Everyone is Creative!
Welcome to my first blog! It coincides with the launch of my book, My Macaroni Sings—Your Guide to Cultivating Creativity in Children, in January 2024. I am a grandparent, parent, and business coach. My quest is to help others understand creativity and build a relationship with it. My book is a guide to enlist grandparents, parents, and other champions of creativity to empower children for life by intentionally cultivating mindsets and skillsets for now. I am using my book, blogs, speaking engagements, and workshops to further educate willing participants on what creativity is and is not. I want to enlist others’ help in my mission to ensure children reach their full creative potential. I will post one or two blogs each month during 2024. Please let me know your thoughts or stories on this topic. I welcome your input and will answer you within one week.
My Story
I am passionate about cultivating creativity in our world! At age 48 I would have told you I was not creative, and I definitely could not draw. My life changed that year! I took a course and read the book, Artist’s Way, by Julia Cameron. I learned many factors that contributed to blocked creativity. Using her suggestions, I examined my beliefs, formed some new habits, and learned what creativity was and was not. When the eight-week class was completed, I had an idea for a product I called “pillow talk.” I found I wanted to learn to sketch better so I took a course called Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain (and bought the book) by author Betty Edwards. My intention was to be able to draw respectable sketches for my product ideas.
Both courses transformed me and my life! I unblocked, discovered, and recovered my innate creativity. I learned drawing was indeed a skill that can be learned and I picked it up quickly. I began drawing portraits and loved the study of faces. I categorized my work around my sketches of dogs, Iris, and family, calling those bodies of work—Friendly Faces, Fancy Faces, and Family Faces, respectively. At the urging of one of my instructors, I even entered my father’s portrait in a show at Indianapolis Art Center. It was accepted!
Fast forward two decades on this path. I am a leadership coach and have two grandchildren. In my work with a wide range of ages, I have been committed to help others find their innate creativity, and to cultivate it in themselves and others. Our world needs the vast, often untapped, human potential called creativity. I also have moved beyond drawing. Thanks to my grandchildren I now have a repertoire of new skills such as sculpting slime, tie-dying clothing and accessories, writing poetry, and exploring culinary arts, photography and cosplay. My book includes some of these creative experiences to try as well.
Getting Started
My motto, whether I am working with leaders in an organization, parents, grandparents, or children, is start where you. Here are three steps.
1.
Order my book on Amazon.com. (CLICK HERE) On launch day, January 18, 2024, my book reached #1 Best Seller on Amazon in US in three categories:
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- Grandparenting
- Creativity and Genius
- Education—Problem Solving and Decision Making
2.
Read chapter 1—”The Five Truths About Creativity.” Examine where you are and what you believe after you read about each one. Ask yourself what you have come to believe over the years about each of the five truths. Decide if you are ready to explore more, want to change some of your beliefs, and which of the truths interest you. Identify who you want to champion the growth of creativity in—yourself and/or someone in your life. For example, if you hear your child or grandchild saying they are not creative, there is much you can do to change this mindset at an early age. My book will be your guide. You can also contact me for a free consultation. The five truths are:
- Everyone is creative.
- Creativity can be honed at any age or experience level.
- Creativity involves imagination, thinking, as well as producing something.
- Creativity is not the same as being artistic.
- Creativity is a way of knowing, exploring, and guiding your Self.
3.
Buy yourself and each child you want to champion in creativity a sketchbook. A sketchpad for the purposes of cultivating creativity is not about becoming an artist, although that could happen. It is a place to draw, doodle, write, scribble or sketch. It creates a ritual that brings into focus the act of pausing, observing, and really looking at a person, an object or scenery. Your sketchbook becomes a record of time together, evokes memories, and aids in reminiscing and storytelling when you leaf back through the pages. Then what? You are ready to go to the seven practices that are used to cultivate creativity over time. That will be the topic of my next blog, but don’t wait for me. You can begin now by reading chapter 2—”Seven Essential Practices.” These are the key to cultivating creativity after examining your beliefs!
