Express Yourself this Summer

As children, we are creators. We use our hands and our mouths, our hearts and our imaginations, to sing and dance and draw and build and dream. If we go into any first grade classroom and ask, "Who here can sing? Who here can dance?" we'll see most of the little hands shoot up in the air, screaming, "I can! I can! Watch me!"

But as we enter the high school years, even young people with great voices and agile bodies no longer feel comfortable saying they're a singer or a dancer--not without years of training and unwavering public approval. As we become adults in this culture, the playful arts of our childhood often become even more distant strangers. Stroking the keys of a piano or holding charcoal between our fingertips is given up in favor of the more pressing demands of career, money and relationships. We forget how much the act of creating is a birthright to being human.

But it doesn't have to be this way. We are never too old to remember, reclaim and re-engage our unique voice and self-expression.

It's our special challenge as adults to express who we've now become and to reconnect with that creative spirit that we have hidden in some deep but retrievable place inside us. As Albert Camus wrote, "A man's work is nothing more than to rediscover, through the detours of art, those one or two images in the presence of which his heart first opened."

It's also our challenge to help each other take the kinds of risks necessary to bring out all our voices, whether creaky, sore or smooth.

If you're in Chicago, I invite you to create with me this summer. Here are a few ways:

1. Our next Creativity Jam is scheduled for Sunday late afternoon, July 25th. Email me for more information or to RSVP and come join us.

2. I'm bringing people together--of all artistic inclinations--to develop The Malaise County Fair, an audience-participation show like no other you've seen before. Want to participate?

3. Let me help you learn to jam with others and play your own songs, whether with guitar, keyboards or other instruments. Read more here and check out the details on my website on my music coaching lessons.

It's time for me to take a little break from this blog to work on my own creative pursuits and to get a little freedom from the computer oppression we all are dealing with these days. Click on one of the themes, below right, or search using the window top left, for previous blog entries to help inspire you to be a force for creativity and innovation in your own life. Here's to letting it out this summer.

Putting on a Show in the 21st Century

I really like the two theater trends I've noticed in the past decade or two--going to a show often offers an experience that feels much more like the circus or a rock concert.

Take a look at the final scene (right and video here) of Lookingglass Theater's production of Hephaestus here in Chicago (now extended for two more weeks to June 20), playing in our esteemed Goodman Theatre. The story of Hephaestus, the Greek god who could forge anything out of metal, is played out in an amazing array of physical and circus performances, swinging from the rafters, flipping from ribbons and navigating the trapeze. Yes, those are seven high wire performers, including veteran members of the Wallenda Family, Ringling Bros. and Cirque du Soleil, way up above the audience (click the pic to see video of it live). I believe the future here is in the merging of narrative and acrobatic acts of wonder, as seen in Hephaestus, illustrating how innovation comes through hybrids--the combining elements in ways not quite seen before.

Now I am someone who sometimes finds myself disengaged during theater, so I welcome these physical feats as a way to draw me in. The popular physical acts of our time--Cirque du Soleil, Blue Man Group, Stomp and others--are also tremendously creative, surprising us with new ways to entertain and astound. Here in Chicago I've been dazzled by the circus-like spectacles of Redmoon Theatre (the pic I took below is a Redmoon spaceman above the crowd at the recent Columbia College Manifest) and the acrobatic wonders of the smaller Ameba Dance ensemble. I find, though, that the narrative element that I need to be fully drawn in is not always there.

The other theater trend--the full-band, rock out shows perhaps first popularized by"Rent"--also works in engaging me and has thankfully updated the musical for a post-Beatles world. I'd like to hear what your favorites have been.

But I'd still like to see theater innovate further by engaging the audience even more, experimenting with removing the fourth wall from the performance. I always ask myself, how can a show enable the audience to participate even more, perhaps even shape the content of the evening? Certainly we see occasional attempts toward audience participation in improv shows, who-done-it capers (where the audience decides on the villain or outcome), Tony 'n Tina's Wedding and the like. But generally the roles are minimal and we are still seated spectators, not exhilarated participators. For years I've been working on my own version of the audience-participation show, The Malaise County Fair, which would allow audience members, if they choose, to play a role in the performance (contact me if you'd like to get involved).

What would you like to see more of as a ticket-buyer? What trends have you noticed? Do you have any other ideas for more audience participation or innovation in shows?

CEOs: "Creativity is the most important leadership quality"

It's already been two weeks since the news broke: According to a new IBM survey, CEOs have identified "creativity" as the most important leadership competency for the successful enterprise of the future. We're used to hearing "innovation" bandied about in the business world, but creativity--the juice that fuels the more results-oriented innovation--doesn't get the corporate limelight nearly as much. Now it does.

"CEOs are telling us they have to be more creative," says Saul Berman, Lead Partner, Strategy and Change, at IBM. "We're not going back to the old normal." Creativity was the highest ranked leadership quality at 60%, followed by integrity and global thinking (Thanks to Fast Company for this graphic, right).

The great challenge for CEOs is dealing with increasing complexity and change on all fronts, and because of that, according to the report, "Creativity is the most important leadership quality." The best corporate executives "practice and encourage experimentation and innovation throughout their organizations." The survey was based on interviews with more than 1500 CEOs worldwide, the largest one-on-one sample known.

So what are the characteristics of a creative leader? As the graphic below reveals, the creative leader is one who invites disruptive innovation and change, can tolerate ambiguity, challenge the status quo and invent new ways of doing things. For more on this study and to get your own copy of the report, click here.