The Accidental Creative

by Todd Henry

  RECOVERING MEANING AND ENGAGING DEEPLY

  One of the natural by-products of establishing rhythmic practices is that we begin to remember things that were once important to us that have somehow been forgotten in the hustle of our daily activity. Once we slip out of reactive mode and into a place of rhythm, space, and mastery of our process, we begin to understand that we have the ability to not only meet the basic objectives of our work but also to actually shape the work into something meaningful.

  Whatever the subject matter of our work, as creatives we have the unique privilege of creating meaning each day. Whether we are designing a system, launching a new product, or consulting with a client, we bring something unique to the process that no one else can. With a bit of space and perspective, we will likely find that our work is less desperate and that we are drawing from a deeper well of focus, and perhaps even a refined sense of purpose. We begin to see how all of our life and work is interconnected when our daily activity is supported by our capacity-increasing practices. Our most significant work will nearly always come from a deep understanding of not only what we are doing, but the why behind it. When we gain a sense of mastery over how we engage our work, we are better able to connect with this deeper sense of motivation.

  In a World Without Limits . . .

  What would you do if you had all the time and all the resources in the world at your disposal? No limits, no constraints, no catches. You have complete and total freedom of time and movement. You can do anything, be anything, or go anywhere you want. What would you do?

  For some of us, just thinking about this scenario gets our heart racing for a split second before we are pulled back to reality. We begin to rationalize and argue why this fantasy-world scenario is impractical and then our thoughts drift off to our task at hand or our e-mail. Some of us feel guilty for our fleeting excitement. We’ll argue that it is impractical to even think about such things. At the heart of our very logical arguments is the reality that we don’t know how to answer that question. We really have never thought about it. Our dreams, if we allow them, often seem highly practical and mostly centered around the prospective advancement, the next promotion, or something else in the foreseeable future. We are wed to the expectations of others or to a corporate culture that wants things from us—very practical things. (And rightly so, by the way. We are being paid for our time and the value we create.) But why is it that we allow others to define how we structure our life? Why is it that we refine and shape our life dreams based upon what’s needed of us next quarter?

  “The only true happiness comes from squandering ourselves for a purpose.”

  —John Mason Brown

  Let me be clear: This has not been a book about achieving your life goals or finding your purpose. But as you begin to build structure and practice into your life, you will find that new possibilities open up to you. You begin to see opportunities that you previously overlooked. You begin to experience new ways of interfacing with the world as you regain a sense of ownership of your engagement. And the reality you find at the bottom of it all is this: you have something unique to offer and contribute to the world. But all of the time-management systems or strategic plans in the world will not help you get to work on it if you are not first willing to ask some difficult questions and then prune away all the things in your life that are getting in the way of it.

  So many people I’ve encountered in my coaching and consulting have set the goal of working practically around the clock for several years in order to claim the prize of early retirement. Somehow they think that if they could only get all of this work stuff out of the way, then they could really enjoy themselves and do whatever they want—take up a hobby, write their novel, et cetera. They have so cast the dichotomy between work and play that they are incapable of seeing them as two sides of the same coin—as an expression of an engaged, focused, and passionate creative process.

  I often hear “I’d really like someday to focus on helping orphans or the underprivileged,” or “After this I’d love to spend time mentoring young designers,” or other types of wishful thinking. But for now at least, these wishers feel like prisoners of this thing called “work” until the “great someday.” They’ve divided themselves into two modes and assigned a purpose to each. One is for their “passions and interests,” and one is for their “work.”

  OCCUPATION VERSUS VOCATION

  “What work I have done I have done because it has been play.... Cursed is the man who has found some other man’s work and cannot lose it. When we talk about the great workers of the world we really mean the great players of the world. The fellows who groan and sweat under the weary load of toil that they bear never can hope to do anything great. How can they when their souls are in a ferment of revolt against the employment of their hands and brains? The product of slavery, intellectual or physical, can never be great.”

  —Mark Twain

  Because we tend to be possibility thinkers, many creatives spend quite a bit of time wishing for more alignment between our values, our passions, and the work that we do every day, or thinking about how we could better structure our work life as a platform for personal creative expression. Some of us believe that if we could only find the perfect job or work for the right company, many of our issues related to lack of fulfillment or occupational frustration would simply vanish. I’ve had this conversation, too many times to count, with creatives considering leaving their job to find something that’s a better fit. While there’s nothing wrong with seeking work that’s fulfilling and that matches our personal skills and goals, often these conversations are less about the job itself and more about unrealistic expectations toward the employer or an overall lack of self-knowledge. Upon leaving their job, many workers find that they are right back in a place of dissatisfaction within a matter of months after taking a new one.

  Why does this happen so frequently to the best and brightest among us? The problem is that many of us spend a lot of time thinking about what we want to do but little time thinking about who we really are and how to bring our full passion to what we do. We haven’t learned to discern the difference between our occupation and our vocation.

  Our occupation is how we make a living. In short, it’s our job. It’s what puts food on the table and keeps a roof over our head. It’s the answer we give at a cocktail party when someone asks what we do. Hopefully, there are many parts of our occupation that bring us fulfillment and enjoyment, though there are likely parts of our work that are less than fulfilling.

  Our vocation, on the other hand, is what we’re inherently wired for. It’s less likely to consist of a set of tasks and more likely to consist of a set of themes. For example, an accountant may technically describe his job by saying that he balances the books, but what really drew him to his job and continues to drive him to do great work is that he loves bringing a sense of order to the company’s finances. It’s likely that this drive to bring order plays out in areas of his life other than his job. Similarly, a manager may say that he strategizes, resources, and mobilizes his team, but the deeper theme that drives him is seeing people’s potential unleashed. He is likely to seek out opportunities to unleash the potential of others through community service or mentoring programs, though he may not have thought much about why this is the case.

  The word “vocation” comes from the Latin word vocare, which means “to call.” As we each have a unique voice, we also each have a unique way of expressing ourselves through our work. It’s the central theme that puts a fire in our gut when we encounter it or engage in work related to it. It’s also the thing that fuels our passion, keeps us moving forward, and in some cases even obsesses us. Author Parker Palmer says in his book Let Your Life Speak that “from the beginning, our lives lay down clues to selfhood and vocation, though the clues may be hard to decode.”

  Once we do begin to decode them, however, our understanding of vocation will fuel our best creating. Having a grasp of how to apply our deeper passions to
the work we do is the significant difference between doing work that’s simply good and doing work that’s brilliant.

  Resonant Frequency

  A few years ago I flew into LaGuardia on a red eye for an early morning meeting. Upon landing, I made my way to the restroom, where someone at the sink next to me made a comment about the flight delays we’d just experienced. I let loose a groan of acknowledgment, and upon doing so the entire restroom literally vibrated with my response. I’d accidentally hit upon the resonant frequency of the room. When I did, the acoustics of the room turned my tiny groan into something that sounded like a grizzly bear growl. My tiny effort was magnified significantly.

  Having a grasp of how to apply our deeper passions to the work we do is the significant difference between doing work that’s simply good and doing work that’s brilliant.

  Similarly, when we do our work in a way that is aligned with our vocation, we often find that the tiniest effort on our part can have tremendous results. Our vocation is like the “resonant frequency” of our life. While we may never have thought about why, there are certain aspects of our life and work that just seem naturally energizing. By tapping into the resonant themes in these areas, we can unlock a whole realm of creative engagement that can be applied to the tasks we do each day.

  I’ll give you an example of how this has played out in my life. I’ve been engaged in a lot of different and seemingly unrelated projects over time, with Accidental Creative being the latest. A few years ago I sat down to analyze the common thread within all of them—my work as a creative director, my time in the music business, my work through Accidental Creative, starting a nonprofit that funds international adoption, and others. As I spent time thinking deeply about the work that mattered most to me, I realized that the underlying theme in all these projects is freedom. It seems that when I really get excited about something, it’s because I see the potential for others to find a new measure of freedom, whether it’s that they’re freed to do brilliant work (Accidental Creative) or freed from a cycle of generational poverty and placed into a family (our adoption-related work). Once I began to understand this as the core of my vocational work, my day-to-day tasks were illuminated, helping me to understand how I could better bring my best effort to the work I do. My best work, and my most creative work, is always fueled by this sense of bringing freedom.

  Once I understood this, I began to formalize it. I dubbed myself the “arms dealer for the creative revolution,” and I like to say that our company is “freedom fighting for the creative class.” In this way, my work is defined by my vocation, not by the tasks I perform.

  Question: What are these deep points of resonance in your life? As you examine the times in your life when you’ve felt most engaged, most focused, and most brilliant, what are the common themes or connecting points?

  One helpful practice that we initiated on the Accidental Creative site was encouraging our visitors to write a “7 Word Bio.” This is a quick, seven-word statement that expresses the deep passion in their life or work. Some examples of 7 Word Bios on the site include the following:“Help others see the ordinary as extraordinary.”

  “Using paint to capture amusing social interaction.”

  “A storytelling approach to life and work.”

  “Imaginatively blending structural elements into the land.”

  “Sharing my life stories, hoping you relate.”

  “Igniting people to thrive in their purpose.”

  Each of these bios serves as a kind of mission statement to guide daily activity. When I say that I’m “the arms dealer for the creative revolution,” it means that I’m constantly looking for ways to equip creative people to do their best work by influencing their mind-set, giving them tools and helping them build relationships.

  Challenge: What’s your 7 Word Bio? Share it with the world at AccidentalCreative.com/seven.

  DON’T BE A COVER BAND

  Because we’ve understood the importance and effectiveness of bringing unique passions to the creative process, we’ve used the tagline “Cover bands don’t change the world” for as long as Accidental Creative has existed. A cover band is a band that plays other people’s music. The most extreme example is the tribute band, which directly copies another artist’s music and style in the attempt to pay homage to their art. More subtle examples are the college rock bands that fill clubs every weekend playing the radio hits du jour. Occasionally you’ll hear one of these bands rattle off something like “Now we’re going to play something we wrote,” and a collective protest arises from the clubgoers.

  Why?

  Because no one came to the band to hear the band’s original music. They are there to dance, have a good time, and hear music they know. The promise of going to hear a cover band is that you’ll be treated to familiar tunes in a dance-friendly format with little variation. This is the expectation. It’s the “brand promise,” if you will. When a cover band pulls an original tune from the repertoire, that promise is violated in a major way.

  “Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.”

  —Oscar Wilde

  It’s incredibly difficult for a band to make the transition from cover band to one that plays original music. In fact, it rarely happens successfully. The band is always caught in the netherworld between making a living/earning money and wanting to express themselves through their art. Even if they are able to successfully slip some original music into the mix, they will always have to stare down the annoyingly vocal requests for the latest Top 40 fare or “Free Bird.”

  In my music business experience, the only way I’ve seen a band successfully earn a living playing original music is by choosing to do so from the very beginning and building a loyal audience for it. If they stay true to who they are and are willing to forgo the immediate financial return available to cover bands, they can sometimes build a long-lasting and loyal audience for their own music. However, they must be patient enough to earn fans, often one at a time. Choosing to chart an original path is not easy. As author André Gide wrote, “One does not discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.” This is not to imply that there’s anything wrong with imitation. In fact, it’s one of the critical phases of creative growth. We need to feel free to imitate others as we learn and develop our skills. But it gets tricky when we start making money based solely on our ability to imitate the creative work of others.

  There are a lot of “cover bands” in the marketplace today. If their only goal is to make a lot of money, so be it. But the products and people who really change the game seem to be the ones who are able to stay true to a set of principles rather than being driven to quick returns. They develop a loyal audience rather than a fickle one that turns away the moment they play an original.

  It’s my desire to continue to strive to find my own voice and to try to weed out all the places where I’m being “cover-bandish.” This can be a very tricky because it often means turning down more work than I accept, but my hope is that the original value that I bring to the clients I chose to work with will create raving “fans” who want to continue to work with me and trust me when I develop new products or ideas.

  How about you? Are you willing to bravely pursue your own voice, carve your own niche in the marketplace and avoid the temptation to go for quick success? In looking at the long-term arc of your life and creating, are you willing to pour yourself into practices that will help you uncover hidden potential and unlock passions that have been buried beneath layers of expectations and obligations?

  There is no greater reward than that of knowing that you are free from the need to be defined by pay or prestige, and are instead motivated by the very process of doing your work each day. This is how we begin to see the seeds of greatness spring up in our life.

  HOW YOU DEFINE GREATNESS DEFINES YOU

  How do you define “greatness”?

  This is something that’s been on my mind a lot lately, and it’s something t
hat I’ve been internally debating over the past few years. I spend a lot of time interacting with brilliant people and studying great minds, and the more I do, the more I’ve become convinced that how we define greatness ultimately defines our life.

  If you define greatness as the pursuit of a bigger title and office, that will define your life.

  If you define greatness as accumulating a lot of knowledge about something, that will define your life.

  If you define greatness as being the best at performing some task, that will define your life.

  If you define greatness as loving your family well, that will define your life.

  If you define greatness as choosing to engage every single act and interaction in your life with purpose, that will define your life.

  How we define greatness defines us. In the end, it’s probably the single biggest determinant of the course of our life.

  I once heard a South African friend share the reason behind the urgency with which he approaches his work. He said that many people believe that the most valuable land in the world is found in the oil fields of Saudi Arabia, the skyscraper-lined streets of Manhattan, or the diamond mines of South Africa. His contention, however, is that the most valuable land in the world is not in any of these places, but rather in the cemetery, because it is there that we find buried the unsurpassable value of businesses never started, novels never written, and dreams never pursued. He challenged listeners to “die empty.”