We Are All "Creative People"

Occasionally when I tell someone that I am a fiction writer, a stunned expression crosses their face -- as if I confessed that my day job is being a Superhero.

"Oh, I could never do that," they say. "I could never make up stories out of thin air. I'm not that creative."

However, if there's one thing I've learned from teaching writing to people of all ages for the past eight years, it's that everyone is indeed creative. Some of us just might have more trouble accessing our creative selves. And others might not recognize their own creativity, even if they use it all the time.

We all possess imagination; we all solve problems; we all daydream. Sure, the problems I solve at work often revolve around fictional characters in made-up situations. But I don't think there is much difference between a fictional character's problem (for example, trying to solve a crime before the murderer strikes again!) and a real-life workplace problem (such as trying to put together a business strategy the client will love, in time for a big meeting with the team.) I think we use the same problem-solving, creative muscles to do both tasks. I guess a main difference is that as a fiction writer, I create both the problems AND the solutions! (And believe me, sometimes I manage to create real doozies for myself and then have to try to wrangle my characters free...) ;)

A real-life problem I am trying to fight is these boxes many people drop down around themselves, labeled as "not creative." It makes my heart ache every time someone tells me they could never be a writer, because they are "not creative enough." It's not true! Don't believe it!

This is a serious matter. Because to accept that limiting, false belief -- to hunker down into that "non-creative" box -- is to turn away from your inherent gifts as a human being.

In his ground-breaking book Genership 1.0: Beyond Leadership Toward Liberating the Creative Soul, leadership guru and business expert David Castro approaches creativity and leadership in an entirely new way. He transforms the way we think of organizations, communities, and "progress" in general. He writes:

"What if our most critical human goal, the most fundamental human activity, is not to know or to understand, but rather to create, to generate? What would it mean if at the heart of human nature we discovered not reason, not rationality, not the capacity to grasp the world in the mind, but rather the capacity to imagine and invent that world?"
(pg. 3)

In Genership 1.0, David Castro explores exciting, freeing new definitions of leadership in the 21st Century. He coins a new term -- "genership" -- defined as: "The capacity to create with others; the community practice of creating." What would this approach mean for our businesses? Our schools? Our politics? He guides the reader into a new way of thinking about leadership that transcends limitations.

To me, this book is not only about being a leader in a business sense; it applies to our personal lives too. It inspires you to reflect on how you see yourself and how you live your everyday life. Here are some questions I jotted down:

• What world do I want to create and invent? 
• How can I take the steps to get there?
• What does it mean to come together and lead as a team?
• What can I generate, for myself and for others? 

I want to close with a poem that Castro quotes in his Preface, from Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke:

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and
try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms
and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue.
Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you
because you would not be able to live them. And the
point is, to live everything. Live the questions now.
Perhaps you will find them gradually, without noticing it,
and live along some distant day into the answer.

Maybe leadership -- or knowledge, or adulthood, or teaching -- is not about "having all the answers" but rather about helping others to learn to embrace life's uncertainties. Maybe true wisdom means cultivating an insatiable curiosity.

Here's to living the questions.

Guest Post by Sean Gray

The Most Enjoyable and Practical Business Books of All Time

by Sean Gray

More and more because of today's economy, people are starting their own businesses. However, the money problems that plague them personally will follow them in their business lives unless they learn how to manage their money differently. For these folks, some basic money 101 is in order. Fortunately, there are a number of books, which not only teach the principles of personal finance, but give readers some ideas about how they can apply these personal lessons to their business's bottom line. These books are both enjoyable and practical.

The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey

"The first hurdle is Ignorance. In a culture that worships knowledge, to say ignorance about money is an issue makes some people defensive. Don't be defensive. Ignorance is not a lack of intelligence; it is a lack of know-how." Pg 78

No business can succeed for long without sound finances to keep it afloat. Unfortunately, many new business owners are not equipped to deal with the financial aspects of their businesses due to their ignorance about how money works. But according to Dave Ramsey, it's not something they need to feel badly about; it's something that they need to do something about. In this case, they should educate themselves about the principles that govern wealth and the flow of money in their lives. As Ramsey says in his book, no one expects a baby to be born knowing how to drive and yet people are expected to know how to deal with money without being taught. This isn't sound wisdom for personal or professional financial growth.

The Total Money Makeover gives people practical baby steps that will help them learn to think about their finances differently. Ramsey himself is a businessman, who knows personally how ignorance can damage a person's bottom line. Ramsey went broke, because he knew little about how money works. He was able to regain his wealth and rebuild his business and then some, because he learned the principles of how to take care of money. The book is easy to read and offers simple, but effective principles for taking control of one's finances once and for all.

The Richest Man in Babylon by George S. Clason

"Algamish, you are very rich man. Tell me how I may also become rich, and all night I will carve upon the clay, and when the sun rises it shall be completed." Pg 12

This is the answer to the unspoken question of the previous book recommendation: Where does one learn how to take care of his or her wealth? Most people grew up in households where money wasn't discussed nor were they around people who truly knew how to make money. As a result, they have gotten their knowledge of how money works and have taken money advice from someone who's broke.

However, the best money and business managers don't do this. Instead, they seek out the advice from people who have considerable wealth—not the conspicuous wealth—think luxury cars, big houses and designer clothing that often has nothing behind it—but rather from people who have investments and money in the bank. This is one of the key principles in the book The Richest Man in Babylon.

The financial principles in this book are revealed through a series of parables that make the lessons enjoyable. The book arose from a series of pamphlets that banks and insurance companies distributed. Although, the book does not give the specifics of where to invest, it does offer basic sound advice that everyone must follow before they gain any kind of wealth, regardless of the types of investments they involve themselves in. Its principles work regardless of whether a person applies them to his or her business or personal money matters.

Elizabeth I CEO by Alan Alexrod

"Elizabeth, a leader of great spiritual force and personal magnetism, devoted a large portion of her personal genius to creating and maintaining her popular image as the Virgin Queen, an almost unnatural presence of earth. She was eminently practical, a hard-nosed pragmatist with an eye on the bottom line and absolutely no tolerance for waste, for excuses, or for the airy and endless arguments of theoreticians." Pg 203

Once the new business owner has mastered the basics as taught by the previous two books, he or she is ready for some more advanced lessons. Elizabeth I CEO teaches business principles through the lens of one of the greatest leaders in world history. Elizabeth herself inherited a broke and crumbling kingdom. The kingdom she left upon her death had been completely turned around and the country was thriving.

This book deals with the idea that the business person is not separate from the private person. The good queen held herself accountable and recognized that she could not effectively rule over others until she learned to rule over herself. The lessons in the book include financial ones, but there's also sections on leadership and perseverance and often the principles are demonstrated through the queen's own words.

Bio: Sean Gray operates his own business called we buy cars San Diego, and uses information from various books to do so.