Not What You Do, But Who You Are

It’s amazing, really. I’ve been an artist all my life, and there is no end to what I still need to learn. Sometimes I feel as dumb as a box of warm rocks. Sometimes I love that I don’t know enough. A person who knows everything has nothing else to learn. I’d be bored.

Change is Inevitable by GollyGForce, licensed through Creative Commons.

Creative Lessons Arrive From Weird Sources
Life essons come from any creative source. And many people in our lives are hugely creative–we just don’t notice it because we don’t look for creativity in everyone.

As I forge ahead to writing the next book proposal,  I am meeting all sorts of stumbling blocks–negative self-talk, time sucked up by paying jobs, and lots of questions about art from people who know me as a corporate trainer.

The one that amazes me the most is, “What does art DO? What good is it?” We have created an interesting culture. Every item in our reach must be practical, nothing can exist without a goal, a purpose, an objective. Art can’t be for beauty, art has to be competitive and functional. “My art not only does X, but it does it fast!” Could someone please apply this demand to television? We’d be watching blank screens by next week.

Growing into Art
We no longer go to school and learn music, philosophy, art. All that is considered a waste of time. Yet it is from mythology and art we learn about ourselves, our values, our ideas. But school is now about reaching a goal–a job. Most universities are no more than Trade Schools for careers. Yesterday I heard that the public schools in my state want 14-year olds to declare a ‘major’ and then learn that trade. We are back in the 13th century, when 12 to 14 year old boys chose a Guild, signed on as an apprentice for seven years, and learned a trade.

I changed my mind about what I wanted to be many times. I started out as a writer, switched to being a science teacher, editor, copywriter, silversmith. . .and kept adding skills well into middle age.

A different kind of change.

That switching privilege is important for creative growth. Schools are spending a lot of time training us to DO something instead of to BE someone. I  learned a lot from teaching, making silver jewelry and handmade paper, but over time, I knew that returning to my roots of mixing images, colors, textures and words was where my artistic truth is.

Life IS Art, Life is AN Art
If I had been sent to school for what I wanted to be at 14, I’d be a horseback-riding ballerina. Why rush children through the only childhood they will have to live in a career they don’t like when they are 25?

Most of my life coaching and creativity coaching clients are on their second or third career. Creativity can’t be pointed out and beat into shape at age 14. Creativity grows with us our whole life.

Think back just a few years–your cell phone had an antenna you had to pull up before you answered it, it didn’t have a camera, and the software you are using today didn’t exist. The best skill to learn in school is how to deal with change and critical thinking, both of which are truly useful your whole life.

It’s OK not to know what you want for the rest of your life  at 7, at 14, and at 55. Because not knowing is the only sure way to knowing. And once you know, you also know what you don’t know. It is not the endgame, it’s the path. It may be the biggest “Ah-HA!” I’ve had in years.

–For more information on life coaching, creativity coaching, and the words-and-images work of one artist, visitQuinn McDonald’s website.

Re-Inventing Yourself: Learn from the Lizard

One of our cats was paying rapt attention to something on the rug. He had that ears-cupped-parallel-to-the-floor look, and was holding absolutely still, eyes wide open. He does this only when there is something of great interest to him, and that is almost always something that is about to become dead.

Lizard image: phoenix.about.com

I got up, and looked at the spot on the rug. It looked like a stick. Suddenly, almost all of the spot on the rug shot across the room, leaving a wiggling piece behind. Nature works really well. The thing was a lizard, and it had dropped its tail, which wriggled appealingly, allowing my cat to focus on it, while the rest of the lizard scrambled across the room.

Picking up the now-tailless lizard with a paper towel,  stepped out the door and shook the paper towel out gently, close to the ground. The little lizard body tumbled out.”Must have picked it up too hard,” I thought, feeling sorry. Just as I thought it, the lizard pulled out of its frozen position, and shot, tailless, up the lemon tree to safety.

“Must have scared it to death,” I thought. But the lizard quickly recovered and scuttled up the lemon tree to safety.

I knew that some lizards dropped their tails, but I’d never seen it work so well. The cat was perfectly happy to let the business part of the prey escape if he got to keep the  funny, wiggly part.

It seems like such a good idea to be able to drop a non-vital body part to save the important working parts. We don’t come equipped with convenient tails, but we do drag around burdensome “tales”–the stories we drag around as baggage. The sad story of how our parents didn’t give us what we needed. The mean roommate in college who was so thoughtless. The boss who wasn’t a mentor we’d hoped for, but gave us all the drudge jobs.

All those stories pile up and slow us down. They make us prey for anger, stress, decisions based on revenge and stored-up resentment. We can drop our “tales” of hurt and pity, leave them wiggling for someone else to become fascinated with. Because they aren’t helping us. No doubt, it’s hard to give up the story we live, the perspective we have on them, how we make choices based on past hurts and injustice.

Recasting our past is hard work and not appealing. The work of letting go the past means admitting that our perspective isn’t working and deliberately looking for a new perspective, one that allows us to live a less-burdened, less blame-riddled life. It won’t be done in a single day, but the small steps and work is certainly worthwhile. My clients have experienced it, and not a single client regrets the work of re-invention.

We can’t change how our story began, but we can change how it continues and build for a happen ending.

Note: this post was originally written for Jobing.com’s blog.

—Quinn McDonald is a writer, life- and certified creativity coach. She has a coaching practice for people in transitions and those undergoing changes in thier lives. See her business site at QuinnCreative.com and journaling site at raw-art-journals.com

Coaching: Price and Value

In the life of a person being coached, there is a question that raises its head. More than a few people have accused me, in a moment of anger, of being in it for the money. Of talking to them only because they pay me to.

On the face of the accusation (it’s never just a statement), they are right. My clients find me, they call me, we talk, and they pay me. Because coaching is intimate work, it is often easy to confuse coaching with talking to a stubborn friend who is totally involved in you and keeps asking questions about things that interest you. I’ve disappointed people who want to be friends after they quit coaching. I’m not totally involved in their lives anymore. It can be a shock.

I admire my clients. It takes guts to call on someone for help. I appreciate all of them. The struggle is almost always worth it—I’ve got the letters of amazement to prove it. “You didn’t give up on me.” “You showed me how to believe in myself.” And I do, with the constant work of the client who does all the heavy lifting of examining their lives and making changes.

Coaching is a calling. I didn’t have a divine light come from the sky. I wanted to help creative people be comfortable with their creativity in a world that often values compliance over exploration; I wanted to help people deal with change, because change is a constant in life and control isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. And I wanted to allow people the space and support to re-invent themselves, as employees, writers, illustrators, parents, leaders–whatever life they choose.

Re-invention is not an easy path, but I’ve walked it with excellent results and I enjoy helping people make the choices they can live with happily.

And yes, I charge for doing this. In our culture, time is money. We get up and go to work in the morning because we need to eat, pay a mortgage, and drive a car. If you didn’t need to earn money, would you still go to your daily job? If you could do whatever you wanted in life, would you still go to your office? Exactly.

And so I charge for my talent, my education,  my experience, my time and effort. For years, I had clients whom I coached for free. I wanted to “give back.” Over time, I noticed that many clients who were receiving free coaching often weren’t invested in their own progress. They missed calls. They called 15 minutes into the hour, then complained when I ended their session on time. I began to focus on their shortcomings, not on their abilities, so I chose not to continue coaching for free. “Free” has no value. “Free” is easy to not take seriously.

I still give back. I volunteer in high school helping kids who don’t know how to prepare for the work of being a writer. I help people write better, I volunteer my time to organizations. Just not to my practice.

And for my clients–they have unlimited emails between sessions. If they are in a spot that needs more work, there is extra time. And that is wonderful for both of us. It’s the reason I coach–you can change, if you want to do the work.

--Quinn McDonald is a certified creativity coach and a life coach who concentrates on change, meaning, and re-invention.  (c) 2008-9 All rights reserved. Image–Q. McDonald.

Choosing Transformation

The caterpillar is programmed by destiny to spin a cocoon and emerge a butterfly. No one knows if the caterpillar is aware of what happens during the process.

People are different. We don’t know how to spin a cocoon, and we would be scared if we could. Yet we can choose transformation. It is hard, making the choice to change. It means we deliberately give up one thing to choose another. It means we risk losing friends who don’t want to get to know us all over again in our new forms.But some of us do choose. We choose to move to a new place and start a life over. We choose to forgive bad parenting, and accept what we did get, and thrive despite of it.

That transformation is as amazing as a caterpillar’s. For all of us who have surivived, who have chosen to heal ourselves, to mother ourselves, to keep going no matter how hard, we have chosen a life of growth and transformation. We know change is possible and sustainable. Sometimes it’s a secret. Sometimes we reinvent ourselves several times. We can be more than one person.
We have a choice.
–Quinn McDonald is a certified creativity coach and an artist. See her work at QuinnCreative.com