Fear ...

Times are tough. And that's scary. But if you're feeling overwhelmed by fear the best thing to do is face it. It's there to teach you something so dont run away - rather run straight towards it head-on ... sit with it, acknowledge it and closely examine what's causing the fear and how to overcome it.

Breaking through a Creative Block

Creative blocks come in two main types - having no ideas at all, literally a blockage or having too many ideas. Try these tips to get your "mojo" back.

1. If time allows put the project on the back burner for a week. Don't look at it, don't do anything connected with it at all. Revisit it a week later.

2. Find a simple, mechanical, methodical task - organizing your office or studio, housework, gardening, filing. These tasks get you moving, allows for a sense of achievement from starting and finishing a task - and they take your mind off your creative block.

3. Get moving - take a walk, swim, stretch, dance, breathe - the block is alive in yor body, so movement allows it to find a way out.

4. Explore for a moment the way you are feeling - is it overwhelm, frustrations, pressure, anxiety, indecision? Whatever it is accept it. You can walk with it, journal it, meditate - there are many ways through it, but naming it and accepting it are key to creating change.

5. If you have an impulse - follow it. It might be just where you need to go next for a fresh idea or direction.

6. Do something - a little step towards the project - sharpen your pencil, make that phone call, clean your studio space - one small step and then walk away for an hour. Then do the next step, and so on...

7. Tap into your creative side - leave the editor, doubter, inner critic in another room.

8. Treat your work as play - make the workspace inspiring, surround yourself with inspirational art, ideas, text, etc.

9. Make a list of 10 things you've learned to do despite doubts that you could. This kind of exercise proves you can do it, because you already have despite doubts and difficulties.

10. Approach your task/block as if you were a child. How would a 5 year old do?

Referrals ... Want them? Ask for Them!

Your best clients are your existing and past clients. This powerful statement has been true for the past hundred years. A common mistake entrepreneurs make is that they spend too much time, energy and resources trying to attract new business.

Developing a relationship with your current clients and they become advocates for your services, and can recommend and refer you to other prospective clients. Keeping in touch with phone calls, informative emails can multiply our referrals.

If you want referrals ask - "I'd appreciate your referrals for my services", "Is there anyone else you know that I could contact that could use my services?" - Ask simply and directly. In your email blasts make sure you have the "forward to friends" option selected. Put a message in your template - "I'd appreciate your forwarding this email to anyone you think might be interested in my work". You can also clearly state "I am looking to expand my business, if you know other {photo editors, art directors, curators}, we'd love to hear from them."

Last tip: join www.linkedin.com and research your past clients, friends and colleagues - this is a great way to network in a professional manner and build your network - and ask for a recommendation.

A Bit of Homework ...

Here's an exercise that I give my clients for homework. It's not as easy as it appears, and is quite revealing.

Make a list of 20 statements starting with "I am..."

And another 20 statements that start with "I want..."

Take a few days to complete the exercise, come back to your lists when a thought pops into your mind.

When you have 20 of each, circle the top 5 that you truly desire to focus on. Set the steps to the goal and get started towards reaching your goals.

List of Firsts ...

First memory – the smell of my great Aunt’s Italian deli

First steps – according to my mother 7 months old, which I find hard to believe

First word – also according to my mother – airplane, I’m still fascinated by flying

First dream job – to work with Jacques Costeau and become a marine biologist

First artwork – a still life pastel drawing of a fern, an empty chianti bottle and a Turkish coffee pot

First artwork admired – "Salome", Metropolitan Museum of Art, Henri-Alexandre-Georges Regnault. I still love her!

First pet – a turtle, which after a long weekend away my mother thought was dead in his little palm tree oasis, and we ceremoniously flushed him down the toilet. As he hit the water he swam and my brother and I were screaming to fish him out. The things mother’s will do for their kids – she stuck her hand in the swirling flushing toilet and pulled him out!

First travel – technically flying from Texas to NY but I have no memory of it as a less than 1 year old. To Florida as a 5 year old, and to Europe as a 6th grader.

First car – a powder blue Toyota Corolla which was previously owned by my father … that thing ran for 100,000+ miles

First job – store clerk

First creative job – as a line producer

First shoot – a commercial for P&G

First long format – a film for the American Cancer Society

First Episodic TV show producer – Spy Game, a flop.

What are your firsts?

Marketing Tips

On my daily commute I listen and view podcasts from TED and Harvard Business Review.

Today I listened to a talk by a marketing professor at Harvard and the major piece of knowledge I received was "Businesses need to think about Marketing as an investment not an expense".

It was eye-opening for me and needed to share ... we need to adopt this mindset as well.

Happy learning!

Inspirations

Below are some quotes that are in-line with our methodologies as consultants and coach. Enjoy!

"Before anything else, preparation is the key to success." Alexander Graham Bell

"If you treat an individual as he is, he will stay as he is, but if you treat him as if he were what he ought to be and could be, he will become what he ought and could be." Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

"What we pay attention to, and how we pay attention, determines the content and quality of life." Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

"One cannot teach a man anything, One can only enable him to learn from within himself." Galileo Galilei

"We may need to solve problems not by removing the cause but by desinging the way forward even if the cause remains in place." Edward De Bono


"Walk with the dreamers, the believers, the courageous, the cheerful, the planners, the doers, the successful people with their heads in the clouds and their feet on the ground. Let their spirit ignite a fire within you to leave this world better than when you found it." Wilferd Peterson