Blog - Melissa Dinwiddie | Create the Impossible™ | Innovation Keynote Speaker & Consultant

March 22, 2017

LCN 101: The Most Important Practice

Does flying across the country on Friday to for a Saturday speaking gig make me a jet-setter?

If so, I’d like to put in for a minimal Business Class upgrade next time, please.

Seriously, my trip to Connecticut to speak at the CTPPA 68th Annual Convention went smoothly, and my presentation went great. I got wonderful feedback, I sold some books, and I think half the audience whipped out their smartphones to video record me when I played my ukulele.

That was pretty fun.

Then there were unexpected highlights like my lunch with Marisa Balletti-Lavoie of Sassy Mouth Photography, which led to a mini photo session! Yowza! Here are a few of the pics she got: [Read more…]

March 19, 2017

Snapshot from My Studio: March 19, 2017 at 06:07PM

There’s no place like home. I had my sketchbook in my carryon on the plane, but with a 5:45 am flight, that meant leaving the hotel at 3:30 am, which meant only 2 hours of sleep in the hotel… so I ended up sleeping on the plane. So my Creative Sandbox playtime today is back HOME, after a much-needed nap, in my own bed, while listening to a live call.

So happy to be home!

#doodle #doodles #doodleart #doodleartist #originalart #dailyart #dailyartist #dailydoodle #dailycreative #creativesandbox #creativesandboxway #doodlesofinstagram #artistsofinstagram #artistsoninstagram #abstractart

March 17, 2017

Snapshot from My Studio: March 17, 2017 at 06:16PM

Doodles on the plane. Letting the turbulence inform the line quality. #tinyanddaily #smalldailyacts #doodles #doodlesofinstagram #originalart #creativesandboxway #creativesandbox

March 16, 2017

Snapshot from My Studio: March 16, 2017 at 09:24AM

Here’s what I learned (or re-learned) from today’s Creative Sandbox session: I don’t like working this way!
Why? It’s too much execution without discovery!
I get BORED!
I want to be in discovery phase, following curiosity, as much as humanly possible. THAT is why I love improvisation.
THAT is why I CHOOSE to improvise in so much of my creative life, as much as possible: my visual art, my music, my teaching, my podcasts… It’s why I was drawn to jazz as an art form, and to improv–why I perform improv (and yes, it’s scary, but it gets less scary the more you do it!) Because that not-knowing-what’s going-to-happen-next? THAT is where the fun is!

That is where the CREATIVITY is!

That is where I SURPRISE myself, and if I’m not surprising myself periodically, then dangit, what is the POINT? I WANT to be surprising myself!

I have not yet figured out how to work with these watercolor markers and Pigma Microns together in a way that doesn’t involve tedium… I will keep working at it and let you know if I figure it out.

#creativesandboxway #creativesandbox #creativity #visualjournal #watercolormarkers #winsornewton #pigmamicron #doodle #doodles #doodlesofinstagram #originalart #originalartwork #dailyart #dailydoodle #dailyartist #dailycreative #dailydoodle2017 #artistsoninstagram #artistsofinstagram

March 15, 2017

LCN 100: Piling Bricks of Fear (Fear and Creativity)

Sunday I came back from five blissful days at the Friends of Calligraphy Spring Retreat.

While I was there, I never wanted to leave.

But I missed my husband and my fluffy Siberian kitty. And doing improv. And sleeping in my own bed.

And on Friday I fly to Hartford, Connecticut to speak at the CTPPA 68th Annual Convention. If I lived in a retreat center making art 24/7/365, I wouldn’t be doing things like that. So there are trade-offs.

Still, right now, I’m a bundle of nerves.

Not just rehearsing my speech (honestly, I wish I could spend all day just rehearsing my speech — I’d be a lot less nerve-addled if I could), but doing all the other things that have to get done that keep me from rehearsing my speech!

Now it’s after 9:00 pm, and I still don’t have a podcast done.

And the podcast publishes at 6:00 am…

So for this week’s episode I decided to [Read more…]

Would You Like Some Cookies?