because the stars were as large as grapefruit and I had always wondered what it would be like to sleep under a night sky filled with grapefruit. Some of the grapefruit flared wildly and fell to the earth in flashes of brilliance and I mistook them for a moment for shooting stars. I felt the night coolness settle on my cheeks and fell asleep with all kinds of possibilities awaiting me.

On the drive back to Paris I kept wondering how the city had changed during my 6 week absence. And then I heard the winds of time whisper: Oh, but you have--how you have changed. I looked through the rear view mirror, trying to catch a glimpse of the wind, but only the road stretched back as far as I could see.

I am in Paris at this moment and except for the toilet paper and the scarves and a few other unimportant details, Paris remains Paris remains Paris. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose. And what about me? Did the wind speak the truth? I like to think I would still pull over and sleep the night under the sky of grapefruit and fall asleep with all kinds of possibilities awaiting me. The other day Karen and I took our shoes and socks off in a lovely park in the 15th arrondissement and felt the moist earth energy under the grass and then we sat under a shady Linden tree and looked at the sky inspired by a Corot painting (left)--or is it the other way around, or maybe it was a Sisley sky (right) but it really doesn't matter since the sky hasn't changed either between their time and ours.

I think that when you are in your 20s and you are in Paris for the first time you are not able ever to leave--you are always still in Paris.

I remember during the return drive from Spain and Portugal refocusing on the road ahead and whispering half to myself, half to the unseen wind: We are not as timeless as Paris. We are here, perhaps we never leave even when we are gone and then something else happens. I have been back to Paris many times since that first time. I better understand some things now, and other things I understand less well. That's a kind of change. The wind was right. I have changed from the first time. Or am I perhaps the same in different ways?

Announcements:

Check out the BIF-7 Innovation Summit. I am excited about being invited as one of the Summit's storytellers. Now in its 7th year, the Summit has been named by Mashable as one of the "7 places to see great minds at work." The Summit is magic. It's intimate. It's assumption blowing. It opens up windows to whole new worlds. You should consider being there. Learn more about BIF-7 by clicking here.
I will be speaking at Fidelity Investments in October at a special client appreciation event. I will also be doing a special program for Rockland Trust, also in October, for those who are considering what comes next in their lives.
I also want to put in a special plug for the program I am doing with Nancy Fernandez Mills at Esalen, November 13 through 18, at Big Sur in California. This is a magical place and the program which will be a special version of our Life Change Studio promises to be highly engaging, insight provoking and transformative. Consider giving yourself a unique gift and joining us for the program. For more information click here. Also check out a workshop my wife Karen is conducting at Esalen at the same time. The workshop titled Calling Calliope; Finding Your Poetic Voice. Not only is Karen a wonderful poet, she has a unique ability to put you in touch with parts of youself that you never knew were there. Check out her workshop by clicking here.

A Different Kind of Hunger

2011-08-10T10:55:00.002-04:00

In this Bloutcher

A Different Kind of Hunger
Announcements
Vive la Difference

A Different Kind of Hunger

I am currently staying in friends Nat and Margaret Harrison's apartment in the 15th arrondissement in Paris for the month of August. They have returned to the states to visit family and generously allowed us the run of their place.

During our stay I have been rereading an old copy of A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway which recounts the profound impact Paris had on him in the early days. For one thing, living here gave him a heightened sense of his native Michigan and allowed him to capture his youthful memories in one of the great American classics In Our Time. Interesting how being in a foreign country produces a perspective that leads you to see things more clearly about your native country.

I bring this up because rereading A Moveable Feast led me to realize something about innovation and creativity that never occurred to me back in the states. Hemingway writes about his practice of writing in the morning and then taking the Metro to the Odeon stop and walking through the Luxembourg Gardens on an empty stomach. He often stopped at the Luxumbourg Museum to look at the Cezanne paintings. He writes: " I learned to understand Cezanne much better to see truly how he made landscapes when I was hungry. I used to wonder if he were hungry too when he painted; but I thought possibly it was only that he had forgotten to eat. Later I thought Cezanne was probably hungry in a different way."

I wonder about this different kind of hunger. Not the kind that growls in the pit of the stomach but the kind that rumbles in the core of our souls. I think is the kind of hunger Hemingway saw in Cezanne. After all, the ordinary kind of hunger cannot sustain creativity. At least that's what contemporary research tells us.

I also wonder about this kind of hunger when it comes to organizations and innovation. It raises the question of whether an organization can experience this kind of hunger and whether it can be truly innovative without it. Hemingway and Cezanne experienced this kind of hunger and it drove them to great creative efforts. Can the same kind of hunger be experienced by organizations?

In his classic book Self-Renewal, John Gardner explores the growing complexity of modern society and the importance of self renewal to a vibrant, innovative society and its organizations. Ultimately, he claims, innovation and creativity come down to the efforts of individuals. Yet, he acknowledges the importance of creating environments that actively foster individual self renewal. Which brings us back to the importance of organizational self renewal. Without such renewal organizations cannot create environments that support and generate individual creativity. As Gardner puts it, the purpose of all our knowledge is "to design environments conducive to individual fulfillment."

Do we dare say that the only way this can happen is through the courageous efforts of leaders who themselves understand that innovation and creativity are the best ways to feed this different kind of hunger.

This is the pathway pursued by Cezanne and Hemingway. They changed nothing less than the arch of art and literature. Even Picasso acknowledged that "Cezanne was the mother of us all." Perhaps we need leaders who think of themselves as the Cezannes and Hemingways of their organizations. Perhaps one day we will look back at these leaders and say they were the mothers of us all.

Announcements

Check out the BIF-7 Collaborative Innovation Summit. I am excited to be attending as one of the summit storytellers. No in its 7th year, the BIF Summit was named by Mashable as one of the "7 places to see great minds at work." The summit is magic. It's intimate. It's assumption blowing. It opens up windows to whole new worlds. You should consider being there. Learn more about BIF-7 click here.
Our pilot for Coaching for Life Change Artists is in full gear. We are aiming to release the online training program in the fall. Let me know if you would like to be alerted to its official launch.

Vive la Difference

patisseries
Velib bicycle rentals
Fitou 2009 for $7.50 per bottle
Baguettes, baguettes, baguettes
The Metro
Walk, walk, walk
patisseries
Doors
quais
small shops
patisseries
Parisian clouds
iron work on balconies
patisseries

I am a pair of endless eyes

2011-07-19T08:10:00.000-04:00

In this Bloutcher

I am a pair of endless eyes
Announcement

I am a pair of endless eyes

I am sending this bloutcher sandwiched between the weddings of my two daughters five days apart. I am not feeling too coherent. All kinds of random thoughts and emotions are bubbling up at unexpected moments. So I've decided to go with it under the premise that incoherence is fertile ground for creativity and I wonder if there is a message in these thoughts, if there is a pattern in their randomness. So here are some of the thoughts/feelings that have shown up during this sandwich time.

Are these weddings an ending or a beginning?
My oldest daughter Hinda is named after my mother Helen (Hinda in Yiddish.) They never knew each other. I am bridge and barrier.
For years we told our youngest daughter Becky that she completed the circle--I come from a family of three children, Karen comes from a family of three children, Becky is the youngest of three. Does she complete the circle or grow the circle? In life, is there such a thing as a circle?
I feel young. I am 69 years old. Parents, grandparents are gone. I am a grandparent. Is this simply the biology of biology or the biology of emotions?
Sometimes I nudge toward despair. And then I kick myself.
I give gratitude for all that I have, but I tell the angels I suffer.
When I am painting I am lost and found.
When I write I think and cry.
When I am by the sea and watch the waves roll in I am a primordial Jewish amino acid. I breathe deeply and feel the depths.
I have a son Jacob. He is named after my father. They never met. I am bridge and barrier.
We fall. We get up. We fall. We get up. It goes on. Our human limits pain us, as does our belief in no limits.
I look at my daughters and I look and look and look. I am a pair of endless eyes.

Let me know if you see any patterns or themes here?

What would it look like if you were to capture your random thoughts/musings over the next five days? Give it a try.

Then step back from the canvas of your musings and see if there are any patterns or themes emerging.

Announcement

I came across an interesting piece of information: the Japanese word for creativity is made up of three ideograms, each one with a meaning: to observe, to separate, to recompose. The Japanese define creativity by its process, not by its outcome! Thank you Andrea Fronzetti Colladon wherever you are.
We are now in pilot mode with Coaching for Life Change Artists. We aim to launch the full program in the fall. It will consist of three major elements: 1. a ten part self guided, self paced, interactive online training program, 2. support that guides coaches and mentors through how to integrate the tools, techniques and concept into their coaching/mentoring practice, 3. a dynamic online community of resources, support and conversation. Let me know if you want to be on our mailing list for updates on when the program will be live. Also let me know if there is anyone else you think might have interest.
Karen and I are off to France next week. More from the City of Light.

6 Surprising Artists

2011-06-30T09:45:00.001-04:00

In This Bloutcher

6 Surprising Artists
So Try This
Announcements

I'm often asked which artists have been most important to me. My goodness! How do you answer such a question? After all, there have been so many. But when I think about the ones I keep coming back to, not only for their visual impact but for their insight and inspiration, there are 6 that keep rising to the surface.

Rembrandt (1606-1669)--Rembrandt's life and art are marked by tragedy and growing self insight and wisdom. His beloved wife Saskia died after 8 years of marriage and only one of his four sons lived to adulthood. He went through a wrenching bankruptcy during which he lost his home and his art collection. Yet he continued to work and his self portraits increasingly reveal his growing self awareness and vulnerability. His final self portrait, painted the year he died, brings him wholly and unabashedly before the viewer. No pretense, no ego, no claims. Only the man. Humble. With a slight glint of mischief!

Kathe Kollwitz (1867-1945)--An artist and woman of great courage. Despite threats, first from Kaiser Wilhelm and then, years later, from the Nazis, she committed herself to a creative life that chronicled the lives of the disenfranchised and vulnerable. Despite threats to be thrown into a concentration camp she maintained relationships with former Jewish students. Her commitment to lithography as a major art form led to a body of work so profound and moving that I am often at a loss for words when I am in front of her work.

Berthe Morisot (1841-1895)--On the surface Morisot was a woman who conformed to the bourgeois norms of late 19th century Paris. Yet she hung out with and influenced the greatest avant garde artists of her generation including Manet, Monet, Renoir, Degas and she was a wonderful innovator in her own work. She almost exclusively painted women and their children in a deceptively simple style that conveys both the mysteries and love of her subjects. As result she broke the gender barrier by setting the stage for women artists to gain entrance to the previously and exclusively male Ecole des Beaux Artes.

Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675)--More than any other artist he combined the ability to be precise in his paintings while conveying the presence of ambiguity and change. Vermeer was a prankster wrapped in the garb of a serious painter. His paintings hold both the impression of order and the lurking dangers of change and chaos. His narrative brilliance is both seductive and profound. He is the ultimate above the surface and below the surface painter. Above the surface, order and stillness. Below the surface, change, uncertainty and the threat of mayhem.

Chaim Soutine (1893-1943)--Soutine fled Russia and a stifling orthodox Jewish upbringing and landed in Paris in 1913 at the age of 20 with pennies in his pocket. He hung out with Modigliani and Picasso in The Hive, painted slabs of raw beef and turned his personal anguish into painting as a form of exorcism and expiation. I love his agitated, worked and reworked paintings and the way his portraits leap from the canvas in a reconstituted image that is more real and vibrant than the original subject.

You--What you say? Me? In the same category as these great artist? Now that IS surprising. Yes, you are my 6th surprising artist. Each person I meet is an artist. Deny it as you might. But you are the most important artist you or I will ever meet. And exactly what form of art are you creating? Your life. Now art may not be the same thing as life. And we may not be able to fully create ourselves from scratch as an artist creates an image from scratch on the canvas. But the truth is you do create more of your life than you give yourself credit for and you have much more creative power than you think you do.

So try this:

First, take out a piece of paper and draw a line across the middle of the page. Then, above the line, describe in short phrases how you believe others see you.

Then, below the line describe in short phrases how you see yourself truly, deeply, free of others' expectations, reflecting your core wants and values.

What stands out about these two descriptions?

How can you use these two descriptions to call on your creative powers to bring these two descriptions into complete alignment?

Announcements:

Kathy Jordan, Donna Krone and I are about to pilot our Coaching for Life Change Artists online training program. We have 13 outstanding coaches from around the country ready to test drive the program. We are aiming to launch the program in the fall.
We have a mailing list of coaches, mentors and other interested folks to whom we send Action Insights every few weeks as a way to keep you up to date on our progress. Let me know if you would like to be on this mailing list.
I would like to thanks all the folks at the NYC chapter of the International Coach Federation for their lively participation in my program a couple of weeks ago. I received an overwhelming response to my offer to send out a pdf of my slides. The title of the program was "The Great Masters of Art Reveal the Secrets to a New Coaching Paradigm." Please let me know if you would like a copy and I am happy to send it out to you.
I am about to head into a rather busy time. I have mentioned that my two very average daughters are getting married in mid July to two very average guys, five days apart from each other and then Karen and I head off to Paris for five weeks. Then, September 19-21 I will be speaking at the Business Innovation Factory BIF7 Summit in Providence, Rhode Island. I will keep you posted on that event.

The Effect of Time

2011-06-10T09:16:00.000-04:00

In This Bloutcher:

The Effect of Time
Announcements

The Effect of Time

I recently received an urgent call to arms from a fellow graduate of the Malverne High School class of 1960. The school board had passed a proposal to rename our high school after a well regarded teacher. You could see the computer screens light up across the Class of '60 Diaspora. From Florida to Indonesia and beyond the cry went out: Do they understand all the memories, associations, friendships, traditions, connections that go by the name of Malverne High School? And what in the world are they going to do with the school mascot: the Malverne Mule. Will they try to come up with a worthy alliterated equivalent? Doubt it!!

And then, in my passionate reaction, I began to wonder about the difference between memory and nostalgia. It struck me that memory is what we recall. The spotty facts of our past. But nostalgia is what we create from this raw material. Nostalgia is the emotional imprint that stamps its full, persistent character on our personal history. It's what cries out to us and calls us back. Memory is the stem and nostalgia the flower.

What are we to with this flower as we get older? Its fragrance becomes increasingly seductive, its call more and more melodic. It would be so easy to let ourselves be absorbed by its power and simply surrender to the richness of our past. After all, the future takes work and effort and energy. And do these capacities not diminish as we get older? So why not give ourselves fully to the nostalgic impulse. Do we succumb? Do we resist? Or do we allow for a few precious moments?

I think of Tennyson's poem Ulysses:

Yet all experience is an arch where through
Gleams that untraveled world, whose margin fades
For ever and forever when I move.

When I look at myself I wonder how much Malverne I still see in me. I acknowledge a great deal remains. And then I catch myself. Allow, allow, I whisper to myself. Allow those precious moments. And then turn, as Ulysses did, To strive, to seek, to find and not to yield. I shift my gaze. New frontiers still call. But I do have a warning. Don't mess with the Malverne Mules!!

(To read Tennyson's full poem Ulysses, click here.)

Below is a photo of me a couple of years removed from high school. And then there is a photo snapped a couple of weeks ago. And then there are a couple of self portraits.

Announcements:

I will be doing a program for the New York City chapter of the International Coaches Federation on Wednesday, June 15th entitled "What the Great Masters of Art Can Teach Us About a New Coaching Paradigm." To register and receive more info, click here.

Also, it's not too early to join me for a 5 day program at Esalen, November 13 to 18. I will be holding a Life Change Studio in the breathtaking setting of The Big Sur and will be joined by my co-facilitator Nancy Fernandez Mills. For more information click here. Also, my wife Karen will be holding one of her remarkable 5 day poetry workshops at Esalen during those same dates, entitled Calling Calliope. Click here for more info.

I also want to remind everyone that I am working on an online training program for coaches with Kathy Jordan and Donna Krone. The program is designed to help coaches integrate the tools, techniques and concepts developed in Becoming a Life Change Artist into their practice. It will be highly interactive and will include an opportunity to join our dynamic online community. We have begun to build a list of coaches who have indicated an interest in learning more about the program. If you would like to be added to this list please let me know. And if you know coaches who you think should know about this program please let me know. We will then ask them for permission to be on our update list. We are planning to launch the program in the Fall.

An update about my plans this summer. I have two daughter, Hinda and Becky, and they are both getting married this summer. Five days apart from each other. Yes, you heard it right. Five days apart. To two great guys. And, then, five days after that Karen and I are heading to France for 5 weeks. Of course, this was not all planned exactly this way. We had made plans to go to France first. Then Becky decided to get married. And, well, Hinda thought it would be a good idea to jump in since the family would be gathered together anyway. So planning goes just so far. The rest is about being grateful.

Fear of Failure Plus

2011-05-11T18:24:00.000-04:00

In This Bloutcher

Fear of Failure
New versus Knew
Updates
Speaking of Aging, or Evolution of a Self Portrait

Fear of Failure

I recently heard an interview with Tavis Smiley, the radio host and commentator. He was speaking about his new book Failing Up. During the interview he acknowledged that for most of his adult life he never admitted failure, but at a certain point he realized that by hiding his failures he was leaving out a critical part of his life and how those failures led to his growth as a human being and a professional.

The interview brought home to me the unintended consequences of our culture's worship of success as an ideal and how it breeds not only a fear of failure at the personal level but at the institutional and cultural levels as well. And where there is a fear of failure there is less willingness to take risks. And where there is less willingness to take risks there is less preparation for collaboration. And where there is less preparation for collaboration there is less creativity and innovation.

We are at a time when creativity and innovation need to act as premium difference makers in our lives so we cannot afford to promote a set of values and behaviors that unintentionally undermine these dynamic qualities.

The answer is not to give up on celebrating our successes, but rather to understand that our successes are built on our failures, our mistakes, our willingness to take risks, and how we respond the mistakes. Success and failure are the ying and yang of personal growth and societal innovation. I believe that part of the response needs to be our own ability to model failure successfully. That begins with acknowledging our personal failings and making that part of our conversation.

New Versus Knew

New cannot come from knew. New can only come from unknewn. From exploration, risk, discomfort. New comes from outside the boundaries of what we knew. If it was knewn then it is not new. It's a repeat of already knewn. We need to let go of knew in order to arrive at new. When knew repeats itself it's old. Riddle: Can new come from knew? Only wenk it embraces the unknewn!

Updates

I am hard at work with co-author Kathy Jordan and nationally recognized life coach Donna Krone on Coaching for Life Change Artists, a highly interactive online training program for coaches and others who would like to develop their creative skills and integrate them into their practice and life. The program will be chock full of tools, techniques and ideas on how to unlock your creative powers and make a difference in your life and the lives of others. We are aiming to pilot the program this summer and release it this fall. Please let me know if you wish to be on the mailing list for alerts on when the program will be ready. Also, please let me know of others you think might be interested in such a program.
I will be heading to France for five weeks beginning July 27th. If anyone will be in Paris during that time, give me a holler.
The International Positive Aging Conference is set for December 7-9 in Los Angeles. If you would like to submit a proposal to present click here.

Speaking of Aging

I will be turning 69 this month. I recently lined up four self portraits I have done over the past 10 years--since I first took up painting. I was curious about how I have changed and how I represented those changes. What do you see? And if you were to create a self portrait today, how might it be different from the one you would have created 10 years ago?

Tradition & Creativity

2011-04-20T11:25:00.000-04:00

In This Bloutcher

Tradition and Creativity

Tradition & Creativity
This past week I attended a workshop conducted by Shefa Gold, an ordained rabbi and healer. The workshop centered on Hebrew chanting and was remarkable. But before I tell you why and how it relates to creativity and life change, let me explain what kind of a Jew I am. We Jews have a primal need to explain. Even when no one may be listening.

I have a strong Jewish identity with a rather loosey goosey set of observances and obvious contradictions. You can't be Jewish without having contradictions. I keep a kosher home yet I eat non kosher meat outside the home. I do not eat pork or shellfish or mix meat and milk, the last for poetic and family history reasons rather than religious reasons. I attend synagogue very inconsistently and would probably do less so if not for my wife's urging. As far as faith is concerned, I am a skeptic. Nonetheless, in a pinch I could see myself siding with Pascal and his wager: since we cannot know for sure we might as well wager in favor of there being a God in case there really is one. This is a more nuanced idea than the one that claims there are no atheists in a foxhole.

In unexpected moments I am taken over by a profound sense of connectedness to all things past, present and future. I am moved to tears by these experiences. I suspect that such moment are intimations of my spirituality, my incomplete self, yearning for a home and wholeness. Yet I consider myself more like Jacob wrestling with the angel without the satisfaction of quite getting to the other side as Jacob did in embracing full faith. So, as Abraham said to God, Here I am. Only not like Abraham meant it. Rather, as a thoroughly modern, perplexed, inconsistent Jew. A mixed bag. And here I was now, attending a workshop centering on Hebrew chanting anchored in Jewish tradition. And I was there only because my wife wanted to attend. She could have gone by herself. I found myself coming along only because I did not find myself resisting.

Shefa Gold told the story of how she came to incorporate many traditions from diverse cultures and religions into her healing. While the workshop centered on Jewish tradition and attempted to create sacred space she also brought in elements of energy healing, yoga, mythic journeys and mysticism. In the workshop she consistently referenced paying attention to our breath, our root chakra and the "egg of light." She talked about chanting not only as a way of connecting to God but as a form of healing oneself and the world. Accompanied by drum and shruti box, her enchanting voice evoked a deep yearning. I could not help but be struck by the way she both embraced tradition and departed from tradition at the same time. The way she expanded tradition thereby creating something new and fresh.

And this made me realize that we in America have an obsession with newness and novelty and the next big thing. This often takes the form of rebelling against tradition a priori--simply because it is tradition. We often do this without even knowing or understanding the tradition.

And so we risk distorting the true underlying dynamics between creativity and tradition. This tendency leads us to think that the great artists rebelled against tradition simply because they believe the role of art is to break with the old and create new forms of art for its own sake. In fact, the great artists honored the Masters before them and understood that their task was not so much to reject them out of hand but rather to reinterpret them. And in order to do this they needed to fully understand them first. The great artists were devoted to studying their predecessors as a required right of passage to full creativity and innovation.

"The Louvre is the book in which we learned how to read," noted Paul Cezanne, the great French painter.

What's my point, you may ask? Understanding tradition is a pre-condition for creativity. Whether it is in our personal lives, in our organizations or in our art. This may make creativity a longer process. Not everyone will have patience for it. But it enables us to develop a sense of empathy which is one of the key ingredients of creativity. Empathy deepens our humanity, and is the basis for seeing beauty. Even in those parts of ourselves we do not understand.

Shefa Gold too understood the Jewish masters before reinterpreting many of their teachings to become a Jewish healer and chanter. And I might not have come to this realization had I not attended what I thought was a workshop in which I had no direct interest!

The things we stumble upon in the most expected ways and places!

Happy Passover and Happy Easter!

84 + 1 & 1/2 =Creativity

2011-03-30T09:40:00.000-04:00

In this Bloutcher

84 + 1 & 1/2 = Creativity
A Life Without Purpose 2.0
Announcements

84 + 1 & 1/2 = Creativity

"The artist...has to look at everything as though he were seeing it for the first time; he has to look at life as he did when he was a child and if he loses that faculty, he cannot express himself in an original, that is, a personal way."

Henri Matisse wrote these words when he was 84 years old in 1953. My grandson Baylor never met Matisse because he just turned 1 and 1/2 this week. But they speak the same language. Well, not exactly, but they are each saying the same thing in different ways. Let me explain.

It was just Baylor and me for a few hours last week. We walked up and down the block, stopping to pick up stones, sticks, whatever caught his fancy. Then we got down and dirty on the floor of his living room, reading books, crashing trucks, throwing balls. We chowed down together, slinging food like we were at a frat party.

And then the playing started.

First, the crayons came out of the box. I was excited to see how Baylor would use them to make markings on the blank sheets of paper. The first crayon went in his ear along with a big grin. The same crayon then made its way into my ear with an even bigger grin. Baylor was quite pleased that I grinned back. The crayon never met the blank sheet of paper.

Then came the big wooden spoon from out of a bowl of toy fruits and vegetables. I was eager to see what Baylor would cook up. He took a plastic orange in one hand, being sure to show me--like a magician setting up his audience--the spoon in the other hand. Then he pressed the keyboard button with the orange to play a reggae tune. The spoon and orange became percussion instruments as he jived to the rhythm of Bob Marley.

I realized Baylor had a very different notion from me about what these toys were for. My expectations logically grew out of my conditioned grown up mind. He, on the other hand, was not constrained by my grown-upness.

By the time I left, the house was a mess. As I drove home I began to wonder if everything strewn on the floor really was a mess after all. Or perhaps it was the raw material of creativity. Maybe Baylor was more Matissean than his artsy grandfather.

And then I began to wonder how my wife would feel if her husband made a creativity at home.

Instead, I finished this painting of Baylor.

Sketch Baylor at One Year

A Life Without Purpose 2.0

In my last bloutcher I wrote about a woman who expressed feelings of inadequacy because she had not found a singular purpose in life. She had lots of interests and pursued them and this made her happy because she felt she was learning. Nonetheless in a culture that emphasizes the importance of living a life of purpose she felt somehow lacking. I offered that the great German artist Kathe Kollwitz suggested an alternative view. "No longer diverted by emotion, I work like a cow grazes," she wrote. Variety versus singularity can also be worthy.

Well, I cannot tell you how strong a response this bloutcher entry received. So many folks out there do not, in fact, have a singular purpose. They identify with the "grazers." And they expressed gratitude that someone acknowledged that such a way of living is just as creative and engaging as one based upon the dedication to a single passion or purpose.

As just one example Mary Anne Haley wrote from Minnesota: "Thank you for the Life Without Purpose article! I certainly related to the article AND felt a sense of freedom after reading it. I too am a person who loves to know a little about a lot and I love my curiosity! With this article I felt an even more "all rightness" with how I do my life."

So I think I touched a cord. At the same time I do not mean to diminish the value and importance of living a life of purpose. There is some terrific work being done in this area. One of my favorite writers and thinkers in this area is Richard Leider who has been inspired by the remarkable work of Viktor Frankl. Check out his recently re-issued and updated The Power of Purpose. Another author to look at is Gregg Levoy who tunes into the sometimes hidden and mysterious ways we are called to do something. His book is Callings.

Of course I ultimately believe we each need to honor each others' very individual and personal journey whether it is one of grazing, singular purpose or "other."

Announcements:

Please tune in to Careerwell radio program on April 14, 1 pm eastern. I will be interviewed by Elizabeth Craig, MBA, MCDP, and Dr. Sally Gelardin.
If you expect to be in Toronto at the beginning of June check out the Silver Screen Film Festival at Ryerson University. The festival showcases the continued and expanded creativity of adults 50+ through theatre, art, and creative works. I will be keynoting the Festival on the evening of June 6th. Here's a look at last year's program. More details to follow.
For coaches or those interested in coaching in the New York City area, I will be doing an evening program for the ICF New York City chapter on June 15th. Stand by for more info.

A Life Without Purpose

2011-03-09T11:30:00.000-05:00

In This Bloutcher

A Life Without Purpose
Life Change Artists Upcoming Launch
What's been in my head

A Life Without Purpose

Last week I gave a talk at the 92nd Street Y Tribeca entitled "What the Great Artists Can Teach Us About Living the Second Half with Creativity, Vitality and Meaning." After the talk a woman came up to me. The furrows gathered across her brow suggested deep sincerity as she shared the fact that she did not have a purpose in life. "I've attended lots of talks about meaning and purpose. I've read the books. But I have to confess I don't have a specific purpose in life. I go from one thing to another. From one interest to another. I learn and enjoy what I'm learning. I even think I am happy doing all these different things even though I have never been able to find a singular purpose. What's wrong with me?"

After staring blankly back at her for a moment I inquired what made her feel something was wrong with her.

"There's so much out there about living your life with meaning and purpose that I feel something must be wrong with me because I don't have a grand purpose in life. On the one hand I really enjoy all my different interests. I am learning stuff all the time, but underneath I am made to feel somehow inadequate because I don't have this bigger thing called a passion."

I have found that there are lots of folks out there with similar experiences, outlooks and senses of doubt. They have not found an over riding purpose that organizes their life. They move from one interest to another and get energized by what they learn. But feel they do not have the right to feel satisfied with that alone. They are made to feel something is missing in their lives. And as Baby Boomers age and come into the potential for a renaissance phase of life many, if not most, have not found a single true passion. As a result they feeling something is wrong with them.

To me the issue is not one of purpose but of creativity. By that I mean the most important dynamic in play is to feel engaged in something or somethings that allow you to think, feel and grow in new ways. This may be a single thing or many things. I like what the great German artist Kathe Kollwitz said: "No longer diverted by emotion, I work the way a cow grazes." Kollwitz Drawing

If we free ourselves from the emotions of how we think we should feel then we are free to poke around where ever the grass is most appealing to us. In other words, learning and growing as a person becomes our purpose. Becoming more complete and whole. For some it may require a singular purpose. For others it might simply mean grazing.

Life Change Artists Upcoming Launch

Since the publication of Becoming a Life Change Artist in August people have been asking me and co-author Kathy Jordan: Can you train us on the concepts, tools and techniques in the book? Can you help me incorporate this rich material into my life and coaching practice? How can I use these great ideas to bolster my leadership skills? We have received these requests from folks around the world.

In response to these requests we have teamed with nationally recognized coach Donna Krone, CPCC, to set up Life Change Artists. We are in the process of developing a unique, interactive on line program dedicated to turbocharging personal and professional creativity and building a dynamic community of people who wish to help themselves and others become true life change artists. We are aiming to have the program launched by later this spring.

Please let me know if you have interested in being on a dedicated mailing list for alerts related to the program. As part of the alerts we are including a short "Action Insight" each week. Below you will find a sample:

What If You Reframed a Client's Problem as a Creative Dilemma?
Creative Dilemmas arise out of a tension between the current state of our lives and a sense that things can be better or different. Creative Dilemmas are sources of innovative breakthroughs in art as well as in life and work. Without them the history of art would be a series of boring reproductions rather than lively bursts of expressive originality. Our lives and work, too, would take on the familiar but boring patina of repetition if it were not for the uncomfortable but necessary tensions that give rise to our creative dilemmas. When we understand creative dilemmas as the entry point into the creative process, we are more likely to face them for what they are, even welcome them, as unsettling as they may be, as opportunities for personal growth and professional growth and reinvention.
Think of a client at the threshold of change. How could he or she benefit from reframing a current challenge as a creative dilemma?

Let me know if you'd like to be put on this mailing list.

What's Been In My Head

I am circling around God, around the ancient tower
and I have been circling for a thousand years,
and I still don't know if I am a falcon, or a storm,
or a great song.

---Rainer Maria Rilke

Please forward this Bloutcher to others you think might have interest.

Egypt

2011-02-09T09:06:00.003-05:00

In This Boutcher

Egypt
Announcements

Egypt

I couldn't help but be mesmerized by the events in Egypt these past weeks. One item concerning the National Museum especially stood out for me in the reporting.

"The military, which has taken over security duties throughout Cairo and in many other cities, did not arrive on the scene until 10 p.m. In the meantime, ordinary Cairenes, aware of the security vacuum, flocked to protect the museum. The citizens, as well as three police officers who refused to leave their posts, apprehended nine alleged culprits as they tried to flee the museum with their loot, including two mummy skulls and a statue of Isis."

I do not know what will follow in the weeks and months ahead, but reading how everyday Cairenes honored their art and artifact history by risking their lives to protect it has given me a sense of hope.

Why? Because creating meaningful social and political institutions, like creating meaningful and lasting art, is based upon two volatile but symbiotic elements. The first is respect for the best of the past and the second is a willingness to step into the future without fully knowing what that future holds.

Let me explain. The great artists were both great iconoclasts and great traditionalists. They aspired to create newness in art while building on the work of the great artists who went before them. Just listen to Paul Cezanne whom many consider to be the father of modern art. "The Louvre is the book in which we learn to read," he tells us. He and many of the young artists who rebelled against the artistic conventions of the day did not begin from a rebellious stance out of the box. First they paid their respects to those who went before them. They learned their craft by actually sitting in the Louvre and copying the works of the great masters. That is what Cezanne meant when he said the Louvre is "the book in which we learned to read." The Louvre was the repository of tradition, of the standards of great art and before he and other artists could go beyond and create a vibrant new art they had to begin in the tradition, with tradition as the stepping stone into the unknown future.

That is because Cezanne and the others knew that art is a great experiment that stands on the shoulders of a rich past. The past is context for the future.

And this is why I had a sense of hope from the reporting in Cairo. A society where its citizens first act is to preserve and protect the repository of its great tradition understands its importance. They see the future not as a clean break from the past but as rooted in the best aspirations of the past. And while the past is not a prescription for the future it is a critical reference point. And that is where the unknown comes in---.

I don't know how things will turn out in Egypt. But it seems to me that Egyptians have an opportunity to create a vibrant new society out of the interplay between its unique past and its present unknown. Much like the great artists created a new art out of the interplay between the greatly honored old masters and the unknown future. That's the great experiment.

Announcements:

If you are in New England join me on February 15th from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. for a special program I will be doing for the International Coach Federation New England Chapter. To learn about the program entitled "What the Great Masters of Art Can Teach Us About a New Coaching Paradigm" click here .
I will also be speaking on the topic "Becoming a Life Change Artist" at the 92nd Street Y Tribeca in New York City on March 3rd for their special lunch program. To register and learn more please click here. The program is co-sponsored by the innovative organization The Transition Network--an inclusive community of professional women 50 and forward whose changing life situations lead them to seek new connections, resources and opportunities. Check them out here.

Worthy

2011-01-19T11:01:00.000-05:00

In this Bloutcher

Worthy
Up for a Book Review?
Announcements
Important documentary

Worthy

It's the beginning of a New Year and it feels strange to write the number 2011. I don't know if you share the sense of being in a science fiction future whenever you write down this date but to me it's just plain weird.

So as we begin this weird feeling year I'd like to pose a question which, at the end of this blurb, you will see has direct relevance to some choices you may make in 2011. Here's the question: How do you evaluate a work of art? How do you know if it is "good?" How do you know if it "succeeds?" (Okay, three questions. They're really the same question anyway.)

In the world of art this is a very important question and, of course, it triggers endless debate. This has been an especially pertinent question since the emergence of "modern" art when the old rules no longer seemed to hold water and the new stuff being produced by cubists and fauvists, abstractionists and expressionists had no prior reference points. When anything is possible in art how do you determine if a particular work is really good or just a gimmick? For instance, how do you evaluate "abstract" art? Do you simply say "Well, I like. I find it appealing. And therefore it succeeds for me."

Well, not to push your buttons, but I do NOT think personal preference is a good enough criteria to evaluate a work of art. So let me call on a third party for some insight.

Henry James, the great American writer, once suggested that there are three criteria for evaluating a work of art.

What was the artist's aim in the work?
Did s/he achieve her/his aim?
Was it worth the effort?

Now, let's face it, sometimes it's difficult to discern an artist's aim but if we are able then the first two questions are meaningful. They are internal to the creative process. My aim is to have a canvas vibrate with bold colors, I state. I use bold colors. The canvas vibrates. I have therefore succeeded in my aim according to the first two questions, I claim.

But then comes the tough part. James is asking if the aim was worthy of the effort. Was it truly ambitious? Was it aspirational? Was it meaningful? Did it challenge us in some large way? To me this is the seminal question. It is not good enough for art to be pretty or appeal in some visceral way to my senses or even to be professionally crafted. For art to be fully meaningful and to live up to its highest purpose it needs to challenge, inspire, teach, disturb us in a way that requires us to reflect deeply on its meaning and effect. That's why the great artists are great. They meet all three of James's criteria.

I raise this question because I think it has direct relevance to our lives in this strange feeling year of 2011. And here's the connection I promised you. How will you evaluate your efforts at the end of the year? It's not simply about whether you are focused on specific goals. Or that you achieve those goals. It's really about the last question: Are your goals worthy of the effort? Do your goals arise out of your highest purpose and best self?

Announcements:

Kathy and I have been fortunate to receive some terrific endorsements and book reviews for Becoming a Life Change Artist. We have been told that having good book reviews on the Amazon website helps with sales. So if you are up to writing a brief review of the book we would be most appreciative!! To write a review click here. Then scroll down to the "Customer Reviews" section and click on "Create Your Own Review" on the right side of the page. Thank you!!

If you will be in New England on February 15th I will be doing a two hour program for the International Coach Federation New England chapter between 3:30 pm and 5:30 pm entitled "What the Great Masters of Art Can Teach Us About a New Coaching Paradigm." To learn more please click here.
Earlier today I did an interview with Lisa Kanda and Deb Frey on their Blog Talk Radio program on the theme of "Leadership in Turbulent Times; What the Great Masters of Art Can Teach Us." To listen to the 30 minute interview click here.
For those in the New York City area I will be speaking at the 92nd Street Y Tribeca on March 3rd at 12 noon. The title of the talk is "Becoming a Life Change Artist." The program is being co-sponsored by The Transition Network. For more information and/or to register click here.

Important Documentary

I want to put a plug in for a very important independent documentary entitled "Race to Nowhere." This is a "should not miss" film that takes a hard look at our educational system and its impact on creativity. The film is not available through general release but you can locate a screening in your area by linking here to a screening near you. I want to thank Lauren Perlmutter for urging me to see the film. She runs an amazingly creative arts education program called Art 2 Grow On in the Los Angeles area. You should definitely check it out here.

What is a Life-ist?

2010-12-21T10:30:00.002-05:00

In this Bloutcher (rhymes with voucher-comes from BLog jOUrnal skeTCHbook newslettER)

Announcements
What is a Life-ist?
Reflection at year end

Announcements

Project Renewment is a grass roots movement begun by Bernice Bratter and Helen Dennis and offers a trailblazing retirement model for the generation of career women just now leaving the workforce. To learn more about Project Renewment and the book which spurred it click here. I will be speaking to the Project Renewment Group on January 22nd in Los Angeles.
I spoke at the International Positive Aging Conference in Los Angeles at the beginning of the month. The IPAC brings together professionals from diverse disciplines who are trying to change the way people think about and behave toward aging. The conference was filled with people who are creating innovative models related to life transitions, creativity, wellness, community. One of the key players in organizing and sponsoring the conference is a unique educational institution called Fielding Graduate School whose students range in age from their 20's to their 70's. To learn more about Fielding click here.
Karen Mandell, (yes, my wife) conducted an inspirational workshop entitled Calling Calliope; Finding Your Voice at Midlife and Beyond. As part of the workshop she read some of her award winning poetry. If you would like to purchase one of her chapbooks for $6.50 just let me know and we will put it in the mail to you. There are two to choose from: Rose Has a New Walker and The Story We Think We Are Telling. Take it from an unbiased source--these poems really speak to the soul through the surprises contained in everyday experiences.
Karen and I have been invited to do a program at Esalen (Karen a two day weekend workshop entitled "Calling Calliope; Finding Your Poetic Voice," and me a 5 day program entitled "Life Change Studio; Navigating Transitions in Turbulent Times") Karen's program runs from November 11-13, 2011 and mine runs November 13-18. We'd love to see you at this magical place in the Big Sur.
It feels good to have capped the year with the production of Unlocking Your Creative Mantra, co-created with Donna Krone. My personal Creative Mantra is CREATE, INTEGRATE, MAKE A DIFFERENCE. I try to live my Creative Mantra every day so it has been very meaningful to bring this sketchbook into the world at this time and to receive such an affirming endorsement from Kris Costello, the talented host of Wellness Talk Radio in Los Angeles. Kris told me: "Unlocking Your Creative Mantra has transformed my life. It has given me a true compass." If you would like to learn more about Unlocking click here.

What is a Life-ist?

There's a fascinating description of an artist at work in Martin Gaylord's book Man with a Blue Scarf; On Sitting for a Portrait by Lucian Freud, Thames and Hudson, 2010.

Gaylord sat for a portrait painted by the great contemporary English master Lucian Freud. He describes Freud's affect as he is working on the portrait.

The tension of working can make LF seem very agitated at times. He gestures; he raises his arms in a movement half triumphant, half despairing, like an Italian taxi driver encountering a perplexing configuration of traffic. He mutters to himself. His bouts of concentration apt to begin with an especially hard stare, followed by a deep sigh. He steps forward and back, and on occasion darts forward and springs away from the canvas, bringing his mouth down in a one-sided grimace. Sometimes he touches the picture with a brush like a person making contact with something intensely hot; or charged with electricity. The paint continues to spread across the canvas in tiny, incremental stages.

So let's pull out some of the phrases here:

agitated at times
half triumphant, half despairing
encountering a perplexing configuration of traffic
mutters to himself
deep sigh
mouth down in a one-sided grimace
intensely hot
charged with electricity
in tiny, incremental stages

Please read these phrases again.

Now I challenge you to tell me whether he is describing someone working on a painting or someone trying to navigate change in his/her life.

Instead of Lucian Freud working on a portrait this description could probably fit any one of us working on our life.

If you are thinking: well then, are you suggesting that my life is a work of art? That living my life is a creative process? Then you are quick. You see, I believe that art and life are not separate things. Art is life, only representing it in a different form. I also believe life is art, only engaging it in a different form. The language may be different, the tools may be different, the medium may be different, but they are both a fundamentally creative process--that is, they are both messy, exhilarating, frustrating and non-linear. And both take place in that murky swamp called The Unknown. After all, we do NOT know the outcome when we begin a journey of change. So I believe that the process of creating Art provides profound insights into the process of creating our lives. I call folks who share this perspective Life-ists.

The truth, though, is that change is not easy. We stumble, we question, we wonder if it is worth it. So, if you are finding change difficult from time to time. If you feel blocked or frustrated or lost, I would like you to read the following piece of advice from Leonardo Da Vinci to an artist:

"Every now and then go away, have a little relaxation, for when you come back to your work your judgment will be surer. Go some distance away because then the work appears smaller and more of it can be taken in at a glance, and a lack of harmony and proportion is more readily seen."

Now I would ask you to read Da Vinci's advice one more time. Only this time substitute the word "life" for the words "work" and "it" when they appear.

Yes, Da Vinci may be giving advice to someone who gets stuck on a painting or an invention, but you and I know he is also giving advice to each of us about our life. After all, Da Vinci is a Life-ist of the first order.

Reflection at Year End

In many ways this has been a remarkable year. Becoming a Life Change Artist came out in August and I have heard from folks all over the globe including Australia, Bali, New Zealand, Turkey, Serbia, Jordan, South Africa, Russia, Canada, USA, and all parts of the Eurozone. Even Mongolia. People have shared the meaningful impact Becoming has had on them. My co-author Kathy and I have been deeply moved by these messages partly because they validate the reason we wrote the book--we wanted to touch people's lives and provide a sense of hopefulness related to personal change--but also because it confirms that people in transition are seeking connection with fellow travelers. The world is in transition and this makes personal change inevitable. It is our belief that these transitions are opportunities for personal growth and when properly equipped we can individually and collectively make a difference.

We would love to continue to hear from those who have taken the journey through the pages of Becoming.

Of course the most wonderful thing of all this year has been spending time with my first time grandson Baylor. He is a wonder of spontaneity and surprises and makes everything he encounters a candidate for creativity. I have begun to sketch out some ideas for a painting.

Have a wonderful holiday season and healthy, vibrant, creating New Year!

The Things Inside

2010-12-01T10:30:00.000-05:00

Bloutcher rhymes with voucher and is a factor of:
BLogjOUrnalskeTCHbooknewslettER

In this bloutcher

Announcements
The Things Inside

Announcements:

Holidays are approaching. Consider a gift of Becoming a Life Change Artist by Fred Mandell and Kathleen Jordan. Order here. Also consider a gift of newly released Unlocking Your Creative Mantra by Fred Mandell and Donna Krone. Unlocking will ignite new levels of creative energy in your life. Order here. Even better, consider giving both as a gift!
I have been out on the speaking circuit lately and have received many requests for copies of the power point slides I have used. I automatically make the slides available to attendees. I thought it might make sense for those who have not been able to attend any these talks to make a general offer to send a pdf of one of these presentations. If you would like to receive a complimentary pdf of a presentation entitled: What the Great Masters of Art Can Teach Us About Navigating the Second Half of Life with Vitality, Creativity and Meaning please just send me an email by clicking here and I will be happy to shoot you the pdf.

The Things Inside

The remarkable Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa who passed away a few years ago made an utterly stunning film called "Dreams." It is composed of several vignettes inspired by Kurosawa's own dreams. One of them, entitled "Crows," begins with a Kurosawa alter-ego, a young man, in a museum staring at a series of famous Van Gogh paintings when he is literally drawn into one of the paintings--The Langlois Bridge at Arles with Women Washing. The French washerwomen, now unfrozen, begin shouting at him to watch out for Monsieur Van Gogh. "He was in an asylum!" they giggle. Wherein the young man takes off in search of the great artist. Only now Kurosawa takes the viewer into a virtual Van Gogh world, as his alter ego trudges through Arles, wheat fields, down dirt roads, resplendant in thick impasto brush strokes--ochres, blues, greens, vermillion. The scenes vibrate with brilliant color.

When the man finally finds Van Gogh, the master is hard at work and asks the young man "Why aren't you working?" He then goes on to say, "All of nature has its own beauty. I lose myself in it. I devour nature completely and whole. It is so difficult to hold it inside." And then he packs up his easel and marches over the hill out of sight until a sky full of crows explodes over the fields

and the young man is back in the museum looking from the outside in again, staring longingly at the painting as though he had lost a world. As though this real world were a mere pale reflection of the actual painting.

This is one of the visually most stunning scenes I have ever seen in a movie. Chopin's haunting prelude #15 in D flat adds to the surreal experience of being IN the painting. Click here to listen.

So what's going on here? Is Kurosawa as mad as Van Gogh? Has he lost his ability to distinguish reality from fantasy? Or is it as simple as one master paying homage to another?

I think there's a lot going on here. But one thing in particular strikes me. It is, as Van Gogh says, "so difficult to hold it inside." Van Gogh gave us the gift of expressing in color what was inside him. He literally created a new visual language. We all recognize it today. He could not resist it. It was inside and it had to come out. From my perspective it seems Kurosawa is telling us we cannot keep our nature tamped down forever. We cannot hold it back. Our personal nature has the force of real nature. What Van Gogh expressed through painting, Kurosawa expressed through film and we can express through the way we live our lives. We each have the opportunity to find the language, voice, courage with which to express our true nature. That is how we create not only ourselves but the world around us.

So a question bubbles to the surface: Imagine, for a moment, you are at a museum or a concert or reading a novel or listening to a poem and you could both imaginatively and in reality step into and live in a particular painting or be the music or be a character in a novel or take wing like the words in a poem. Which painting, music, novel, poem would you choose? What does that tell you about your true "nature," about the things inside you, and how you are or are not fully expressing it in the world?

The Big Wiggle

2010-11-10T11:50:00.000-05:00

In this Boutcher

What is a Bloutcher?
The Big Wiggle
Announcements

What is a Bloutcher

Folks have suggested that I should remind readers what a bloutcher is and how I came to give it that name. First, bloutcher rhymes with voucher. Second, I created the name from BLogjOUrnalskeTCHbooknewslettER because none of those things by themselves matched what I was interested in doing which is to COMBINE all of them as a way of reflecting on and sharing the creative process (of/in living and working.)

The Big Wiggle

In my last bloutcher I offered readers the opportunity to identify with a straight line or a wiggly line.

Well, the results qualify as a landslide. Only one person identified with the straight line--she was very focused on finishing her dissertation--and still admitted "in a more general sense I really relate to the big wiggle." Here are some other responses.

"Who would have thunk it but I'm totally wiggle."

"My life is very much like the squiggly line right now and that's the way I like it. I feel totally unencumbered."

"I'm definitely the wigglie line. Some folks think that just because they have clear goals things are going to go in a straight line. Yeah, right!"

"I'm definitely a squiggle! I pity the individual who either has, or thinks he has, things figured out and is on a straight track."

Soooo, virtually everyone is sympatico to the wiggle. This doesn't surprise me because I have come to refer to the creative process, aka life, as The Big Wiggle.

And what makes life a big wiggle?
How many times have you changed your mind?
How many times have you had to start over?
How many times have you made a mistake?
How many times have you gone down the wrong road?
How many times have you given the right answer but asked the wrong question?
How many times have you wondered--"coulda, shoulda, woulda"?
How many times have you had the rug pulled out from under you?
How many times did things "just not work out the way I thought they would?"
See what I mean?

Pablo Picasso understood this when he said "I start with an idea and then it becomes something else." He got The Big Wiggle! Of course he was speaking about art and the creative process, but you and I know his comment also applies to life and work. After all how many of us are doing what we thought we would be doing when we were 18 or 28 or even 48?

So I think there's a big deal implication to The Big Wiggle view of the world.

What if our educational system spent time teaching us how to navigate the "something else" Picasso talks about? I am not suggesting we forego the basics. I am suggesting that we teach the "oops, the rug has just been pulled out from under me" skills. The change skills. The embracing uncertainty skills. The creative skills. I recently polled an audience of 125 people regarding whether they were currently doing what they thought they would be doing 10/20/30 years earlier. Somewhere north of eighty percent of the hands indicated they were doing something different from what they had expected to be doing--and, as one person in the audience noted, that's if they even had an idea of what they wanted to be doing. If 80 percent of the people are currently doing "something else" then we know there's been a whole lot of wiggling goin' on. So doesn't it make sense not only to "educate" people to prepare for the 20 percent of what they expect to be doing but to also prepare them for the 80 percent Big Wiggle?

But the real message in this is that the The Big Wiggle is where we spend most of our time. The Big Wiggle isn't the exception. So feel it! It's where we are domiciled. TBW is home.

This isn't only true in terms of life skills but leadership skills as well. After all, YouTube started as a way to share videos for dating purposes and became something else. Facebook started as a self contained system for Harvard students to be in touch with each other and became something else. Wells Fargo started with a bunch of ponies and became something way else.

Educate for The Big Wiggle!!

Perhaps no other artist embodies The Big Wiggle more than the abstract expressionist Jackson Pollock who began to drip cans of liquid enamel paints on a canvas he had spread out on the floor of his barn studio. Visually step into one of his drip paintings and you're not sure which side is up. I don't care what the art critics say, you can't convince me he ended up where he thought he would.

So if you're feeling tossed about by TBW, you're not alone. I would suggest you use it as a creative opportunity. Here are three things you can do to wiggle The Big Wiggle.
1. Drip paint--that is, try something new. You know, the thing you've wanted to do but have put off. Just start it. You might become famous. At least, you will end up doing something else.
2. Step back from the canvas of your life by suspending the governing "shoulds" in your life and asking these three big questions:

What do I really want to do?
How do I really want to be in the world?
Are there things inside of me that I really want to get out but have been tamping down?

3. Find the irony in your life, that is the incongruity between the actual outcome of events in your life and what you had expected and ask yourself what makes this incongruous. Then ask how you can create greater coherence between what you expect and what you want to get.

Announcements

Reminder: As the holidays approach please consider a gift of Becoming a Life Change Artist; 7 Creative Skills to Reinvent Yourself at Any Stage of Life. I am more than happy to sign a card with an inscription that you can insert into the book. Just send me an email with the name of the person(s) and anything you would like me to incorporate into the card. To order the book please click here.
Speaking of gifts I am extremely excited to let you know that Donna Krone and I have just come out with a wonderful and we believe inspiring workbook/sketchbook/guide we call Unlocking Your Creative Mantra. I reference the power of a creative mantra in Becoming a Life Change Artist. If you would like to spark new levels of creative energy, get focused on what really matters to you, create a framework for wise decision making, then Unlocking is the perfect gift to yourself or others who are at a crossroad in their life. If you would like to order a copy just click here.
I also encourage each of you who are interested in issues surrounding the second half of life to consider attending the International Positive Aging Conference. Attendees are committed to shifting the paradigm related to aging in America. I will be presenting at the conference and I am thrilled that my wife Karen will also be presenting a program entitled: "Calling Calliope; Finding Your Poetic Voice at Midlife and Beyond." For details click here.
In my last bloutcher dated October 20th I noted an article on the decline of creativity in the US that appeared in Newsweek and the IBM CEO study that identified creativity as the number one need for corporate leadership. Well, there seems to be confluence of these articles. In the Tuesday, November 9th op ed page of the NYTimes David Brooks wrote a worthwhile piece on the importance of creativity in the years ahead entitled The Crossroads Nation.

Percolating or Procrastinating

2010-10-20T11:10:00.000-04:00

In this Bloutcher:

Percolating or Procrastinating?
Announcements
A Percolating Question

Percolating or Procrastinating?

My last bloutcher elicited an interesting set of responses. I wrote about a photo I had clipped from a New Yorker magazine because it grabbed my attention for reasons I could not explain. I pinned the photo on my studio wall and over the next several months allowed the photo to percolate in my awareness until I finally began to sketch it and then ultimately develop a painting inspired by the photo. I've had readers ask: When does percolating become procrastinating? One person mentioned that percolating can be deadly because rather than confront the thing and do something about it the whole thing simply dies.

So here are some thoughts.

Leonardo Da Vinci is said to have worked on the Mona Lisa for 26 years, carrying it with him on his various peripatetic journeys across borders, bridges and City States. Was he percolating or procrastinating?

Wilhem de Kooning, the great abstract expressionist, worked on his seminal painting Excavation for almost a year before throwing it in a garbage heap consigned to the city dump. It was rescued by a friend who talked de Kooning into re-engaging with the painting. From start to finish it took almost two years. Was he percolating or procrastinating?

So one way to look at it is that ultimately the measure of whether we are percolating or procrastinating is in the result--whether it takes one week or one decade. If something worthy emerges from the time + the engagement, then it is percolating. Creativity has its own natural life cycle. And percolating is an essential element of that life cycle.

Now I know that is not going to be a satisfactory answer for everyone, especially for those under the gun of a deadline. After all, deadlines introduce consequences. (Let's leave aside the question of what would the Mona Lisa or Excavation have been if they had been produced under a deadline.) I will acknowledge that deadlines change the dynamics. We may sacrifice the full maturation of the creative process by adhering to deadlines but, hey, that's a reality. We do the best we can with the time we have.

So here's a little secret I discovered. We actually know when we are procrastinating, when we have tipped from percolating into procrastinating. I have rarely found a person who is not aware of when s/he is procrastinating. The problem isn't recognizing it. It's what to do about it.

In the research my co-author Kathy Jordan and I did for our book, we found that the best way to preempt procrastination is to regularly engage in "preparation practices." These are activities which help us separate from the problem we are trying to solve and stimulate a state of mind which predisposes the brain to creative insight. In other words, preparation practices are a form of percolating that move you toward creative insight. Examples of preparation practices include meditation, yoga, going for a walk, riding your bike, even taking a shower. I suggested to one marketing executive that he write down the problem he was trying to solve in the form of a question. I then suggested he put it in his desk drawer and go to the museum for a while and enjoy the art work on the walls. After 45 minutes he rushed back to his office flooded with all kinds of ideas. Unknowingly he had engaged in a preparation activity.

Da Vinci recommended simply going away for a period of time. He meant separating yourself from the thing about which you may be procrastinating. Go some distance, he advised. That way "the work appears smaller and more of it can be taken in at a glance, and a lack of harmony and proportion is more readily seen."

On the other hand, de Kooning went on bike rides. That helped him "keep my eyes fresh."

Ultimately, though, we need to honor percolating. Not rush it. Percolating is a kind of pre-wisdom, a prelude to wisdom, wisdom in the wings that ultimately gets shaped into its appropriate mode of expression. A gift.

Announcements:

If you are in the Minneapolis/St Paul area please join me at a joint meeting of the Minnesota Coaches Association and the Minnesota Career Development Association. I will be presenting a program entitled: Navigating Change at Midlife and Beyond; The Great Masters of Art Reveal the Secrets to a New Paradigm. To register go to: http://www.minnesotacoaches.org/ OR http://mcda.net/events/navigating-change-at-midlife-and-beyond/
This is a season of change. And Thanksgiving is around the corner. So I had a thought. If you would like to give Becoming a Life Change Artist; 7 Creative Skills to Reinvent Yourself at Any Stage of Life as a gift to someone I am happy to write a personal note to the recipient on a handsome Thank You card that you can insert into the book. Just let me know the recipient's name and anything you want me to include. If you want to take advantage of this just send me an email at fred@fredmandell.com

A Percolating Question:

Which image below best captures how you are thinking about your life at the present time? And what does that say about where you are in the change process?

Percolating or Procrastinating?

I am Man. Male.

2010-09-29T10:45:00.000-04:00

In This Bloutcher

I am Man. Male.
Announcements

I am Man. Male.

That means I don't ask. At least in public where I might be embarrassed for not knowing. I don't ask for help. Or anything else that might hint at a handout. I figure it out. I am good at repartee, not disclosure. I'm the hunter. I capture or conquer. I provide.

I am a craftsman. I know how to make things--that's THINGS--and make them work. Homo Faber--Man the Maker, the fabricator. I don't whine. I solve problems. I'm a man. Male. And I am lonely.

Being Male means innovation, yes. It is practical. It has utility. Creativity, eh. Pure whimsy. What's its purpose?

Being Male inhibits my creativity. Creativity flows from vulnerability. From longing. From wonder. Not from solving but from touching the untouchable. Not from the hands or the brain or even from the wits, but from the firmament. Look up, O Male. Take in the stars. Close your eyes and see!

Please excuse the above rant--well, actually don't excuse it. I wanted to give you a sense of where one of my paintings came from. It speaks to the sources of inspiration. And the peculiar process of creating. I'm sure we have all experienced it at different times and in different ways.

Let's go back to the day I was leafing through a copy of The New Yorker and came across this photo.

It caught my attention for reasons I could not explain at the time so I tore it out and kept it in my studio for many months. Whenever I looked at the photo I couldn't escape the feeling that it was something more than a photo of a man running down the street in a suit. Perhaps he was Modern Man? Post Modern? Whatever that means. On the run in any case. But from what and toward what? And then he seemed so alone. I was also reading about and looking at the work of Spanish painter Francisco Goya at the time. And was both floored by and inspired by his painting The Dog (1820-23), a foreshadowing of post modern (whatever the hell that means) angst.

That is when I started sketching out some possibilities. Example on the right.

And then I moved into painting. I might stumble across something in the process, I thought. I didn't need an answer at the outset. I just needed to get started. Sometimes I have a title in mind before working on a painting and I keep it. Other times I end up changing the title. And still other times I don't have a title until the end, if even then. And then I change it. This one I called "Running Man" and I have kept it all the way through. The quote in the painting is from Ecclesiastes: "Running Man is like a breath...his days are like a passing shadow."

That doesn't mean I didn't run up against problems while working on it. In fact, at one point I was so frustrated that I made the above entry which kicks off this bloutcher (I am Man. Male.) in my sketchbook. Ouch. Did I really mean it? Do I really believe this? Does being Male limit creativity? Neuroscientists are discovering that creativity is a whole brain activity (versus an exclusively right brain activity) so perhaps creativity is enhanced through the union of opposites--the best and worst of male and female.

And what does the experience of creating the Running Man painting say about the creative process of living and life change?

Here are a few quick thoughts:

Sometimes the best way to engage an idea is to separate from it. [Thank you Dr. George Klavens for this notion.] Instead of pursuing it, let it pursue you. Sometimes you simply have to let an idea float. It's not ready for prime time or for action.
Creativity does not occur through thinking but when emotion and thinking combust with each other. When we are considering life change or are in it we need to listen to both our heads and our hearts.
And, finally, when you and the idea are ready for each other it only means the work is just beginning.

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Announcements:

On October 4th, 7 p.m., I will be speaking at University of St. Catherine, Jeanne D'Arc Auditorium, 2004 Randolf Avenue, St. Paul, Minnesota, sponsored by the pioneering organization SHiFT. Topic: What the Great Masters of Art Can Teach Us About Navigating the Second Half of Life with Vitality, Creativity and Meaning. Start time is 7 pm. Admission is free with donations accepted. For reservations simply email: DavidBuck4@gmail.com
There is a movement afoot called Positive Aging. For those who are dissatisfied with the old model of aging as one of decline, stepping away and retreating then please check out the 4th International Positive Aging Conference in Los Angeles December 7-10. Go to the Life Planning Network website at: http://www.lifeplanningnetwork.org/index.cfm?action=main.conference10
I will be speaking at the Association of Retirement Organizations in Higher Education (AROHE) on October 16th at Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT. http://www.arohe.org/conferences.php

Art & War

2010-09-08T09:15:00.000-04:00

In this Bloutcher

Announcements
Art and War; and a Gentler Order of Feeling

Announcements:

If you are in the Boston area, please join me at the Newton Public Library on September 13th, 7 pm, for an Author's Talk and book signing. I will be discussing Becoming a Life Change Artist; 7 Creative Skills to Reinvent Yourself at Any Stage of Life. Get there a little early because I will have a special guest handing out some special goodies! Thank you to Discovering What's Next and the Newton Public Library for sponsoring this event.

Anyone who cares about creativity and its importance in American life and business should check out the article in Newsweek that appeared a few weeks ago: The Creativity Crisis. http://www.newsweek.com/2010/07/10/the-creativity-crisis.html. It's time to take this seriously. At the very same time that this article is sounding the alarm, the 2010 IBM CEO Study shows that CEOs identify creativity as the number one need in business leaders.

Art and War

All the recent news about combat troops leaving Iraq and the ongoing concerns about Afghanistan brings up for me the very strange relationship between Art and War.

For one thing artists such as Picasso have been credited with introducing camouflage into modern warfare. Now that's a strange footnote to military history! And Leonardo Da Vinci was the man who both painted the Mona Lisa AND invented prototypes of war machines such as the tank.

Leonardo's Tank

WWI Camouflaged Boat

But for me the most compelling story about art and war relates to a lesser known but remarkable French sculptor and artist Henri Gaudier-Brzeska.

At the beginning of the last century he was unknown in his native France but hung out in London with some of the artistic greats such as Jacob Epstein and Ezra Pound. By the time he enlisted in the French army at the age of 22 at the outset of WWI he had already produced over 120 sculptures and 2000 works on paper including pastels.

Gaudier-Brzeska sent several letters from the front in which he describes the day to day scene around him. "Human masses teem and move, are destroyed and crop up again. Horses are worn out in three weeks, die by the roadside. Dogs wander, are destroyed and others come along. The bursting shells, the volleys, wire entanglements, projectors, motors, the chaos of battle do not alter in the least the outlines of the hill we are beseiging." Trench warfare was brutal, often fought hand to hand. Corpses laid in the wasteland between the two encampments.

At one point Gaudier-Brzeska wrestles a mauser from a dead German soldier and takes it back to his trench during a break in the battle. In a letter he reflects: "It's heavy unwieldy shape swamped me with a powerful image of brutality. I was in doubt for a long time whether it pleased or displeased me. I found I did not like it. I broke the butt off and with my knife I carved in it a design, with which I tried to express a gentler order of feeling which I preferred."

In the midst of this horrific devastation the young Gaudier-Brzeska finds it within himself to reconfigure a weapon of killing into a "gentler" form.

Two months after he sent this letter, Gaudier-Brzeska was killed in battle. He was 23 years old.

Art and War. Artist and Soldier. Creator of life and Destroyer of life. How do you explain this side by side capacity for brutality and gentelness? Where does it come from? These opposites contained within us?

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Grandma Moses & The Wisdom of Chickens

2010-08-26T10:45:00.000-04:00

In This Bloutcher

Announcements
Grandma Moses and The Wisdom of Chickens
From My Sketchbook

Announcements

If you're in Boston mark September 13th @ 7 pm, Newton Free Library. I will be doing an author's talk and book signing. I will also have a surprise guest who will be bringing some surprise goodies! Bring a neighbor.
Charlie Finesilver whose story appears in Becoming a Life Change Artist (he sold his plumbing business and then he and his wife joined the Peace Corp in their mid fifties) reports: "Your book pretty much captures my life experiences and changes. But I must tell you that I have been dressing like Monet lately, which has been getting a lot of attention..." Let's hear it for Charlie and his inner Monet!!!
And if you plan to be in Central New Jersey on the evening of September 21st, I will be speaking to the New Jersey Professional Coaches Association in Edison, New Jersey.
If you are a writer or interested in writing and books consider contacting my co-author Kathy Jordan. She is an active member of a remarkable on-line organization called SheWrites--over 9,000 strong women who have formed a community related to writing and books. You can reach Kathy for more info at http://www.drkathyjordan.com/contact/

Grandma Moses and The Wisdom of Chickens

"If I didn't start painting, I would have raised chickens."

Grandma Moses (Anna Mary Robertson Moses) spent her first 70+ years raising 10 children and working at broidery. In her mid 70s she picked up a paint brush for the first time. She died in 1961 at the age of 101 with a reputation as one of America's pre-eminent folk artists. She was still painting.

But if she had not painted the last quarter of her life she tells us she would have raised chickens. What are we to make of this claim?

For one thing, she was clearly not full of herself.

For another, she is going against the grain of a popular view that seems to be out there today. Many folks seek a purpose or passion in life. While such a quest is certainly worthy it risks the effect of making those who do not find a single purpose or passion feeling somehow inadequate or with a sense that something is missing in their lives. They may feel somehow diminished. Perhaps even on the periphery. But what about those who have lots of interests? What about those who cannot seem to find that one true passion? What about those who believe there is more than one of us in each of us?

Grandma Moses to the rescue. You can always raise chickens. Or shell peas. Grandma Moses understood there is more than one possibility in our lives. More than a single scenario or narrative. I cannot help but think that some of us have multiple passions and purposes. Contradiction? Well, I take comfort in Grandma Moses and her chickens and also in Walt Whitman.

Do I contradict myself?
Very well, then I contradict myself,
I am large, I contain multitudes.

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From My Sketchbook

My sketchbook is a hodgepodge of stuff. I sketch. I journal. I admonish myself. I motivate myself. I chronicle fleeting ideas or capture quotes. Sometimes I do all at once. As I did on this page.
Aren't we all a little strange?

Book Neat, Life Messy

2010-08-13T10:30:00.001-04:00

In This Bloutcher

Announcements
Book Neat, Life Messy; Or Seeing Matisse's Basket of Oranges in person for the first time

Announcements

My sister Miriam reports: "My iPhone has now stopped auto correcting bloutcher (to butcher) and has started autofilling "bloutcher." Made me think: iPhone therefore iAm!

An idea to unabashedly promote Becoming a Life Change Artist. Recommend the book for book clubs you are part of

I will be speaking to the New Jersey Professional Coaches Association on September 21, beginning at 6:30 p.m. at the Hilton Garden Inn, Raritan Center, Edison, New Jersey. Topic: "The Great Masters of Art Reveal the Secrets to a New Coaching Paradigm." You can find a full listing of future speaking and programs on the events page of my website: www.fredmandell.com

Book Neat, Life Messy

Matisse's painting Basket of Oranges, 1912, is luxuriously succulent. Just ask Pablo Picasso. You see, Picasso and Matisse were great artistic rivals, yet Picasso was so smitten by Basket of Oranges that he acquired it in the early 1940's and kept it in his home until his death in 1973. Today, it hangs in the Picasso Museum in Paris.

I first encountered this painting in an art book. The color was so vibrant, the design so balanced and clean that I acquired a photographic image and set it on my desk. I marveled at the creative prowess of Matisse that he could paint something more perfect, more flawless than the original basket of oranges. Whenever I got hungry it seemed to fill me up. I don't mean to over romanticize the thing but the painting did nourish me.

Then I visited the Picasso Museum in Paris last spring with great anticipation at seeing this painting. As I approached it I was struck from a distance by its enduring luminescence. The pinks vibrated, the oranges pulsated, the very painting seemed to want to leap from the wall.

But as I got closer something strange happened. I was no longer looking at a photographic representation of the painting in a book, but the real McCoy, up close and personal and what I saw really set me back. The surface of the painting had been worked and reworked. Parts had been scraped out and other parts had been painted over. The surface was not photographically smooth but scratched and thickened. Certain sections looked almost primitively dabbed at as though they had been put there in a fit of frustration. Yet, despite these many "imperfections"--or perhaps because of them--the painting took on a new kind of breathless beauty for me, one born out of the struggle to not accept the ordinary.

I walked away from Basket of Oranges in a sweat. I felt I had not only encountered a great painting but I had been taught a life lesson. Real life like real painting is a messy process. What may seem effortless from a distance or in a book is in truth the outcome of struggle, emotional ups and downs, fits and starts, tears and fears. It can be plain ugly.

Life can be like that also. We experience moments of grace and beauty. We aspire as Joseph Campbell said for the "experience of being alive" more than we aspire to the meaning of life. Most of the time, though, we are at the easel of our lives dabbing, scraping, painting over, scraping again, experimenting and wondering how to get the most out of ourselves.

Matisse's greatness is in part due to his willingness to endure the messiness of it all in order to create something extraordinary. I can't speak for Picasso but my hunch is that he may have bought the painting to remind himself of that as well.

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The Day Cezanne Turned Leadership Upside Down

2010-08-03T11:00:00.000-04:00

In This Bloutcher(TM)

Announcements
The Day Cezanne Turned Leadership Upside Down

Announcements:

Believe it or not today is the official release date of Becoming a Life Change Artist; 7 Creative Skills to Reinvent Yourself at Any Stage of Life. You can now actually order and receive a copy. Lots of credit goes to our amazing agent Joanne Wyckoff at Zachary Shuster Harmsworth. zshliterary.com. Thanks also to Esmond Harmworth for his initial encouragement. And thanks to our Penguin Avery Group team for all they have done. Lucia Watson, Miriam Rich, Lisa Johnson, Adenike Olanrewaju, Gordon Lindsay, Jessica Chun, Megan Newman, Bill Shinker. A Great Group!

All you folks in the environs of Denver, please join my Co-author Kathy Jordan at the Tattered Cover Bookstore, 7:30 p.m., August 12, Highland Ranch Location.

I am currently on a national radio interview tour over the next several days. This means I sit at my desk and get interviewed by radio stations around the country. These include: KLPW, "Lifestyle Matters"; KAHI, "The Mary Jane Popp Show"; KAAM, "The Breakfast Club"; WGET, "The Breakfast Nook"; WUML-FM, "It's Your Health Radio"; KEEL-AM "David McMillen Show"; Lifestyle Radio Network, "The Frankie Boyer Show"; WDEV-FM "True North Radio." Among others.

Please join me on August 10th at the Brookline Booksmith, Brookline at 7 pm for a talk and book signing.

The Day Cezanne Turned Leadership Upside Down

Several days ago I met a good friend Ellen Glanz for some ice tea. Since there were no seats available in the Starbucks we decided to take a walk. There are three things you should know about Ellen. She is incredibly bright and curious. She was born with a unique insightfulness gene. And she has a wonderfully uplifting smile. She's also an accomplished management consultant and photographer. And we never know where our conversations will take us. So maybe that's four or five things.

Our conversation turned to the subject of leadership and Ellen was curious how my involvement with art might have influenced my view of leadership so I told her about an experience I had which profoundly changed the way I look at leadership.

Several years ago I enrolled in a drawing class. I had not taken an art class since the seventh grade. My instructor was a very perceptive yet gruff critic. In the middle of my second class, he stopped in front of my work, folded his arms across his chest, and began shifting his eyes between my drawing surface and the model. "What are you trying to do?" he asked, his voice tinged with genuine puzzlement.

I explained that I was trying to render on the page what I saw with my eyes.

Well, it was as though I had lit a match to Vesuvius.

"No, no, no," he erupted. "Follow Cezanne. For you, Cezanne should be the beginning and end. You do not see in order to draw. Cezanne teaches us just the opposite. You draw in order to see! Drawing is a search. It is discovery. If you take anything from this class it is this: You do not see in order to draw, you draw in order to see!"

Cezanne Self Portrait

Now that was a mouthful. And totally liberating. Cezanne caused nothing less than a revolution in my understanding of drawing and art in general. You draw in order to discover. You learn through the process of drawing. In that moment I felt as though I had rediscovered art.

Now what does this have to do with leadership? Over the years I have had many discussions with individuals who aspired to grow as leaders. Many times, they ask: "What would you suggest I learn in order to be a better leader. I need to learn in order to lead." My response would often involve a combination of some reading suggestions, a call to become a keen observer of other leaders and the encouragement to seek new "stretch" assignments.

I still believe that is sound advice. But Cezanne has totally turned my thinking on its head. Now I share a different perspective. Cezanne advised that one does not see in order to draw; rather one draws in order to see. So now I humbly suggest that one does not learn in order to lead. Rather one leads in order to learn. I am not speaking here about technical learning--that's basic. I am talking about the deeper learning and insight that builds wisdom and contributes to one becoming a more effective leader. I am talking about modeling a new kind of leadership.

I'm not alone in thinking this way. Peter Drucker wrote eloquently about his belief that the leader of the future will not lead by knowing, especially since the complexity of today's world does not allow one person to know all things, but will lead by asking questions.

What is new for me in this, though, is the sequence and emphasis. For a long time I thought one needed to develop an area of expertise before assuming a leadership role. I realize now that there are at least two kinds of learning. The first is what might be called technical learning, the kind that is necessary to develop one's baseline competence. The other, and in many ways tougher, kind of learning might be referred to as leadership wisdom, and that only comes from a willingness to step into the unknown by doing, processing, reflecting, reintegrating--in other words, by constantly reinventing oneself through learning the lessons of leadership. This kind of learning is generative/regenerative and a source of self renewal for individuals and organizations. And it is a fundamentally creative process!!

This is why I believe Cezanne's understanding of drawing so profoundly mirrors a critical lesson for leaders today. Just as he suggested that one does not see in order to draw, but one draws in order to see--so too is it important that leaders do not learn in order to lead, but they lead in order to learn.

Ellen then brought me back to earth. She mentioned a few books I had not read and flashed her terrific smile. And then she said, "I really like these upside down walks. We never do know where the conversation will lead."

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Pizza, Dead Bodies and the Creativity of Limitations

2010-07-21T17:46:00.000-04:00

In this bloutcher:

Response to "Welcome to My Bloutcher(TM)."
Pizza, Dead Bodies and the Creativity of Limitations
Announcements
From my sketchbook: Self Portrait Done from Car Mirror While Waiting (Again) for Karen

What a great response to "Welcome to My Bloutcher(TM)."

Thanks for all your wonderful feedback on the maiden voyage of my bloutcher. It seems to have hit a cord. And has raised a few very serious questions.

Jeff Weinberger wants to know: "Is the act which defines writing a bloutcher bloutching? Can we conjugate a new verb 'to bloutch?' Can I kvetch when I bloutch?"

Howard Stone has inquired: "Is bloutcher now an official scrabble word?"

These are serious questions which I need to ponder. As always, your thoughts are welcome.

How Bloutcher?

BLogjOUrnalskeTCHbooknewslettER = Bloutcher. Rhymes with Voucher.

Pizza, Dead Bodies and the Creativity of Limitations

A good friend of mine, Frances Caravana, recently sent me the following story.

An old Italian lived alone in New Jersey. He wanted to plant his annual tomato garden, but it was very difficult to work, as the ground was hard. His son, Vincent, who used to help him, was in prison. The old man wrote a letter to his son and described his predicament:

Dear Vincent, I am feeling pretty sad, because it looks like I won't be able to plant my tomato garden this year. I'm just getting too old to be digging up a garden plot. I know if you were here my troubles would be over. I know you would be happy to dig the plot for me, like in the old days. Love Papa

A few days later he received a letter from his son. Dear Pop, Don't dig up that garden. That's where the bodies are buried. Love Vinnie

At 4 a.m. the next morning, FBI agents and local police arrived and dug up the entire area without finding any bodies. They apologized to the old man and left.

That same day the old man received another letter from his son. Dear Pop Go ahead and plant the tomatoes now. That's the best I could do under the circumstances. Love Vinnie

This story reminded me of what the late great Gene Cohen called "practical creativity." Cohen provides another illustration in his book The Mature Mind.

His in-laws, both in their seventies, found themselves emerging from a Washington, DC subway into a raging snowstorm. Since it was rush hour there were no cabs to take them to their dinner host's home. Gene's father-in-law noticed the steamy window of a pizza shop across the street so the couple trudged through the slush, stepped to the counter and ordered a large pizza for delivery.

When it came time to pay he said, "Oh, there's one more thing."

"What's that?" asked the puzzled cashier.

"We want you to deliver us with the pizza."

Now that was brilliant. And the pizza cost less than the cab ride--even with the tip!!

These two stories got me thinking. We often assume that creativity thrives when it does not have any constraints imposed on it. Where our creative instincts are freed from limitations and allowed to soar unfettered in whatever direction they choose. The reality may be quite different, however. Creativity may derive from just the opposite. Try this. Creativity sprouts when it is faced with limitations, sometimes severe limitations. Limitation, not freedom, is its birthplace. It is the very nature of creativity to be born out of the tension between perceived and real constraints and the need for new possiblities. Vinnie, of course, had severe limitations.

In fact, the jail bars are a kind of metaphor for the way we are all imprisoned in some form or another by ours assumptions. The presence of the prison walls created a basic tension and inspired an entirely new approach. Vinnie turned his imprisonment into an asset. He knew the feds would bite because he knew what their assumptions were. So, unable to physically help his father, he ingeniously converted your everyday U.S. Postal Service into a co-conspirator. And bite they did!

And what about Gene Cohen's in-laws? They were surrounded by limitations. The inhospitable weather. The absence of taxi-cabs. It was the very severity of these limitations that led them to such an inventive (and cost effective) solution.

So what can we glean from Vinnie and the in-laws? What are the critical elements that make creativity work when confronted by limitations?

Define the challenge--a clear understanding of the limitations one faces
Adopt a Possibilities Orientation--Using the limitations as an inspiration for creativity not an impendiment to it
Suspend Beliefs--Allowing data to come rather than judging it
Freshen Your Eyes--Leveraging what is commonplace in the environment in new, different ways
Play--Make it into a game

Send me examples of "practical creativity" you've encountered. Fred@fredmandell.com

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Announcements:

Join me on August 10th at the Brookline Booksmith for an Author's Talk and Book signing for Becoming a Life Change Artist; 7 Creative Skills to Reinvent Yourself at Any Stage of Life. Starts at 7 pm.

And if you are in the Denver area be sure to show up for my co-author, Kathy Jordan's, talk at the Tattered Cover Book Store, Highlands Ranch Location, August 12, 7:30 pm.

Note your calendars for September 13th at the Newton Free Library where Discovering What's Next is sponsoring an author's talk and book signing, beginning at 7 pm. Try to get there a few minutes early because I will have a special guest handing out some yummies. Clue: A Real Life Life Change Artist.

From my sketchbook:

I carry my sketchbook wherever I go. For one thing, I often find myself waiting for my wife Karen. If you know her you understand. On this particular wait I sketched myself staring into the car mirror. I could also have read a book which I often do but in this one moment the goofy expression on my face seemed to capture the existential recognition of hopeless surrender. I also ended up reading a book.

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Finally, please consider Becoming a Life Change Artist; 7 Creative Skills to Reinvent Yourself at Any Stage of Life as an interesting read for any BOOK CLUBS you are part of.

Welcome to my Bloutcher(TM)!

2010-07-08T12:30:00.001-04:00

Huh?

French philosopher Voltaire bloutchering at his desk in the 1700s.

So I looked up the following in Websters:

* Blog—personal journal with reflections
* Newsletter—small publication containing news of interest to a special group. If you’re reading this you’re special!
* Journal—a record of experiences, ideas, reflections kept regularly for private use.
* Sketchbook—a book of or for sketches. I’m assuming sketches can be verbal as well as visual.

So naturally I came up with the idea of a bl[og][j]ou[rnal][ske]tch[book][newslett]er. Bloutcher(TM). (Rhymes with voucher.) An all in one deal.

My idea is to combine personal reflections, news of interest (announcements, among other things,) ideas and experiences, and sketches both visual and verbal.

Why do I want to do this?

* I’m bored? Nope
* I’m self important? God, I hope nope
* I have something to say? That’s not for me to say
* Can’t help myself? Maybe
* To provoke? Probably
* I’ve never bloutchered before? You betcha
* To live my Creative Mantra? Definitely

(My Creative Mantra: Create, Integrate, Make a Difference)

It’s all about creating possibilities. For myself and others. Pushing the edge. Turning things upside down. Etc.

So what can you expect?

* News and announcements
* Commentary and reflections
* Provocative ideas
* Regular irregularity—that means not every day. Probably not even every week. But you’ll know I’m here.

Possible Bloutcher(TM) Content—At least, some of it.

* Creativity
* Transitions & Life Change
* Art and Life
* The Art of Life
* The Life of Art
* Leadership
* Innovation
* Aging Positively

In this bloutcher(TM)

* Announcements
* First Entry: Love, Hate and Truth

Announcements:

Becoming a Life Change Artist; 7 Creative Skills to Reinvent Yourself at Any Stage of Life will be released by the Penguin Group/Avery on August 3rd. To order an advanced copy go to www.fredmandell.com

I will be doing an author's talk at the Brookline Booksmith, Brookline, MA on August 10th at 7 p.m.

I am working on a creativity tool with Donna Krone called "Unlocking Your Creative Mantra." Should be ready by late August/early September.

My first entry:

Love, Hate and Truth

I have a love-hate relationship with Picasso. I love the way he constantly experimented with and reinvented his art. I hate his overbearing egotism. I love the incredibly human and sensitive figures from his classical period. I hate his personal streaks of meanness. I love his spirit of artistic playfulness and his willingness to take risks. I hate his sexual deceits and conceits. I love his quote-ability. He is probably the most quotable artist in history.

Picasso claimed that “Art is a lie that helps us to realize the truth.” Now it’s always dangerous to interpret what someone means but I think Picasso is speaking to the dynamic that a painting of something is not the same as the original something. For instance, a painting of a bouquet of flowers is not the original bouquet. In that sense the painting is a lie and the original bouquet is the truth. But he is also getting at the fact that the painting comes to be its own truth. It stands on its own two feet independent of the original subject. In some sense you can argue that Van Gogh’s famous painting of sunflowers is more sublime than the original sunflowers themselves. A painting helps us realize a new truth.

Last week I learned that Picasso was talking about life as well as art.

This was brought home to me while speaking to a woman who had been on a remarkable journey of growth and healing. She had been abused since childhood, fell into addictive behavior and ultimately straightened herself out and became a highly productive citizen. But she had recently (now in her mid forties) found herself stuck. In the midst of our conversation she suddenly said, “You know, who I am is not who I am.”

We both fell quiet at these words, silently acknowledging their apparent contradiction. How can you not be who you are? And then I realized she was not so much contradicting herself as she was speaking Picasso-ese. I haltingly offered: “Could you be saying who you are today does not represent who you are underneath—there’s another less visible you trying to come out. You want to create a new visible truth about yourself.” “Yes,” she said, “but sometimes I think it’s just too difficult to figure out how to do that.”

Since that conversation I have wondered how many of us arrive at a point where we realize we are living a representation of ourselves that is no longer who we really are. We have become what Picasso calls “a lie”—we are no longer aligned with what truly matters to us. The good news is that we can “realize” a new truth. That’s one of the things I love about Picasso. His art is an affirmation of new possibilities in life as it is in art. It may not be easy. But it’s true.

Check out the Events tab on my website (www.fredmandell.com) to see some of the events I will be speaking at. Let me know if you would like to attend any of them.

Oh, yes. Since this is my first bloutcher(TM) I would appreciate it if you would pass it on to others you think might find it interesting.