A Different Kind of Hunger

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