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

November 2, 2010

Stuck? Sandbox Sessions to the Rescue! (and Free in November)

Do you have a burning desire to create, but can’t seem to get to your projects, let alone get them done?

Maybe you have UFO’s (UnFinished Objects) languishing in your closet.

Or you’ve been working on a new offering for your business and can’t get past the dreaming stage.

Or maybe you’ve been wanting to write—a story, a song, a poem, a novel, an essay, or for your blog. Or spend time with your musical instrument. Or get your hands into some clay, ink, or paint.

You need to get into the Creative Sandbox

If you’ve been here before you know that one of my overarching goals is to be in the Creative Sandbox on a regular basis—playing, experimenting, just doing my creative thing—and to help others get there too.

Unfortunately, it’s way too easy to get stuck on the outside.

Maybe you find it hard to get started. Or stay focused. Maybe you find yourself distracted—by housework. Or email/Twitter/FaceBook… Or… other stuff?

I know.

For years, although I made my living from my art, I felt practically locked out of the Creative Sandbox. I almost forgot it existed.

That’s actually how this blog came about: I was fed up with being stuck, fed up with struggling through life and not doing the creative things that make me happy.

I got into my art business by following my Bliss, but over the years the Bliss I was following had evolved. I needed to reset.

I needed to get back to the Creative Sandbox!

The first step was realizing how important this was to me.

The next step was committing to making it happen.

These steps made a huge difference, but even though I knew how important this was, the making it happen part still had a tendency to get stuck.

Here’s what finally helped

Support.

Accountability.

Reminders from other people that this is important, and why.

Validation that YES, you get to do this. It’s good if you do, not just for you, but for the whole world.

The Universe needs you to be creative!

Nowadays, my life pretty much revolves around the Creative Sandbox. I’m mostly either playing in the Sandbox, or doing something to help me get back to the Sandbox.

Now I want to help you get into the Creative Sandbox.

How?

In response to LaVonne Ellis‘s #Customerlove challenge, and inspired by her Stuckbuster Sessions, I’ve decided to set up weekly Sandbox Sessions to get YOU into the Creative Sandbox.

What are Sandbox Sessions?

They’re three-hour group sessions, limited to 6 participants (plus me), where you get a chance to connect with other creative people before, during and after your work/play time.

Why? To create some support and accountability so you can get your important work done.

Instead of just thinking about it.

Instead of just planning what you want to do.

Instead of feeling badly about yourself for not doing that thing—you know what it is—that you want so much, but haven’t been able to get yourself to do.

How do Sandbox Sessions work?

Here’s what happens:

At the designated time we meet on Skype for a short check-in.
Each participant gets a chance to briefly share what they intend to work on, what it means to them, why they want to do it, and how it will make them feel to accomplish it.
Check-in complete, we go our separate ways for three hours of Sandbox time.
Half-way through the session, and again at the end of the three hours, we take a break and check in to talk about our progress (or lack thereof).
I offer encouragement and words of wisdom to help keep you moving forward.
Everybody helps and encourages each other during the check-ins, and on Twitter at the #sandboxers hashtag.

Why do you need Sandbox Sessions?

Support: You get encouragement from me, and from the other Sandboxers.
Community: There’s something about knowing that other people are working alongside you—even if they’re thousands of miles away.
Accountability: Yep! Rest assured, nobody will yell at you or make you feel badly if you’ve twiddled your session time away on Twitter. But just knowing you’re going to check-in with the group tends to keep people on track. Which is, of course, the point!

Who are Sandbox Sessions for?

Anyone who wants to make progress with their creative thing—or any project they want to complete—is a good candidate to be a Sandboxer.

You don’t have to be an artist. You don’t even have to work on a creative project. My goal is to get you into the Creative Sandbox, but anything that supports you in that is fair game.

If you feel that catching up on that pesky bookkeeping or cleaning your file cabinet is the best use of your time, go for it!

To make it super-clear, Sandbox Sessions are for you if:

You’re ready to do, instead of just planning
You’re willing to give yourself the gift of dedicated time for you
You have three hours to commit to working exclusively on your chosen project
You like to play
You could benefit from the support of a small group of committed people
You’re able to offer positive feedback and encouragement

If you have a project you’ve been aching to get done, or if you’ve just been wanting some playtime, Sandbox Sessions can take you from “maybe someday..” to “I did it!”

Who are Sandbox Sessions not for?

Sandbox sessions are not for you if:

You’d rather make excuses than get your important work done
You have a hard time being positive and encouraging
You like to whine and complain
You don’t want to take responsibility for your own happiness, and prefer to be a victim
You need to put others down to make yourself feel better
You can’t commit to three hours of working on your thing
You are not respectful of other people’s time and feelings

The logistical stuff

Starting in December, a month of once-a-week sessions will be $40 per month, or you can buy a single session for just $15. Peanuts, really, if you think about all the work you’ll be producing during our sessions.

BUT, for #customerlove, in the month of November, Sandbox Sessions are FREE.

That’s right, as my way of showing how much I want to help you get into the Creative Sandbox and get your important work done, I’m offering the Sandbox Sessions for no charge this month.

You either get four Tuesdays (November 9, 16, 23 & 30), three Wednesdays (November 10, 17 & 24), or three Thursdays (November 11, 18 & 25 ).(Because I’m seeing the knee doc about my other knee this Thursday, November 4, I won’t be around for a Sandbox Session that day :().

(Note: The Thursday, November 18 session will end an hour earlier than usual, to accommodate my follow-up visit after my knee surgery. If Sandboxers want to start an hour earlier that day, that’s cool with me.)

Ready to sign up?

Sandbox Sessions are limited to six people in each session (plus me), first come, first served. Priority goes to Sandboxers who sign up for the full month.

I have sessions set for 9am-12pm Pacific Time, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. (If those times don’t work for you, let me know and if there’s enough interest I’ll set up additional session times. Or check out LaVonne’s Stuckbuster Sessions.)

What are you waiting for?

Stop dreaming and start doing! Let’s get you into the Creative Sandbox!

Sign up by clicking on the PayPal link below. If there are no more Sandboxer spaces available I’ll add you to a waiting list.

$40 per Month FREE in November!	$15 Single Session FREE in November!

Remember, in order to keep the groups small and get the most out of each session I’m keeping the groups small, no more than six people per session.

Sign up now to secure your spot to get Sandboxing!

November 1, 2010

What’s your challenge?

Need some support to get something done? A group challenge is a great way to do it! Here are three challenges going on RIGHT NOW that you can participate in (or just enjoy from the sidelines and contemplate taking part next time).

Customer Love

Today is the first day of the #customerlove challenge. I’ve signed up to spend 28 days basically being awesome and putting lots of love out there in the world. (I mean, like, consciously. Not like I don’t do this all the time, people. I mean, really.)

The goal? To make customers love you.

It’s LaVonne Ellis‘s creative response to Naomi Dunford’s post “Make Them Love You. THEN Ask For Money.”

The upshot? Lay the groundwork. Or, in Naomi’s words:

Spend the first 28 days being totally, ridiculously awesome. Plan to make 100% of your money on the 29th day.
Spend 28 days being insanely active on Twitter or Facebook or your local small biz networking scene. Spend 28 days making killer contacts on LinkedIn or at the local flower shops or a few select forums. Spend 28 days loudly creating tactical, useful content on your blog or YouTube or, hell, Facebook notes.
Make friends as if your life depended on it. Be helpful. Give lots of shoutouts. Send link love. Generally be the nicest, coolest, smartest kid in school.
Then, on the last day, ask for the money. Launch your consulting sale or your custom deck design sale or your half price classes or whatever at the last possible moment.

So that’s what I’m doing this month.

Wanna join me? You can still register and download the (incredibly awesome) free e-book here.

NaNoWriMo

Today is also the first day of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), an annual creative writing project in which registrants commit to writing an entire novel in a month.

50,000 words. 175 pages.

Yep. Crazy, huh?

But according to Wikipedia (the NaNoWriMo site being unavailable at the time I was looking), in 2009 170,000 people took part.

My friend Fawn is doing it, and hell, if you’re ambitious and a little crazy, you can too!

I’m… not. But then I’m a little busy with other stuff…

Art Every Day Month

Eight years ago, inspired by NaNoWriMo, artist Leah Piken Kolidas challenged herself to make a piece of art every day. The following year she invited others to join her, and at the time of this writing there are 235 people signed up for this year’s challenge.

Participants post their daily creations on their Flikr account (though you don’t actually need a blog OR a Flikr account to participate!)

—–

Once you start searching for challenges they start popping up everywhere. Know of any you want to share? Post them in the comments below.

Now go get creating!

October 31, 2010

Weekly Review #30: The Great Bedtime Experiment

So how’m I doing in my quest to re-invent my life, follow my evolving Blisses and create the life I really, really want?

Sleep, it turns out, is a critical factor for optimal happiness.

Gretchen Rubin, über-blogger and best-selling author of The Happiness Project, even said so recently in an interview with Reach Personal Branding.

I knew this. It’s kind of intuitive. I mean seriously, who doesn’t get cranky when they don’t get enough sleep?

Adequate rest is also a critical factor for optimal productivity. I know this too.

But knowing something and actually doing something about it are two different things.

Today I had a very concrete reminder of this fact, because last night I stayed up way too late.

There was a good reason for it: I was singing (and playing ukulele!) at a jam session, and since performing is one of my Blisses, I can easily justify staying up late to do it.

And in fact, a 2:00 am bedtime was pretty typical for me until very recently.

But a few weeks ago (before the infamous street fair that I never got to because I was in the ER with a dislocated knee instead), I told Susan, my life coach, that one of my biggest issues is getting to bed too late. I know it isn’t helpful. I know it makes me feel crappy. I know I’d probably be way more productive swapping that late-night time for morning time.

But getting myself to do it? That’s another animal entirely.

This is where life coaching has been astonishingly helpful. Somehow, having an outsider help me look at my “stuff” helps get me to actually make changes that haven’t quite managed to accomplish by myself in the past.

Susan made a deal with me. She challenged me to make a commitment to get to bed by 11:00 (or midnight at the latest) for one week, and see how it went.

I was up to the challenge, and part of the deal was that I would email her every night right before going to bed.

Brilliant Lesson #1: Incorporate Accountability

Accountability works, people. Or at least makes a big, big difference.

Still, I wasn’t entirely sure I’d be able to keep the commitment, until Susan pointed out that I could write about my experience here on my blog, on 365 Days of Genius, and in my happiness e-course.

Brilliant Lesson #2: Tie Goal to Underlying Motivators

The sad thing is, self-care was not a big enough motivator to get me to 100% commitment. But hell, whatever works.

In my case, tying something in to one or more of my passions turns out to make a really, really big difference.

So here it is, a few weeks later. I’m proud to say that I stuck to that commitment and got to bed, lights out, by 11:00 pm (or midnight at the absolute latest) every day that week.

I even got to bed at 10:30 the night before the street-faire-that-wasn’t. A record. A miracle, in fact.

But the coolest thing of all is that I kept to this earlier bedtime routine, even after the week of the commitment had passed. My experience of feeling better and being more productive for that week was finally enough to get it through my thick head that yes, I really can pull myself away from my computer, and yes, life really is better when I get to bed earlier, and damn it, just do it, girl.

Except, of course, that I did fall off the wagon a few times. Usually with good reason (as in the aforementioned jam session). Sometimes because, well, I was just being rebellious. Or falling back into bad habits. Whatever.

The cool thing, though, is that now that I’m (mostly) used to getting to bed earlier, when I stay up til 2:00 am (as I did last night), I really feel it.

Oh my god, do I feel it.

I feel crappy all day.

I can’t think as clearly.

I frequently get a migraine.

And possibly worst of all (vain creature that I am), I have really big, dark circles under my eyes and look closer to my actual age! Ack!

But we won’t talk about that.

Suffice it to say that instead of beating myself up for staying up too late, I’m choosing to see it as a great learning experience. A scientific proof, as it were, that I really want to get to bed earlier. Even when I don’t always think that’s what I want.

So that, dear reader, effectively encapsulates some of the most important lessons from this week.

And because I’m committed to shutting down and getting to bed in the next hour, I won’t go on for pages (as is my wont) about all the other stuff from this week.

Like the fact that I figured out that I really need to write first thing in the morning if I want to have a chance of actually completing my various writing projects. So my Ideal Daily Template (IDT) has been changed accordingly.

Or the fact that I’ve been obsessively obsessive about playing my ukulele for hours every day, and have been forming all kinds of new neural pathways learning jazz chords and every possible way to play them up and down the neck. And that I’m well on my way to getting up to speed with several songs in my jazz diva repertoire.

Or the fact that I actually wrote a complete melody line and first verse to a brand new song.

Or the fact that, although I didn’t do much painting this week, I’m feeling mostly okay about it because I’m really rocking the music and writing.

Or the fact that I (perhaps somewhat compulsively, given how busy I am) signed up to participate in LaVonne Ellis‘ #Customerlove challenge.

Or the fact that after hours of mind-numbingly boring data entry, my business books are now up to date, and my tax return filed and paid. Hallelujah.

Or the fact that, assuming I get insurance authorization, I’m getting an MRI on my left (ie, un-dislocated) knee, and (oy vey) may end up having surgery on that knee first. We’ll see…

No, instead I’m going to shut down and go get some sleep.

And if you happen to be reading this late at night, you might want to do the same.

Or not.

Me, I’m going to bed.

October 30, 2010

How to Woodshed on the Ukulele (or Guitar, or Any Fretted Instrument)

One thing I’m especially pleased about at the moment is how much I’m playing my ukulele.

Right now, I am a woodshedding fiend. In fact, I’m having to restrain myself so I don’t develop a repetitive stress injury…

It helps that the first item on my Ideal Daily Template is “Play uke” (though that’s actually changing, but more on that in another post).

It also helps that the ukulele is wonderfully portable – easy to bring from room to room, so it’s always available for a little strumming. (The removal of obstacles being a very large portion of spending more time on your creative thing.)

All of this woodshedding made me think some people out there might find it useful to have a little tutorial on how to practice effectively. Just playing a song straight through is never going to do the job; instead, you’ve got to break every song down to find the hard transitions, and woodshed on those until you want to puke.

Isn’t that the way life always works? The fun and easy stuff rarely gets you up the mountain. We all resist the hard stuff, but it’s what creates greatness in the end, isn’t it?

Anyway, I hope you enjoy this. I love to teach, so I had fun making it.

(Plus it was a good exercise for me – Ms. Vain – to shoot a video with bed-head. Always working on getting more Zen..)

Enjoy, and let me know what you think!

Uke til you puke!

October 28, 2010

New Art: Customized Ketubah

As the tentative launch date for 365 Days of Genius approaches, and demands for my time heat up, I really have no business posting more than once a week here, but staying away is making me crazy.

So I promised myself this would be brief. (Ha – when have I ever been brief? I was born verbose).

Okay, here goes.

New Ketubah Art

Monday I got a phone call from a groom, getting married Friday. (I am not making this up, people.)

Groom: Is it possible to get a ketubah in time?

Me: Um, yes, but there’s a rush fee.

Groom: No problem. And oh, by the way, could you possibly add some animal illustrations?

Me: Um.. What did you have in mind?

Groom: Well, an elephant. And a monkey. And a Himalayan cat, a Russian Blue cat and a black and white Shih-Tzu.

Me: Um.. Well, it’s possible.. But you’re looking at approximately [high dollar amount].

Groom: No problem.

Well, okay then!

I told him I’d need their personalization info ASAP, and I’d get back to him with a precise price quote the next day.

Needless to say, Tuesday was a whirlwind of proof-making and painting. When I gave him my quote (basically the same as the approximate amount I’d mentioned the day before), he had the nerve to ask if there was any flexibility on the price.

Considering that I’m stopping my entire life to get this project done? Um, that would be no.

So fine, we went ahead with the deal.

And this, dear reader, is what emerged (the main artwork, my Spiral of Life ketubah, was done already; the additions are the animal illustrations in the captions):

Spiral of Life Ketubah, by Melissa Dinwiddie - customized with animals — My Spiral of Life ketubah print, with custom animal illustrations

And detail shots:

Spiral of Life Ketubah (with custom Shih Tzu and Himalayan Cat illustration) — Shih Tzu and Himalayan cat

Spiral of Life Ketubah (with custom Russian Blue cat illustration) — Russian Blue cat

Spiral of Life Ketubah (with custom monkey illustration) — Monkey

Spiral of Life Ketubah (with custom elephant illustration) — Elephant

Thanks to the wonder that is Photoshop I was able to paint the animals, scan them, and add them to the existing artwork so that the piece looks like it was all created at once. (I especially love the monkey’s tail curling around the vine.)

It ended up being pretty good pay for a day’s work, and I kinda like the result! (A girl could get used to this.) What do you think?

Meanwhile, I’m itching with news and announcements, but I promised myself I’d shut down before 10:30 tonight, and I’m keeping that promise no matter how it hurts.

So you’ll just have to stay tuned. More tomorrow, perhaps?

‘Night ‘night!