Just Create Something

Business is hard. Processes, meetings, clients, work, schedules, finances, paperwork, time, strategy, hiring, firing, mistakes, ideas.

It’s not all bad. But there are days or moments where it sure feels that way.

There’s a way to make it better.

Remember in school when you had art class and the teacher gave you an A…as long as you tried? Your work was never going in a gallery. But you got an A. A family member might have told you how amazing your artwork was (or still is!).

Imagine if you gave yourself some kid-like success. You can.

Just create something. It doesn’t matter if it is terrible. This article might be terrible. It’s unedited. Besides me going back on my cursor 4-times on this sentence cause I couldn’t punch the keys properly!

That’s the point though. It’s imperfect. Just like that piece of art in 4th-grade art class. But to someone it was perfect. It was everything. Maybe it was a Mothers’ Day gift. Or a gift for someone else. Whoever that someone else was, they loved it. And I bet you loved creating it. You might even like thinking about it right now.

You know, you can still do that. Maybe not in the same way. Or maybe, yeah, in the same way. Actually, I think I am going to give this piece to my mom. She is an artist, after all. She always said there are no mistakes in art. How cool is that! You make a mistake on your taxes, and yeah, that’s a big league problem. Better fix that.

A mistake on a podcast recording. Don’t worry about it. A mistake on a drawing. Even better! A mistake in an article. Easy fix, or whatever, let it be.

And what’s even cooler, this creative thing you are about to do right now (podcast, write an article, take a picture, create a graphic on your computer), it will make you appreciate more the work you are doing. In the book Unlimited Potential by Adam Grant (a book my Aunt gifted me), he even talks about stepping away from your work and accomplishing something else if you are stuck. Go for a walk. Take a picture. Write an article. How do you think I started writing this article? By the way, it might suck. But I bet my mom likes it.

(btw, in this ‘just create something’ piece, there are lots of Grammarly and other notices of errors above. I am not fixing them. Point is, the mistakes aren’t what matters. What matters is this piece was created, gifted, and it got me out of my own way…and that is good).

Here’s to other creators:

The Creative Act by Rick Rubin

Saviors of the Metaverse latest episode as of the time of this article

Kenny Dillingham and the Rising Sun of Arizona State Football