by seanlow on January 18, 2012
Think about why you do what you do? Ego? I want to be the world’s most famous, fabulous, richest [designer, photographer, sculptor, baker, etc.] on the planet. Love of the art? I would just die if I could not [design, take pictures, sculpt, bake, etc.]. Or some combination of the two? But maybe it is something more. To make a difference, to define a moment, to change people’s minds.
Lost in the every day of serving, producing, doing business is the notion that art simultaneously has no purpose and is everything that we are as human beings. Nobody needs his or her picture taken, a pretty logo, fancy copy, cool furniture, a blowout party or a beautiful cake. Yet, when we permit ourselves the luxury of self-expression, the world benefits from the spirit of creation. We are simultaneously inspired and grateful for the statement. We see beauty through your eyes as an artist, the way you would have us see it, the way we never could alone. In the freedom of your expression, we may be able to know ourselves differently, even if only for a moment. And in that moment maybe lies transformation. The impossible possible.
When, as a creative business owner, you become jaded with the work, you lose the underlying notion of your purpose. You knock out your thousandth wedding, your millionth picture, your gagillionth floral arrangement. No matter the accolades (peer and/or client), the light goes out behind your eyes because you now have a job, with all of the headaches that come with it – bills, payroll, employees, all things corporate. You do not bother to really see the client, employee, colleague across the table from you other than as a means to an end – what do they want and how can you give it to them as easily and cheaply as possible. It will become very easy for you to say that the art you create is not like brain surgery, insulting your client and yourself in one shot. If you have not lost it already, the notion that you make a difference gives way to the idea that you provide a great service. Again, insulting both you and your client in one shot.
If this is you or becoming you, consider this – you are tasked with creating a defining moment or series of moments. In that moment, the depth of meaning your client seeks from you is no less important than brain surgery. Whether it is the moment they walk down the aisle, see your images, hear your music, experience your design, they want everyone (themselves included) to blink their eyes to the reality you are showing them. If you miss the moment, it is gone forever. You might be able to go back to fix things, but the original moment is gone. In its loss so to is your client’s ability to experience your grace (your gift, your vision), to be moved by something beyond their own comprehension.
If you lived in 1912, an IPad would be magical, godlike in its creation. You would be hard-pressed to believe that it was something humans created. So how do you think we got from there to here? Moments when impossible was no longer. Knowing that your art and your creative business are the ones primarily responsible for these moments, why would ever allow yourself to become jaded with what you do as just another [you fill in the blank]?
No one needs to take themselves too seriously, even brain surgeons. Just honor the responsibility you have been given as something more than a task, a service. In the responsibility are meaning, integrity and faith that you and your creative business are paid to make a difference. To create.
by seanlow on January 10, 2012
Creative business is about self respect, setting the course for the journey you will take your clients on to arrive at your art. In this way, creative businesses and their owners stand apart. Those who sell defined products or services have already pre-determined the journey – buy the specific product or service or don’t. It is what it is. Creative businesses, by definition, sell the opposite – the “it” does not exist until a creative business creates “it” for its clients. Getting to the “it” is the entire reason creative businesses exist. Yet, all too often the focus is on the proverbial destination rather than the journey, as if you were selling interchangeable widgets. Why? Plain old fear.
There are two kinds of fear – rational and irrational. If someone puts a loaded gun to your head, that is rational fear. You should be scared and something would be very off if you were not. However, being afraid that the Moon is going to fall out of the sky and hit you on the head is irrational. It is not going to happen and worrying that it will is a distraction (larger psychological issues aside).
By the same token, doing that which is antithetical to your being as an artist, creative business owner and even your own sense of humanity is equally irrational. And being scared of doing otherwise is not real fear. Bunny Williams might be able to fake loving Zen minimalism once or twice, but it is not who she is. If her creative business refuses to acknowledge that she does not do Zen, what does it say about what she does do? When you layer onto your creative business all of the things you and it are not, you are expressing your irrational fear that what YOU do is not enough. Same goes for your business process. Any creative business that does things the way everyone else does even if it does not work for them is, well, not very creative. And if your business process is boring and disconnected, how exactly are your clients supposed to get excited (i.e., pay you) for the journey to arrive at your art?
All of which brings me to the illusion of choice. You might think you can do what you do not, act in a way that belies you, your art and your creative business, but you cannot. Pretending to be something you are not is unsustainable, not so much because you cannot fake it well, but because you will pale against those who are the real deal. If you cannot make a sustainable creative business doing the art you want to do, in the way you want to do it, then you simply do not have a business. However, before you get to that place, the effort first has to be to strip away all the things you are not, focus solely on what you are and charge appropriately for that journey.
For instance, go read the copy on your website. If it says anything that cannot be true in the opposite (i.e., our business is all about fantastic customer service), then you are saying nothing. So take it out. Same goes with pictures that tell the viewer nothing about what you stand for. Leave the pretty pictures for Flickr. If a fifth grader cannot understand how and why you do things (i.e., they won’t get that that is just the way it is done), then change it so they can. Work to find disconnects and then fix them (i.e., spending hour(s) with a prospective client and then sending a draconian contract you would not wish on your worst enemy). Be ruthless with the truth of who you, your art and your creative business are. Do the opposite of apologizing and hiding behind art and process that are not you.
If you still cannot make it, then you have your answer. My guess though is that self-respect will be its own reward.
