Category Archives: Creativity

A Writer’s Exploration: Fleeting Ideas

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That worst possible scenario for any creative person struck me this weekend – drawing a blank on ideas about what to write about. I knew I needed to write something about writing, but what? I ignored the news for the past week or so, having no idea of what the latest is on the hot button issues or presidential race. I know there has been a lot of politicization on the unfortunate Martin death in Florida, as evidenced in some posts on Facebook and Twitter I read, which made me feel sick. Why shouldn’t I be surprised, though? Somehow, the conservatives support the shooter, while the liberals support the victim. I really don’t get it. Yet another example backing my life-long independent streak and disdain for partisan politics. Whatever. Moving on now.

Here I am writing about something with no particular purpose in mind. Just letting the words spill from my mind and into my fingers finding their final resting place on the computer screen. I write because I do, I have stories to tell, from what I have been told. With no ideas in mind the language still manages to take form in something comprehensible. That is, if you find the stream of consciousness gibberish comprehensible. I’m not sure I do right now as I fight to stay awake.

But this is how ideas are born, at least for me. Well, this is one of several ways they are born; one I don’t use enough when I am faced with this weekend’s dilemma of fleeting ideas. So, as I write this piece having no ideas, the idea has already taken form – a blog post about having no ideas. How obnoxious can I make this? How poignant and life changing? How mundane. I write because I need to, because it’s my job, my education, my passion. Because I would much rather invest my short time on this planet creating and hopefully enlightening others than passively watch hours of television each night. That would suck the life right out of me; I know so because it has happened.

While the news media pundits debate whatever the current topic is – I seriously don’t know – and reality TV shows continue to take the country by storm, I will sit idly by with an active brain and computer on my lap typing away. That’s what matters to me.

A Writer’s Exploration: Plight of the Obsessive Revisionist

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I enter my own world when I write. I know all artists can identify – some call it entering the zone or finding their own space. The sights and sounds around me become non-existent; I hear nothing but my mental voice. As a painter sees only color, form, and texture on the canvas, I see nothing outside of the words on the page or screen and the mental images I intend them to portray. Smell, taste, and touch are similar experiences, except for the sips of beer or water as I work, which I tend to forget about pretty quickly until I have exhausted my brain for the night.

I enter an entirely new world when I revise. With all senses alert, I traverse this alternative environment capturing every pertinent detail for the reader who dares to enter it. Life spent in this world far exceeds the time spent in the first round of creating it. It is an art unto itself, one that has occupied my brain at all hours of the day and night regardless of activity – cleaning the dinner dishes, driving my daughter to an ice rink, working on a project at my job, enjoying a show – revision never sleeps.

Once upon a time, when I was eighteen or so, I would fall in love with my first draft. Yes, I was one of those people. God forbid I corrupt those authentic words no matter how unnecessary, weak, or confusing the language might be. I quickly came around, though. By the time I graduated college, my creative writing mentor, Dick Allen, had instilled in me the necessity and value of revision. My power over the craft and technique were less than stellar at my nascent age, but the effort was there.

Last summer I pulled out my writing archive (read: large airtight Rubbermaid container filled with notebooks and printed manuscripts) to review what I wrote nearly twenty years earlier, in search of stories I might revitalize. Some stories were immediately cast aside; they are not the person I am today. Minimal effort on revision, I determined, unintentionally breaking rules with minimal consequences. Others showed promise. I went to work on them for the full summer, cringing and laughing at the elements I allowed to stay in the final drafts when I was just starting out.

So here I am today, revision is a permanent addition to my pantheon of obsessions. I have a touch of OCD, well, maybe more than a touch, but I have learned to manage it over the years, funneling it into my creative endeavors. Thankfully, I would never qualify for the latest wave of reality TV shows exploiting people’s strange addictions and compulsions, not that I would ever take part in those. This writing thing, whether on my blog or other channels, is my reality show with me in control. Those TV shows do serve as great source material for creating some interesting characters, however.

I spent the other night compiling line edits, comments, and other feedback from at least ten different people (I lost count) for a story I have been developing for the past several months. Hours passed without my knowledge, the occasional blurt from my daughter or whine from a cat piercing my focus, but I persisted. When I decided to finish for the night, I had learned seven hours had passed and it was nearly 1:00 AM. I finished my warm Ruthless Rye IPA and went to bed satisfied that my new story had grown up a little bit more. Of course, my story wrapped itself around my waist and followed me to bed where it continued to play out as I slowly fell asleep.

Thing is, if it wasn’t a story my brain was mulling over as I tried to sleep it would have been some other not so happy – even stressful – thoughts in a continuous loop plaguing my sleep. I will always opt for the former; call it my form of escapism in support of mental wellness.

A Writer’s Exploration: Finding My Nonfiction Voice

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I tried something new recently. It was risky – well, not really risky, let’s say daring – I applied my fiction voice to my nonfiction work.

Over the years, as I have developed my business writing prowess, I always felt there were certain molds I needed to fit in to and expectations to meet. Often times I found myself writing in a stilted, unnatural voice, like I was listening to myself on the other side of a two-story brick and mortar wall. It never sat right with me. It felt like a chore. I would spend countless collective hours revising and refining, restructuring and reworking – as I am sure any writer has had the good fortune of dealing with – to sound reasonably good. And the good was good, sometimes a little better than good, sometimes it was dry, business-like, professional, regimented, bland and craving a makeover of charisma and soul. Sometimes I hated the venomous amorphous beast that slowly gnawed at my psyche little bits at a time. It made me crazy; my mental wellness was not quite at stake, but crazy nonetheless. But I did what needed to be done, I stuck to my due diligence.

Now don’t get me wrong, I wrote well, when I was into it. And if not well, well enough for the sake of well enough. I wrote news articles and business information for the corporate intranet, website content, ad copy, various employee communications, a few press releases, a speech or two … whatever a Corporate Communicator would write on a regular basis. It did the job, it communicated clearly and efficiently, and I fulfilled my obligation. Nevertheless, it felt distant to me – like another shallow faceless automaton wrote it. I was starved to fight my way out of this monotony.

Since last August, I have been writing a short fiction piece for my MFA writing workshop course. You could say it is a psychological thriller among other things. During the process, I found myself seeing the story and interpreting it into the written language in a novel way. My writing voice, to my surprise, had evolved to a new level. Though it is hard to pinpoint the catalyst, I fell in love with the writing process all over again (I had to throw in one more cliché, really).

Then it hit me in a subconscious sense – because I did not actually speak or think these words – why not use this evolving fiction style, this new voice, in my nonfiction? I tried it out on a few small pieces. I found myself perceiving what I was writing in a new light with a different thought process. I introduced elements of this evolving voice to a recent book review … and it blew my mind. Reading the work back to myself aloud, I could not believe the barrier I had leapt over. The style was so fluid, so easy to follow, so full of humanity and personality. It was, and still is, an incredible feeling. My true nonfiction voice has emerged from the dark depths of white offices with beige carpets!

American innovation

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Innovation is a hot topic lately, I hear about it at my job and in the collective consciousness of the business world quite frequently. Innovation for new products, new work methods, new infrastructure … the list goes on. With innovation comes the need for change, a concept championed by some and fretted by many, yet necessary. And at the root of innovation is creativity, which seems in recent decades not to receive the respect it deserves in American business.

As stated in the article “Innovation and Growth ‘Inextricably Linked,’ GE’s New Global Innovation Barometer Finds,” the US is perceived “as the country with the best reputation for innovation.” There is no doubt that the US is where it is today because of its innovative history. Think about the many inventions we now take for granted – automobiles, computers, light bulbs, semi-conductors – all products of American inventiveness, and great feats of innovation that have propelled this country to the global economic forefront throughout its relatively short history.

With the outsourcing of manufacturing to Asia and automation of jobs once requiring mathematical skills over the past few decades, America now finds itself in a rut. Nine or ten percent unemployment as blue collar jobs are shipped overseas and a lack of a new industry to compensate for these losses – it is time for the country to embrace and find opportunity in its innovative spirit as a means to turn this crisis around.

Innovation, creativity, and inventiveness cannot be automated or outsourced. They are part of the American fabric, the source of our former industrious heyday. As the findings suggest in the Innovation Barometer study, the other developed and emerging nations recognize this to varying degrees and are investing in innovation with the intent to drive their economies forward. In order for the US to stay ahead of the curve, it needs to invest in its intrinsic talent pool, despite the slow economy and lack of funding. It can start with the education system, placing a new emphasis on the arts and sciences. Out of that will grow a new awareness and appreciation for innovation and creativity that can be embraced not only by the business world, but also on a larger cultural level.

As a communication professional, I feel it is my obligation to help lead the wave of innovation at my job and in the community. My employer would not have endured a century-and-a-half if it were not for its history of innovation, as I am sure the same could be said about many other older American businesses. We need to sow the seeds now so in one hundred fifty years America will still be regarded as “as the country with the best reputation for innovation.”


See the article that inspired this post, “Innovation and Growth ‘Inextricably Linked,’ GE’s New Global Innovation Barometer Finds” on GE Reports: http://www.gereports.com/innovation-and-growth-inextricably-linked/