Day 4: KIE Conference (Knowledge, Innovation and Enterprise)
I’m super excited, I just completed presenting to the KIE conference.
I had one of those emergency sleep / dream wake-up moments. Have you ever had a nightmare of taking an exam, or missing a final exam? My recurring nightmare is that I make it to the exam on time, but I can’t read the test questions - they are written in a foreign language. This recurring nightmare is one that my psyche and I have been waging against each other for some time. After I woke up this morning I read an email stating that I present at the prestigious KIE Conference at 2-2:30pm UK time. I freaked out because I thought I had missed my scheduled time.. Truthfully, I was on-time for a 6am presentation (my time).
Another reminder to not take on too much, or bite off more than I can chew. Feels amazing to have presented! Dr. James Ogunleye had some great questions about the 4 C’s of creativity. When the topic of everyday creativity comes up, the conversation often gravitates towards those who are genius or those who look at creativity in an everyday capacity. I know my project is called everyday creativity - and it seems like it would relate to the one side of the spectrum of creativity that relates to little things and everything. I do not see the distinction, nor do I like the idea that one might judge or analyze and state that an idea that is both novel and useful is mini-c creative or maybe Pro- or Big- C.
Frankly, we all need to realize that creativity is everywhere and for everyone - and once this reality is shared amongst everyone, we will begin to believe that some of these Nobel prize ideas may actually be born out of someone or someplace least expected. Let me state that again, ''great ideas may come from the least expected”!
This mindset is something I am really after in this study. We do not need to identify people who possess some form of creativity that is rare or unique. This is within each and every one of us. If our schools and businesses actually believed this mindset, we would stop looking for the creative “type” and begin changing the environment, context, and the ways we engage in creative expression.
Another dimension of this study is sleep. It is lacking in my daily regiment. It is critical to this study and to my health and well-being and yet, it seems out of reach each day. Finding the time to complete this project, school, and work has caused too many to-do items in the day and not enough sleep (or at least my sleep is suffering rather than choosing to allow other aspects of my daily regiment to suffer).
I do need to validate myself a little here, this post is sounding a little bit like I am beating myself up rather than thinking about ways to learn and grow and improve. So far, it has only been a few days and I feel it has illuminated a great deal already!!!
https://kiecon.org
“Pete, you did it. You presented at your first international conference!”
Mindfulness Practice:
During my sit today I realized by allowing the body and nervous system to calm...ideas really begin to flow. My idea quota would be very different if measured from within the mindfulness state. I can really feel unnecessary thoughts that seem to easily flow away if I let them, and on the contrary I can really anchor into them if I choose. I thought of how the late Sir Ken Robinson and Mihaly Csikszentmihaly’s ideas of the Element and Flow came together. As they both have to do with skills, interests, things we are good at and are challenging and engaging. I wonder if anyone has entered the flow state doing something they didn’t enjoy? Flow is a chemical response brought on by conscious actions or activities…I suppose everything is a chemical response. Yet it feels trancelike.
Idea Quota:
It was fun getting lost driving around Renton Washington. I did find the Renton Farmers Market which I’d never been to before. More importantly, its the idea of “if you don’t get lost sometimes you won’t run into places you’ve never been before.” My daughter and I have a saying… “you can’t find a park you’ve never been to before without going places you’ve never been. Go Get Lost!”
I like this notion of allowing the people that already exist to be the one’s we’ve been looking for.
“We may not find what we think we need, but we definitely will find something new, if we go looking.”
How can the environment effect the changing needs that cultivate a creative space?
Music…Mood…Lighting, Space or work space, fun is playful, inspiring, aligned, exciting, passionate. These are all considerations.
‘Surrender’ and ‘vulnerability’ both have wonderful and confusing uses or definitions.
The idea of safety, no one is really safe. Isn’t this just a mindset of courage, resiliency, and wholeheartedness. Courage is the ability to function well in the environment of feelings of not being safe. How do we cultivate a worldview that we may spread and sustain as part of our culture and consciousness that we simply create with our minds? How far does the consciousness go to create its worldview?
Turning one thing into another. Creative Alchemy?
The side effect or offshoot of one thing is useful for another. Brining two pieces together to make something completely new, novel, original, creative.
The ripple of enthusiasm extend without borders.
Incubation Challenge:
How do we teach to those who are uninterested, uninitiated?