A large creative project of the type Phyllis
Korkki references in the title of her book The Big Thing can be hard to finish, or even start. Korkki
identifies several characteristics of big things that make them challenging.
-Big things are personally meaningful. The dread of failing or falling
short of a dream can keep us from crossing the finish line, or even the
starting line.
-They have no deadline. It is your personal project that you get done
on your own schedule.
-They are large and complex. At
first, the structure of the thing you want to create may not be clear in your
mind.
-They require sustained concentration
and effort. It can be hard to keep going and going, especially in the face of
the other challenges of taking on a big thing.
Creative projects are not just novels, movies,
painting
or other thing we typically think of as art. A healthy relationship,
especially marriage
and family,
can be a creative undertaking. Other types of creative goals might lead to you
to organize people and resources to make a difference in the world.
In order to find a way to complete her big thing, Korkki looked into
areas that you might not find in other get-things-done type self-help
books. For instance, she looked at the effects of health
and sleep.
Along the way she received coaching in breathing, posture and mindfulness.
The bottom line is that if you’re going to have the energy, stamina and mental
clarity you need to finish a major creative work, you’ll need to take care of
yourself.
She also found that constraints were helpful. For her, her sense
obligation help her design constraints around accountability to her editors and
others. My background is engineering,
so I tend to think of creativity in terms of dealing with constraints and how
they can be overcome or possibly used to achieve a purpose.
Creative projects are rarely the work of one person. Korkki gives
credit to her agent, her editor, and the many people at her publisher who
turned her words into a book. Ego can get in the way of working with other and
Korkki offers advice on how collaboration can work.
Something I found helpful was Korkki’s advice on figuring out when to
let something go. Get real with yourself. Do you have the motivation,
especially if you must learn and practice something new to achieve your
creative goal? Are you committed to work on it regularly? Is it worth the
sacrifice you’ll need to make? You may find that something else is more
important to you, or that you don’t realistically have the desire to push
through the obstacles that will inevitably show up. Instead of torturing
yourself because of what you’re not doing, put you energy and talents into
something else you want to do.
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