Dr. Zoltan's Pearls of Creative Wisdom

It's always fun to hear from your readers. Several weeks ago, I got a nice email from Carl King, aka Dr. Zoltan Obelisk. Carl lives in southern California, and is a jack of all media — musician, performance artist, comedian, web designer, philosopher, and blogger. I enjoyed digging through Carl's Dr. Zoltan site, and you will too! [Here's a link to his music.]

What really caught my eye (and mind) are Zoltan's "Ideas for a Creative Career." This list consists of 81 ideas to keep in mind as you pursue your creative career. This is one of the most perceptive such lists I've encountered in a while. I encourage you to check out all 81 ideas. Here are a few of them.

5) Do not place yourself below anyone. No matter how much fame, money, freedom, and material resources someone else may have, accept that you deserve to have the same, and take your own path as seriously as they do. What you do is just as valid and real. Which means that what everyone else does is also valid and real. Calm down.

19) Learn to work alone, in a vacuum. Be able to keep talking even when no one is listening. The initial process of creation has to come from a place of wonder and curiosity. You have to be viscerally fascinated by coming up with ideas, whether or not anyone else cares.

22) Do not seek approval or encouragement from others. Approve and encourage yourself. Give yourself permission to achieve your goals, simply because you want to.

33) Learn the difference between an idea and a plan. Then learn the difference between a plan and the execution of that plan. Many ideas are best left as ideas. Many plans will be abandoned. That is OK. Enjoy them for what they are, and then go ahead and invent new ideas and plans. You may find that you are executing only a small number of plans that will bring you the most success.

38) Do not draw a hard line in your mind between “you” and “people who are successful.” VERY IMPORTANT: Do not let a small-town mentality infect your mind.

46) Money is not what the universe is made of. Recognize its use as one tool for exchanging energy in a society, but realize that there are other ways of exchanging creative energy. Don’t get locked into only one economic system. Not everything can be measured in dollars, euros, pesos, or whatever type of colorful paper or metal you and billions of your friends are hypnotized by.

73) Learn to sit and do nothing. Find a comfortable chair and do not watch television, do not listen to music, do not read a magazine. Turn off your cellphone, get away from Myspace / Flickr / Facebook and your friends or pets. Do not keep bombarding your mind with external stimulation and cramming things in from all directions. Just enjoy your own mind and realize that nothing bad is going to happen to you if you sit by yourself and shut off to the world. Look inward and see what you can find.

75) Make mistakes and then learn from them. Lose money. Lose friends. Get fired from your job. Go broke. Once you hit bottom a few times, you will not make such scared decisions. You will find out that you can start over again and again, with more knowledge and less fear. Many great people throughout history have done this repeatedly. You will also find out who your real friends are.

Thanks for the tips, Dr. Zoltan!

Comments

[Elton Daley]

Zoltan has some practical and good advice. Thanks for sharing it. I especially liked his distinction between an idea and a plan.

[Randy Bosch]

Roger:
Hugh MacLeod has a parallel track, but quite a few different points, based upon his unusual career. His "How to be Creative" may be worth a look, and can be found at:
http://www.gapingvoid.com/Moveable_Type/archives/000876.html

[Brendan Davis]

Carl is a good friend / colleague who I know was inspired greatly by your work, and being that I am also a fan of yours it was a very cool to see the two worlds converge in this blog.

All the best!

Brendan

[William Maier]

Great to see Carl's work shared like this; many kudos to you both.

~W.