"The finest language is mostly made up of simple, unimposing words."
— George Eliot
English Novelist
1819 - 1880
Think simple. Think unadorned. Think powerful. Sometimes we believe it's the fancy words, the longest speeches, the wildest colors that win the day. But the truth is the simple words carry more emotion and have a greater impact.
"Poetry is more fundamental than written language... It is one of the characteristics that defines us as human... Where there are people, there is speech; where there is speech, there is poetry."
I just pulled off my bookshelf the first book about writing poetry that I ever read. I purchased it in 1967. The book is The Poet and the Poem by Judson Jerome. For more than 30 years, Jerome wrote the poetry column for Writer's Digest. The title of the first chapter is: "Are You A Poet?" The first two sentences read: "Of course, you think you are. I have never met a person who has never written a poem."
Many people write what they think is poetry. Most have no clue as to what poetry really is and many have never read a book of poetry. Few people would take up painting without studying the masters of the past. Most people wouldn't attempt to play the piano without studying the greats. Yet, many who have not ever read a poem will pick up a pen and attempt to write one.
As Jerome says, "where there is speech, there is poetry. Poetry is in our DNA. Poetry is at the heart of language. So maybe we all at some level are poets. We may not be great poets or even good poets, and we may write bad poems, but we still call ourselves poets. And that is okay. We should not stop writing, painting or singing simply because we are not successful.
Writing is in the sharing of details. Even the smallest detail helps to create the story. Writers are cautioned again and again not to tell, but to show. If you tell, you are placing judgement on the story. If you show, you are allowing the reader to make up his own mind. And I think the same is true of painting. The goal is not to show the moon hanging in the sky, but to see it reflected in the plants and trees. Painting is about light and shadow. You know the sun or moon is there even if you can't see it. You see the light on the leaves. Dig deep and reveal the details. The story is build on the details.
One of the things that makes us humans special is our ability to learn and understand verbal language. We name things. That is what writers do. That takes courage. We conceive a thought, write it down and share it with others. And this also makes writing different than painting.
Eric Fischl
Eric Fischl, an American artist, says it this way: "The difference between painting and other forms of creativity like writing or filmmaking is that painting is a preverbal experience." The language of painting is the language of the eyes. We communicate by seeing. The language of the spoken word is the language of the ears. We understand by hearing. Language was first spoken before it was written. It takes courage to speak and to hear what is spoken.
The ability to conceive a thought and then speak it is an amazing gift. If you ever become depressed because you feel you don't have talent, stop and think about the many gifts you have been given — the ability to think, the ability to comprehend language, the ability to speak words and the ability to write and read. Consciousness itself is an amazing gift. If you don't think of it as a gift, imagine being dead and having no consciousness.
Painting by Eric Fischl
And because we can speak words, we are able to imagine that which is not. We are able to conceive ideas and worlds that do not exist. We are not limited to the world that we see, hear, taste, smell and touch. And writers have the power to help us see worlds that only exist in our minds. Imagination is an amazing gift. Celebrate your imagination. Celebrate your ability to speak.
Here is Salman Rushdie discussing his creative process.
Words are very powerful. A few words here or there can change a life. Who have been the encouragers in your life? Maybe it was a parent, a teacher, a friend, a child or a preacher? What did they say to you? How did they touch your life? How did they change your life?
Many motivational speakers have inspired me over the years. Driving to Texas from Illinois in December of 1982 to start a new job, I discovered Zig Ziglar, the grandfather of motivational speaking, on the radio. I didn't know who he was or the impact he would eventually have on my life. I have since met him and seen him on several occasions speak. The last time I saw him speak was at the 2000 National Speakers Association annual convention in Washington, D.C. Like many speakers that I enjoy, I have listened to him dozens of times on tape. I, with his permission, actually tell some of his stories.
One of my favorite Ziglar stories is the story of the man who had an opportunity to visit heaven and hell before he died. St. Peter asked the man where he wanted to go. He told St. Peter to take him down to hell. There he saw a beautiful banquet hall with the finest food and drink you could imagine. When he looked at the people he saw that they were skin and bones and that they were cursing and swearing at each other. He told St. Peter to take him up to heaven. In heaven, he saw the same beautiful banquet hall filled with the finest food and drink. When he looked at the people, he saw that they were healthy and robust and that they were laughing and singing. The man asked St. Peter what was going on. St. Peter responded, "Did you see the silverware." Strapped to each arm was a four foot fork and a four foot knife. Now, we all know we can't eat with such large silverware. The people in hell were so busy getting everything for themselves that nobody got anything. Up in heaven each person would feed the person across from him and that person would feed him back. The message is very simple but powerful: if you help other people get what they need and want you will get everything you need and want.
As creative leaders we have the opportunity to touch the lives of the people we meet through our books, paintings, songs, photographs and stories. Whose life did you touch today?
Here is Zig Ziglar telling his famous primp the pump story.
"I don't know where a poem comes from until after I've lived with it a long time. I've a notion that a poem comes from absolutely everything that every happened to you."
Do you know where you creative work comes from? Have you ever been surprised by something that you created? Everything that happens to us and everything that we do ultimately influences what we create. That quarrel you had with your spouse this morning may one day make it into your painting, or story or poem. Watching the sunset today with your lover may someday find its way into a novel or a play that you write. That stranger you saw at your local coffee shop this evening may have a walk on role in that short story you are writing. I once wrote a story called Bath Day about an old woman who lived in a nursing home. I had a walk-on part in the story as a young man who times how long it takes to give the woman a bath. This bit of action is based on a time when I was doing a time study of how long it takes to give a bath. In one of my story poems, Mary Lou, the fact that my father showed Grand Champion hogs at state fairs showed up in a poem about young love and the loss of virginity.
Here is a poem by Donald Hall.
White Apples
when my father had been dead a week
I woke
with his voice in my ear
I sat up in bed
and held my breath
and stared at the pale closed door
white apples and the taste of stone
if he called again
I would put on my coat and galoshes.
Here is Donald Hall reading his poem, Affirmation.
Our minds are very powerful. What we imagine, think and say can impact what we do. Creative leaders should use their imagination not only for their creative work, but also for their personal lives. Can you see yourself as a successful writer, artist or actor? Can you see yourself sitting at a desk typing that great novel or standing at a easel painting your best painting?
Do you want to change some habit or relationship? Begin by imagining yourself in a new role or relationship. See yourself successfully behaving in a new way. We call this positive visualization. Most of us already do negative visualization. Do you ever worry about the future? Worry is a negative form of visualization.
Through the process of visualization we can change who we are. This is the power of positive thinking. The easiest thing in the world is to be negative. It takes a lot more will power to be positive in a negative world. I challenge you to take five minutes each day and visualize your success.
This statement by Stanley Kunitz sums up one of the key challenges that every creative leader faces. What we create in the physical world never is as good as what we imagine in our minds. Most artists, writers and performers are never satisfied with the end product because we see something different in our mind's eye. And we have to learn to accept that it is okay to be imperfect. Perfection is unachievable. In fact, as humans what makes us interesting is our flaws. And the same thing is true of our art. It is the mistakes that make our art unique. If the work we created was perfect, then every piece of art would look the same. It is our flaws and weaknesses that make our art uniquely ours. Our imperfections help make the art perfect.
Here is a poem by Stanley Kunitz.
Passing Through
By Stanley Kunitz
-- on my seventy-ninth birthday
Nobody in the widow's household ever celebrated anniversaries. In the secrecy of my room I would not admit I cared that my friends were given parties. Before I left town for school my birthday went up in smoke in a fire at City Hall that gutted the Department of Vital Statistics. If it weren't for a census report of a five-year-old White Male sharing my mother's address at the Green Street tenement in Worcester I'd have no documentary proof that I exist. You are the first, my dear, to bully me into these festive occasions.
Sometimes, you say, I wear an abstracted look that drives you up the wall, as though it signified distress or disaffection. Don't take it so to heart. Maybe I enjoy not-being as much as being who I am. Maybe it's time for me to practice growing old. The way I look at it, I'm passing through a phase: gradually I'm changing to a word. Whatever you choose to claim of me is always yours; nothing is truly mine except my name. I only borrowed this dust.
"Writing was a spiritual exercise for my father, the only thing he really believed in."
— Mark Vonnegut American Writer
1947 -
Writing for me is a spiritual exercise. I did not realize until I read an essay a year ago in which Mark Vonnegut talks about his father, Kurt, one of my favorite authors. The quote opened for me the door into why I have spent 35 years writing without fame or fortune. Since I rejected organized religion at age 18, writing became the spiritual road I walked. Writing gave my soul the strength necessary to face the traumas of this world. I was called to be a preacher but I could not preach until I first cleansed my soul and made it strong through writing. The writing is what makes me whole, gives meaning to my life, and keeps me believing even when I feel there is nothing left to live for. Here is a short poem I wrote a year ago today.
As a writer, I have lived in a black and white world. The pages of books are black and white. The page I write on is black and white. I have come to color only slowly when I took up the study of art about a decade ago. The complexity of color is hard to understand. Since the impressionists, color has been celebrated and let free. The old Dutch masters were darker, deeper. What is the color of your life? Bright? Sparkling? Deep? Dank? Dark? Autumn is coming — my favorite season. A time of reflection. The colors shift and darken. The greens fade from the world. We see yellows, reds and browns. Then winter will be here and we are back to black and white, waiting for spring to sprout.
"Story is the mother of us all. First we wrap our lives in language and then we act on who we say we are. We proceed from the word into the world and make a world based on our stories."
The world we live in is the world we have created by the stories we tell ourselves individually and collectively. Both personal, family and community history is made up of remembered stories that we have told ourselves over the years. We make decisions about our lives based on the stories we believe to be true. As creative leaders in our society, what stories are you telling in your writing and painting? The stories that you and I choose to tell help shape the future of our world.
"Poetry is more fundamental than written language... It is one of the characteristics that defines us as human... Where there are people, there is speech; where there is speech, there is poetry."
"Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint on the broken glass."
"You never know when one kind act, or one word of encouragement, can change a life forever."
"I don't know where a poem comes from until after I've lived with it a long time. I've a notion that a poem comes from absolutely everything that every happened to you."
"Imagination is the true magic carpet."
Do you want to change some habit or relationship? Begin by imagining yourself in a new role or relationship. See yourself successfully behaving in a new way. We call this positive visualization. Most of us already do negative visualization. Do you ever worry about the future? Worry is a negative form of visualization.
"The poem in the head is always perfect. Resistance begins when you try to convert it into language."
"Art is a wholly physical language whose words are all the visible objects."