Rabindranath Tagore

"Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark."

— Rabindranath Tagore

Bengali Poet, Novelist, Musician, Painter, Playwright

1861 - 1941

Do you believe in your artistic talent?  Do you have faith in your creativity?  Do you let your creative light shine or do you hide it under a bushel basket and refuse to share it with the world?  Creative leaders need to have the faith that they are on the right path.  Even in those darkest hours before the dawn, you need to understand the sun will rise again — that your creative work is important.  Don't give up on yourself.  Don't give up on the work you do.  You are unique and special.  No one else can create the paintings, the poems or the novels that you can create.  If you don't use your creative gift to produce art, the world will have lost much.  So pick up your pen and write.  Pick up your brush and paint.  Pick up your guitar and sing.

Here is a poem by Tagore:

My Song

by Rabindranath Tagore

This song of mine will wind its music around you,

my child, like the fond arms of love.

The song of mine will touch your forehead

like a kiss of blessing.

When you are alone it will sit by your side and

whisper in your ear, when you are in the crowd

it will fence you about with aloofness.

My song will be like a pair of wings to your dreams,

it will transport your heart to the verge of the unknown.

It will be like the faithful star overhead

when dark night is over your road.

My song will sit in the pupils of your eyes,

and will carry your sight into the heart of things.

And when my voice is silenced in death,

my song will speak in your living heart.

Rico Lebrun

"True lines do not exist in nature; we invent them.  They are poetic fiction."  

— Rico Lebrun

Italian Artist

1900 - 1964

Turtle

All creative works of art are fiction.  They do not exist in reality.  Even the most realistic painting or novel have no existence in reality.  They approximate reality.  A painting of a rose is never going to match the real rose in the garden.  Human creativity does have limits.  We can not create the world in which we live.  And this is okay.  We are not gods.  We are not perfect.  Sometimes it is best to accept our limitations than to become frustrated in our attempts to overcome our limitations.

Rudyard Kipling

"If history were taught in the form of stories, it would never be forgotten."

— Rudyard Kiplng

English Novelist and Poet

1865 - 1936

Do you love history?  Do you read history?  Or could you care less about history?  Do you incorporate history into your writing and paintings?  I believe creative leaders need to study history?  Artists should study art history and many do.  Writers should study the lives of writers.  English degrees tend to focus on the literature and studying the literature.  Writing degrees tend to focus on the writing.  But few writers study the history of writing, the history of writers, the history of words or the history of publishing.  I have met many wanna-be poets who haven't even read other poets. They would never consider studying the history of poetry.

But understanding literature, art and theater requires more than studying the history of the arts.  We need to study literature, art and theater in the context of the times they were created.  We need to study the social, political and economic histories.  We need to read biographies and memoirs. 

Writers, artists and actors are people of their times.  They creative works contain the same beliefs, hopes and biases that can be found in the rest of their society.  Novels written in other times and places will teach you one perspective of that society.  Their paintings are minature history books.

So I encourage you to read a biography of a favorite writer, actor or artist.  Immerse yourself in the history of another time and place.  What was Paris like during the time of the Impressionists?  What was New York like during the 1950's and the beats?

One of my favorite movies is The Man Who Would Be King, starring Sean Connery and Michael Caine, directed by John Huston and based on the novel by Rudyard Kliping.  The movie takes us to another place and time and gives us a glimpse of a world not our own.  Here are some scenes from the movie.

Ken Patchen

"I don't consider myself to be a painter.  I think of myself as someone who has used the medium of painting in an attempt to extend — give an extra dimension to — the medium of words.  It happens very often my writing with a pen is interrupted with my writing with a brush — but I think of both as writing."

— Kenneth Patchen

American Poet, Novelist

1911 - 1972

We define ourselves with labels.  "I am a painter.  What are you?"  "I am a poet."  We are born into this world without labels and when we die, our obituaries tell the world that we were lawyers, doctors, merchants or candlestick makers.

In my profile I list many of the labels that have defined me over the years:  a carpenter, street sweeper, car hop, corn detasseler, hospital orderly, radio announcer, blogger, book editor, publisher, freelance writer, bus driver, sports writer, bookkeeper, policy and procedures writer, forms designer, marketing vice-president, corporate executive, professional speaker, facilitator, salesman, trainer, poet, storyteller, organizational development consultant, ad writer and communications executive.  And that is the short list.

What labels have you given yourself?  What labels have others given you?  Do these labels define you?  Do the labels tell the world who you are?  Do your labels limit you or expand the boundaries of who you are?  Do the labels allow others to place you in a cubbyhole?  To limit your creativity?

Do you ever judge people by their labels?  "Oh, you are just a bus driver?  A street sweeper?  A garbage collector?...."

Patchen said that he is not a painter.  He is a writer who has given an added dimension to his writing.  He has extended the boundary of the label beyond how most people define it.

Patricia Highsmith

"All arts are one and each art — even ballet — is a form of storytelling."

— Patricia Highsmith

American Novelist

1921 - 1995

 

Do you agree that "all arts are one..."?  At the core, each of the arts are about creativity, about communication and about storytelling.  Whether we are talking about a painting, a dance recital, a play or a novel, we are talking about the impulse to create stories that communicate the meaning of why we are here.  Even abstract art has a story to tell if we can interpret message within the symbols.  The forms of the storytelling are very different, but the impulse that brought the forms is the same.

Do you celebrate and support other art forms?  Do you associate with artists of all stripes and shapes and genres?  Or do you stick to your small corner of the universe?  Do you only surround yourself with poets, or realistic painters, or ballet dancers, or stage actors?  We can learn much from talking with others and studying their creative processes.  We can be inspired by the works of others.

Unfortunately, in the American society, people don't always appreciate the value that the creative arts bring to a community.  Usually the arts are the first programs cut when there is a budget crunch.  The hard subjects of math and science are more important.  Yet, I believe, the arts are what make us human.  They help us create new futures and new visions.  Without the arts, life would be boring and dull.  So support your fellow artists today.

Hugh Nissenson

"One of the things that I felt I wanted to do as an artist was to expand the frontiers of my imagination as much as I could; to follow wherever my imaginative facility took me, and to create alternate worlds."

— Hugh Nissenson

American Novelist, Poet and Artist

1933 - 

One of the things that fascinates me about writing is the opportunity to create a world peopled with characters.  I enjoy watching the world take form out of my imagination combined with memory.  Now, it can be a world that looks very much like the world you and I live in or it can be a world that is solely from my imagination.  As a reader, I am deeply impressed with science fiction writers and their ability to create alternate worlds.  If you have not read Dune by Frank Herbert, you need to put it on your to-read list.

I am also fascinated by artists who paint genre paintings.  They create a whole world within a painting.  Two of my favorites are the American, Eastman Johnson, and the Dutch Master, Jan Steen.  Both artists tell stories through their paintings.  They create worlds that we can see.

What stories are you telling through your art?  What imaginative worlds are you creating?  Are you expanding the frontiers of your imagination?  Are you seeing things that others can't see?  Are you opening up new worlds for others to experience?

In my research on Hugh Nissenson, I discovered an amazing artist.  As part of the process of writing a novel about an artist, Nissenson painted a series of paintings for the novel in the style of his character.  In this video, Nissenson discusses his combining art and poetry into the novel. The Song of the Earth.

Mother Teresa

"It is not what we do, it is how much love we put in the doing."

— Mother Teresa

Catholic Nun

1910 - 1997

Do you put love into what you do?  As creative leaders we should love the process of creating.  The more love we put into our work; the more creative the end product is.  If you don't enjoy the process, then why do you do it?  Are you doing it for the wrong reasons?  For money?  For fame?  For sex?

Some writers and artists struggle to produce work.  I once read about a writer who published his first novel in his thirties and didn't publish his second until he was in his eighties.  For some people the creative process is difficult work.  I suggest you put love into your work and you might find it more enjoyable and less painful.  The journey we take is often more important than the destination.  We find out who we are and why we are here through the process of creating.  

The process of creating is a form of prayer — a connection to a power beyond ourselves, to a purpose bigger than us.  When we lose connection with this creative force, we stumble and struggle to create.  Writers and painters both talk about being in the flow — of something greater than themselves actually taking control and doing the creating.  They are only the instrument in the hands of the creative force.  They connect through love.

Morihei Ueshiba

"Your heart is full of fertile seeds, waiting to sprout."

— Morihei Ueshiba

Founder of Aikido

Japanese Writer

1883 - 1969

Each of us is full of potential.  If you have within your heart the desire to create music, paintings, stories or poems, you also have within your heart the seeds of those paintings, songs, poems and stories.  The flowering of these seeds also depends on the soil in which they are planted.  Is it rich, fertile soil?  Or rocky, barren soil?  The amount of rain and sunshine is also important.

Is your heart ready to grow the paintings you are destined to paint?  Or the poems you are destined to write?  Or the stories you are destined to tell?  Only you can nurture the seeds within your heart.  Only you can pick the fruit from the trees your heart will grow.  Your creativity is a gift.  Are you using it wisely?  Or have you hidden it from others?  The choice is yours.

Ernest Hemingway

"The best people possess a feeling for beauty, the courage to take risks, the discipline to tell the truth, the capacity to sacrifice.  Ironically, their virtues make them vulnerable; they are often wounded, sometimes destroyed."

— Ernest Hemingway

American Novelist

1899 - 1961

As writers, artists and creative leaders we often are vulnerable to the hostile, negative behavior of people who do not understand us and what we represent.  These negative people can be our friends and family initially and the wider world eventually as our creative ideas and works try to find their place in that world.  We need to remain strong and courageous in the face of negative attacks.

As creative leaders we often sacrifice much to achieve our dreams.  We become so focused on and obsessed with our work that we ignore family and friends.  We miss out on the joys of life.  We may forget to take care of our health.  We drink and/or take drugs to kill the demons chasing us.  We suffer ridicule at the hands of those who don't understand us and what we do.

People may hate us when we tell the truth.  Often people are not ready for the truth we have to speak.  They may criticize and condemn us.  They may laugh at us.  We must find the discipline and the courage to speak the truth anyway — to open up and share our thoughts and feelings, to share the beauty we see.

Hemingway At Work

Stanley Kunitz

"The poem in the head is always perfect.  Resistance begins when you try to convert it into language."

— Stanley Kunitz

American Poet

1905 - 2006

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.

Marcel Proust

"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes."

 

— Marcel Proust

French Novelist

1871 - 1922

For some people the environment is crucial to their happiness.  They let where they live affect their emotional life.  And there is some truth to the fact.  Cloudy days can bring people down.  Long winters give some people cabin fever.  Others need the mountains or the ocean or the prairie.  How does your environment affect you as an artist?  Does it inspire your creativity?  Does it make you hopeful?  Does it make you happy?

For other people like Proust and myself, the environment is less important?  I can create anywhere.  I can sit in a shopping mall and write poetry.  I can sit in a church and write.  As I write these words I am sitting in a hotel in South Carolina.  And the environment rarely affects my mood or happiness.  I love the mountains, the ocean and the prairie, but I don't need them to be happy.  I live inside my head.  Can you create anywhere?  Or must you be in a certain place?  A certain mood?  A special environment?

Sydney Smith

"Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goals."

— Sydney Smith

English Writer, Anglican Clergy

1771 -1845

The reason many creative leaders don't reach their goals is that they are focused on the wrong thing.  People focus on all the reasons their feel they can't achieve their goals.  They need to focus instead on their goals. 

If you are focused on your goals, you will see over the obstacles, under the obstacles, around the obstacles and through the obstacles.  If you are focused on the obstacles, you will only see the obstacles and you will not achieve your goals.

What are your goals?  What are you focused on?  The obstacles?  Or the GOALS?  Banish the obstacles from your mind.  Focus on your goals.  Achieve your dreams.

Frank Stella

"One learns about painting by looking at and imitating other painters.  I can't stress enough how important it is, if you are interested at all in painting, to look and to look a great deal at painting.  There is no other way to find out about painting."

— Frank Stella

1936 - 

American Painter

I think one of the best ways of learning how to create is to study other artists, novelists, poets, musicians, dancers and storytellers.  And most creative leaders do.  The only exception is wanna-be poets.  I am always surprised when I meet a person who tells me that he writes poetry but he never reads it.  And I have probably met hundreds in my life.  If you want to perfect your art, you need to study other artists.  But don't limit yourself to your chosen medium.  Explore other arts.  If you are a painter, read poetry.  If you are a novelist, study landscape artists and portrait artists.  If you are a dancer, study the painters who painted dancers.  The message is simple:  creative leaders need to be studying other creative leaders for insight and understanding.

Harran II
(1967)

Vincent Van Gogh

Self-Portrait
(1887)

"I have a more or less irresistible passion for books and the constant need to improve my mind, to study if you like, just as I have a need to eat bread."

— Vincent Van Gogh

Dutch Painter

1853 - 1890

Do you have a passion for learning?  Have you read a book in the last month?  Or are you, as some people tell me, too busy to find time to read?  If you read one book a month you are in the top one percent of the population.  Van Gogh was a lifelong learner.  If you are interested in seeing some of the 29 books I have read in 2010, check out my list on Goodreads.com.   

http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/2103162-harley?shelf=read-2010

Learning does not just come from books.  You can learn a lot listening to the people you come in contact with.  In the last couple of airplane flights I have had the privilege to engage in conversation with two interesting people.  One was a minister who has spent 15 years in Japan.  We shared a love of Japanese culture.  The other was a recent college graduate who found a job within a month of graduating which given the state of the economy was an amazing feat.  People from other walks of life can teach you a lot.  Do you limit yourself to communicating only with people you know?  Or do you seek out interesting people and learn from them?

Don't limit yourself to just learning about your field of interest.  Explore new topics.  If you are an artist, you should know everything you can about art, but you should also explore other areas of interest.  Take seminars and workshops.  Listen to audio books.

Here is one of my favorite Van Gogh paintings.  

Potato Eaters
(1885)

In one of his letters, Van Gogh described this painting:  "I have tried to make it clear how those people, eating their potatoes under the lamplight, have dug the earth with those very hands they put in their dish, and so it speaks of manual labor, and how they have honestly earned their food."

Harold S. Kushner

"If we put our soul into our work, if, rather than just going through the motions, what we do flows from the deepest part of our being, then after a burst of creativity, we need to replenish our souls."

— Harold S. Kushner

American Rabbi, Author

1935 -

Sometimes we need to rest — to replenish our spirit.  We cannot work all the time.  How do you replenish your spirit — restore your energy?  Exercise?  Walking?  Reading?  Visiting friends?  Loafing?  Good farmers know the importance of leaving a field fallow so as to restore the nutrients in the soil.  How do you restore the nutrients in your soul?  Do you take the time to be with yourself without the noise and chaos of the world in which you live?  Do you spend time with your soul in meditation and prayer?  Have you learned how to relax — to slow the pace of your life?  Take time today to pause for a few minutes and listen to the spirit within your flesh.  Find comfort in the small acts like the dance of a child, the breeze in the trees, the scampering of a squirrel or the hug of a friend?  Gently love the world in which you find yourself.

Harold S. Kushner wrote a book, The Lord Is My Shepherd: Healing Wisdom of the Twenty-Third Psalm, in which he meditates on the meaning of the twenty-third psalm.  The words I quoted above come from the chapter entitled: He Restoreth My Soul.  Kushner tells the story of a group of people who were on safari in Africa and hired porters to carry their supplies.  After three days the porters insisted on stopping for a day to rest.  The porters claimed that they were stopping not because they were tired, but because they had walked too far too fast and they needed time for their souls to catch up.  Have you traveled too fast and left your soul too far behind?  Do you need to wait for your soul to catch up?

As a speaker, I travel a lot — both by car and by plane.  I am currently in the midst of five weeks of travel.  Every time I return home, it takes me a day or two to renew my spirit and allow my soul to catch up.  And sometimes I feel like my soul does not catch up with my body before I am back on the road chasing the tiger.  In my case, my writing of poetry helps my soul to find its way back to the body and restore my sense of who I am.  




The Twenty-Third Psalm


The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures,
He leads me beside the still waters.
He restores my soul.
He guides me in straight paths for His Name's sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil
For Thou are with me.
Thy rod and Thy Staff, they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies.
Thou anointest my head with oil,
My cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life,
And I will dwell in the House of the Lord forever.

Gloria Steinem

"Without leaps of imagination or dreaming, we lose the excitement of possibilities.  Dreaming, after all, is a form of planning."

— Gloria Steinem

American Journalist, Author

1934 - 

Most of us underestimate the power and importance of dreaming — whether we are talking about day dreaming or sleep dreaming.  Sleep dreaming is one of my favorite times, especially in the twilight world between being awake or being asleep.  Dreams can feel so real and meaningful.  Years ago I kept a dream journal where I would record my dreams.  I have documented proof that I dreamed of marrying my wife a month before I met her.  So I do believe that dreams can predict the future.  I have experienced the excitement of possibilities.  Dreams are small windows into our souls.  

Day dreaming is a way to explore your options and find the right path.  Day dreaming helps creative leaders make decisions and take action.  As Steinem says, day dreaming is a form of planning, a way of preparing for what is to come.  Our minds are very powerful and we can see things our mind's eye before they happen.

Have you ever gone to sleep thinking of some problem and wake up with the answer?  You need to learn to harness the power of your dreams to help you creatively solve problems.  You need to increase your involvement with dreams.  My wife at a very young age discovered that she had the ability to consciously change her dreams.  If she did not like where her dreams were going she would change them while dreaming.  Today we call it lucid dreaming. 

Havelock Ellis

"Dancing is the loftiest, the most moving, the most beautiful of the arts, because it is no mere translation or abstraction from life; it is life itself."

 

— Havelock Ellis

British Physician, Writer, Psychologist

1859 - 1939

Dancing has never been my strong suit.  I grew up in a church where dancing was considered a sin.  I sinned in the seventh grade when I danced at a sock hop, but I have never felt comfortable dancing.  I have no rhythm. 

 I have learned that dancing is an art that touches the soul.  While I may never have rhythm, I can appreciate it in others.  I took a movement class 5 years ago that used movement to explore your purpose in life.  We created our life story through movement.  Some day I would like to participate in a workshop that combines dance, painting, storytelling and writing.  Who knows maybe I will create it myself. 

Martin Luther

"Music is the art of the prophets, the only art that can calm the agitations of the soul; it is one of the most magnificent and delightful presents God has given us."

— Martin Luther

German Priest, Theologian, Bible Translator, Hymn Composer

1483 - 1546

For those who have not heard of Martin Luther, he was a Catholic priest who inspired the Prostestant Reformation in 1517 by nailing his 95 theses on the door of the church in Wittenberg, Germany.  He helped change the course of Christianity.  I heard about Martin Luther early in my life, but I never knew that he translated the Bible from Latin to German or that he composed hymns.  He had a creative nature.

And I believe as does Martin Luther that music heals the soul and takes us to a whole other world.  Do you listen to music when your write or paint?  What kind of music inspires your creativity?  And if you compose music, are you ever inspired by a painting or a novel?  I believe the arts are intertwined and interconnected and touch our souls at a deep level.