Last week, I found myself coaching a client who had just experienced a major shift and life change.  The emotions after such an occurrence can be some of the hardest combinations to handle, particularly when one is used to a high degree of control over their destiny.  As we’ve all come to know as adults, there are some things which we simply cannot plan or prepare for, but that in itself does not keep us from feeling like strangers to ourselves when something goes terribly wrong.  We forget the exact things we know, who we are exactly and the world and our place in it seems alien.

Maybe the easiest analogy I can think of is the change of seasons I have known since I was a child growing up in New England.  I knew each year there would be small yellow and purple flowers in our backyard in April, and that the trees would start to turn amazing shades in late August.  Despite this knowledge, and to this day each season, I am caught in amazement at the reemergence of overwhelming green and warmth in the air, or the briskness of a calm winter night in early winter.  What some might dismiss as a standard part of life, inspires me to remember and locate where I am with my own personal growth and to notice what I might have overlooked during the cold months of winter.

Starting over is natural.  And although getting knocked on your ass by your partner’s betrayal or a positive test result from your doctor’s office tends to bring out your most primitive modes of survival: fight, flight or the one we tend to numb out of awareness: freeze.  Just like the animal who plays dead until the bigger animal passes by, our mind can choose to play dead on us as it renews and reconvenes on its next course of creativity. Although the challenge to rebuild after any significant pain and disorientation can seem overwhelming, the process itself can offer some of the biggest and healthiest opportunities you will ever find.

Creative leadership is about adapting and that comes from a heightened sense of awareness and self-care.  Wisdom and humility to acknowledge what is working and what is not in our life and what we can contribute to create more of what will best serve us are each of our intentions.  It might not be easy to find that center when you are experiencing the moment of healing or a drab winter week or the rage of being iced out of a place that you loved.  But it is the wisdom of our own creative practice which can foster growth during such times.

We have all been through “fresh starts” in our lives, some chosen and some not.  How you choose to experience the change is pivotal.  The hardest thing about being in transition is being in transition.  Be and meet yourself with the same appreciation as you would for the first truly warm spring day.  Sometimes focusing too far ahead is the same as focusing on the past; neither exists or serves us.  What we have is the infinite possibility in each moment to be and create what we want now.  Scary?  Sure, sometimes.  And other times, centered, deep, thrilling and energizing.  Choosing to create the new life you desire even in painful times rather than judging yourself is part of your rebuilding and renewal.  When you are ready, the new begins to grow.

Adversity might blind us temporarily to the opportunities it holds for us, but just like what lies barren in the winter, it too hold life and energy within it.  Growth and change are harnessed together both in our internal and external worlds.  Take a good look around you in these first bold days of the new spring and hold it as a reminder of the infinite power of your own creativity for renewal and magnificent growth.

Connect to your CLCommunity and share whatever you are appreciating anew in yourself and your world.

The Mayans were right, the world as we know it is ending.  But before I really delve further into any Meloncholia type references let me clarify.  The world that operates as we know it is ending.  Whether your career is in advertising, law, sales, entertainment, finance or hospitality – nothing, nothing, nothing is really operating the way it did in the 1950′s.

This is good news for those who tend toward the side of expansive creative leadership.  The changes in technology have led to an increasing ability to break down barriers.  People who did not have the means to speak to the world can now do so by simply setting up a domain address, a twitter account or a social media profile.  If you’ve ever had anything important to say this is literally the twilight of opportunity.  The pace at which we do business, the communication methods for professionals, the access to research and data have all been turned upside down as well.

So although I’m sure none of this is news to anyone who’s reading a blog, I do think there are things that we can all do to nurture the market of creative capital in a way that fosters growth and allows us to see potential threats as opportunity.

Let me offer an example:  One of my clients is a graphics designer with a long career of large commissions per project.  His world of a few $60,000 pay out per year has innovated along with the rest of the marketplace.  You don’t necessarily need a graphic designer anymore to lay out a product sketch if you’re a manufacturer – you can buy graphic programs to do so at a fraction of the costs.  What were once steady, large projects for him had changed – like many designer he was being asked to do more sophisticated work for a piecemeal fee.   And this disruption in the marketplace crosses industries – legal documents can be downloaded for a sixteenth of the standard cost of hiring an attorney, songs can be downloaded or ‘shared’ for free and all other sorts of ‘expertise’ freely shared.

So how do you answer this challenge?  As a creative leader you have to reassess what the market is actually asking for.  If there are specialized tools – learn them and sell that angle. If your cushy payouts are no longer coming, then change your personal business plan. Keeping your ears to the ground (READ: tapping into your intuition, creativity and combining it with strong collaborations) will give you everything you need to know and how best to offer your clients what they want.  The creativity lies in changing your own angle to perform smarter and wiser to the new world we’ve entered.  And to remember that there will always be opportunities in disruption and a need for creative leaders to do interesting things in the marketplace.  Share your tales of success with the CLCommunity here!

It’s Sunday brunch and you’re listening to your sister complain about her good but imperfect fortune, and it’s grating your every last nerve.  Had you been a child, you would have pulled her hair, but you are an adult sitting next to her.   Your ability to respond and to understand your sister and yourself, is a simple matter of choice.  It is the simple creative perspective you offer yourself in that moment which will literally serve to dictate the next hour (or maybe year) of any given relationship.  It does not always feel simple before you start putting it into practice.

Creative choice is something we learn to practice as leaders.  It is a celebration of positive belief in yourself and in others.   Much like the best American jazz trio, it welcomes improvisation and listens in the moment.  Living your life fully engaged with your awareness in the present, but detached enough to avoid reaction or judgment provides the opportunity to actually enjoy experiences and the people you hold dear to you in life.

So how do you begin to exercise this choice?  By consciously committing to pause before reacting to your habitual patterns.

Pausing before reacting.

What happens in that pause is enormous for those of you who practice living in creative choice.  Why?  It frees you from the limitation of your routine mindset and allows you to access the range of your creativity that lies beneath the habit.

Let’s put the practice into context:  You notice that you are beginning to feel irritated by your sister (the tightness in your stomach, tension in your neck, the negative thoughts and judgments that are running through your mind), by noticing this early enough, you can choose to create a different response and break the habit of being angry or disappointed with her.  You can throw away the resentment you normally conjure  up and accept that this is who she is.   You can be thankful that this is different than how you operate in life.  And by choosing to feel forgiveness toward her, or appreciation for her presence, you can completely change the experience.

And it’s not just mental.   There is a bodily freedom that also comes along with such a practice.  When you are able to notice your heart racing, or a slight tinge in your gut, creative choice allows you to step back from the immediate set of circumstances and truly relax.  Take a deep breath, focus and PAUSE.  Ask yourself who you want to be in the experience and what you want to contribute that would be compassionate, loving, accepting, and understanding.

Living in creative choice means being mindful of your body, thought patterns and self alignment.  We are all care-takers to each other and all set an example for each other to learn how to respond calmly and creatively to the daily ups and downs that life dishes out.  A small shift in your routine opens a world of energized connections, and a new range of PAUSEibilties and eventually establishes a new deep-rooted sense of fulfillment in your life.

Keep the creative momentum going by taking the time to appreciate the CLCommunity, ‘like’ and follow CLC here!

We tend to take ourselves quite seriously – and with regard to our careers often even more so.

But what happens when the wind is literally knocked out of your socks, when your HR administrator of 10 years sits you down in a conference room and politely asks for your blackberry back (the one that never worked all that well anyway)?

Well sometimes, rather than race to the job boards, your LinkedIn connections or your trusted network, it’s actually the perfect time to sit down and think about changing your direction.

Creative Leadership Coaching is fully invested in the path of the entrepreneur and the self made management guru, but often before these big moves take place, a decent amount of soul and CAREER SOUL searching needs to take place.

So if you’ve had dreams that never became real, or you’ve found yourself down and out.  Congratulations.  There is never a more perfect nor available chunk of free time to actually think about yourself.  Selfish?  Reframe that.  Honest reflection in figuring out what your next calling might be is necessary to survive the changes in today’s marketplace.

So beyond a Myers-Briggs evaluation, take some time to put in your own work and address some of the suggested thought topics below and get your wheels turnin:

Social or Solo: CLC is based on the premise that we are all here to creatively collaborate.  Still, there are some people who are burnt after an overly social or not-social-enough experience in their career.  So what’s your orientation?  Sometimes something we thought would be sooo interesting just isn’t in reality because we don’t get to speak to real people during the day.  Sometimes our industry is shifting to a digital platform where we can’t maintain a real connection to others.  In other cases, where we wanted to be left to create we were surrounded instead managerial demands.  Figuring out your orientation here is a crucial factor in your career choices.

Bank or Bliss: This is actually a trick question because the CLC method is based on the premise that you can have both your dreams and a big pocketbook of revenue… However the priority of what you’re going for first, and where you are in life matters.   Be honest, whether or not you have a house, kids or a boat load of student loans.  What are you really after right now??

What Have You Never Let Yourself Try?: I hear a lot of my clients give excuses for why they stayed in the same industry for DECADES!  The truth is, if you’ve been a successful professional in one setting, you’re most likely going to be a success in any thing else you dare to try.    So, what is it?

A change in life is literally the most natural thing that we will all continually experience.  It is not only important but also imperative to learn to live in a flexible, honest mindset in order to continue and cultivate each of our own paths toward creative leadership.

Career wake-up call?  Please share your success, your challenges, and your thoughts here.

Want to get play in life?  Conveying a sense of enticement whether it’s in the boardroom or bedroom is about tapping into your own sense of enthusiasm.  Sure, we all experience our share of lack-luster days, when feeling confident, strong and fully alive seem like distant memories.  But it’s the beginning of a new season and time to reconnect deeply with your genuine excitement.  Here’s a quick set of creative jump starters:

1.  Focus on what you want (not what you don’t have YET):

Single?  Only have one decent client and want two more?  Stop focusing on what’s missing, and instead look to what it is you want more of.  Want to feel irrestible?  Trash the less-than perspective and take charge of your thoughts.  Make an unconditional commitment to zero negativity and invite only enthusiastic, joyful and positive thinking into your brain.  You will feel the surge of reward in many different aspects of your life start popping up.

2.  Dream BIG and take action:

Without positive thinking your creativity deflates, but positive thinking isn’t enough to drive home results.  Focus on which initial steps you need to take and then embrace your determination and start.  If the initial stage of transforming seems hard to figure out, hire a coach – you’ll have a clearer picture by the end of your first session of YOU and you  achieving your individual plans. And if you don’t, find a new coach.

3. Strut something NEW:

Go to the other side of your world.  Taking a moment to completely shift your perspective is a fun and easy way to initiate change.  Feeling trapped in your current job or relationship?  Try thinking of that challenge as just the beginning of your next big move instead of the beginning of the end.   What are you going to do to make it work?  New music, new outfit, new people, new activities, new responses: new enthusiasm for who you want to be more of now will all help you to embrace the possibilities which really do exist.

As you know, trying new things can shake up a little anxiety.  Take it as a positive sign that you are entering some uncharted territory (READ: growth) and get revved for the adventure.  Possibilities are a lot more exciting than certainties, although nothing is more fulfilling than having both.

Focus with hope and ethusiasm on what you want more of and take the next steps to create your own transformation toward creative leadership.  When you sync up with your creativity, results and renewed resonance are sure to follow.

“Leadership at its most fundamental level comes from within”.   Sun Tzu

Creativity is the fingerprint you were born with.

Great leaders harness their belief and courage to shape their vision of the world for the generations of creative leaders to inherit.

Everything you touch is an indication of your leadership.  When harnessed together, your creative leadership is your authentic capacity to forge ahead and act regardless of your circumstances.  The muscles of leadership are built through experience.

At the core of creative leadership 3 unwavering principles remain:

Transparency

Authenticity

Adaptability

Leadership shines from the inside out and is reflected in the inspiration of leadership in others.  A leader who is flexible, well humored and safe in their peace of mind is fulfilled. What action can you take now to challenge and transform whatever seemingly limited belief you have outgrown?  Share the inspiration.

1. Genius is nothing more than inflamed enthusiasm. – Unknown Genius Author

2. I prefer the folly of enthusiasm to the indifference of wisdom. – Anatole France

3. The fiery moments of passionate experience are the moments of wholeness and totality of the personality. – Anais Nin

4. We’re just enthusiastic about what we do. – Steve Jobs

5. Faith is an excitement and an enthusiasm: it is a condition of intellectual magnificence to which we must cling as to a treasure, and not squander on our way through life in the small coin of empty words, or in exact and priggish argument. – George Sand

6. Flaming enthusiasm, backed up by horse sense and persistence, is the quality that most frequently makes for success. – Dale Carnegie

7. Get excited and enthusiastic about you own dream. This excitement is like a forest fire -you can smell it, taste it, and see it from a mile away. – Denis Waitley

8. Enthusiasm is contagious. Be a carrier. – Susan Rabin

9. Men who do things without being told draw the most wages. – Edwin H. Stuart

10. The world belongs to the energetic. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

11. The key that unlocks energy is desire. It’s also the key to a long and interesting life. If we expect to create any drive, any real force within ourselves, we have to get excited. – Earl Nightingale

12. I feel sorry for the person who can’t get genuinely excited about his work. Not only will he never be satisfied, but he will never achieve anything worthwhile. – Walter Chrysler

13. Zeal is a volcano, on the peak of which the grass of indecisiveness does not grow. – Khalil Gibran

14. You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm. – Colette

15. Knowledge is power and enthusiasm pulls the switch. – Steve Droke

16. I found that the men and women who got to the top were those who did the jobs they had in hand, with everything they had of energy and enthusiasm and hard work. – Harry S. Truman

17. Enthusiasm is that secret and harmonious spirit which hovers over the production of genius.-Isaac D’Israeli

18. How do you go from where you are to where you want to be? I think you have to have an enthusiasm for life. You have to have a dream, a goal and you have to be willing to work for it. – Jim Valvano

19. If you approach each new person you meet in a spirit of adventure, you will find yourself endlessly fascinated by the new channels of thought and experience and personality that you encounter. -Eleanor Roosevelt

20. Enthusiasm is not the same as just being excited. One gets excited about going on a roller coaster. One becomes enthusiastic about creating and building a roller coaster. – Bo Bennett

21. It is the greatest shot of adrenaline to be doing what you’ve wanted to do so badly. You almost feel like you could fly without the plane. – Charles Lindbergh

22. You need to get up in the morning and say, “Boy, I’m going to–in my own stupid way–save the world today.”- Carol Bellamy

23. I became quite successful very young, and it was mainly because I was so enthusiastic and I just worked so hard at it. – Francis Ford Coppola

24. Zeal will do more than knowledge. – William Hazlitt

25. The great person is she who does not lose her childlike heart. – Mencius

26. Years wrinkle the face, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. – Watterson Lowe

27. I focus on spiritual wealth now, and I’m busier, more enthusiastic, and more joyful than I have ever been. – John Templeton

28. I still get wildly enthusiastic about little things… I play with leaves. I skip down the street and run against the wind. – Leo Buscaglia

29. I would say the secret is to be enthusiastic about everything that comes into your life. To care, to care about people. To be excited about everything that comes close to you. – Fay Wray

30. If you are not getting as much from life as you want to, then examine the state of your enthusiasm. – Norman Vincent Peale

31. Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

32. Enthusiasm can only be aroused by two things: first, an ideal which takes the imagination by storm, and second, a definite, intelligible plan for carrying that ideal into practice. – Arnold J. Toynbee

33. Enthusiasm is excitement with inspiration, motivation, and a pinch of creativity. – Bo Bennett

34. We act as though comfort and luxury were the chief requirements of life, when all that we need to make us really HAPPY is something to be ENTHUSIASTIC about.- C. Kingsley

35. I’ve just been so interested in what I was doing that I never thought of stopping.-Barbara McClintock

36. It’s always the challenge of the future, this feeling of excitement, that drives me. – Yoshihisa Tabuchi

37. When you start being enthusiastic about whatever it is you like, that is the golden age for you. – Michael Winterbottom

38. Positive thinking will let you do everything better than negative thinking will. – Zig Ziglar

39. Success is walking from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm. – Winston Churchill

40. In order to succeed, your desire for success should be greater than your fear of failure. – Bill Cosby

41. As long as you’re going to be thinking anyway, think big. – Donald Trump

42. If you can give your child only one gift, let it be enthusiasm. – Bruce Barton

43. Wherever you go, go with all your heart. – Confucius

Do what you know.

Pursue your passion.

Do you detect a difference between these two perspectives?  Does one make you feel more energized or nervous than the other?

Ask yourself why, because it might in fact point to how ready you are to strike out on your own.

When I started my business design/marketing/sales business 17 years ago I was 24 years old and knew little about anything except that I did not want to be bored or poor.   My big corner office was actually just a corner of my studio apartment.

I figured it out though and now I find myself living with multiple careers that I am passionate to claim:  published poet, entrepreneur, self-made multi millionaire (with no trust-fund, sugar daddy, or real daddy safety net), wife, mother, leadership coach, and psychotherapist.  Today, steering the helm for more than one profitable international business, collaborating with a team that inspires my leadership, living in a city that I love with a family that I love even more is my reality.  And it all took passion and push.

It wasn’t easy, of course.  Starting anything always sucks a little whether it’s a business, exercise, or a new relationship.  But ya know what? If you stick with it, eventually that initial challenge ROCKS!

I feel honored to help others along their journey to achieve fulfillment, and to use the knowledge that anything is possible.  Still, as you start out, there are a few myths about the life/work journey that I hope by addressing can be debunked:

1.  If you are in the mind-set that it has to be life happiness OR profitable career than you are not tapping into your fullest strength as a creative leader: believing in yourself.  Pursuing your passion as a person is not in direct conflict with pursuing your passion as an entrepreneur.

2.  Focus does not require a myopic approach.  Be passionate and push yourself to be flexible, not fearful as you grow.  Dare to ask yourself often: What is it that I love most? In business, if there an opportunity, go after it.  Check out Sara Blakey’s story of hitting the sweet-spot with her now billion-dollar Spanx business (started without an MBA and 5k of her own money).  Think you can’t get there because you didn’t take the straight and narrow course through finance or corporate banking?  Stop thinking and start creating. There is no ONE way to do it, only your way.

3.  Dreaming does not make it happen.  Dreaming paints the picture and that is where the passion comes in, but you still have to write the words to the story.  Follow through and build your internal systems, (even if that means delegating your discipline to a coach every week) get your deliverables in line, and deliver them on time.  Crunch time can start to feel good as you build your stamina and see your self-confidence, client base, and greenbacks increasing.  What once was impossible, with commitment becomes the new possible.

Got another myth you feel like contributing to the mix?  Share it here!

Don’t believe everything you think.

Your creativity is at the core of your being and is something you were born with; it is where your peace and deepest sense of purpose and well-being spring forth from.

If you are feeling less than satisfied or less whole than you desire, shine your attention and curiosity there.

Ask yourself, “What wants to come alive in me now?”