Rediscover Forgotten Dreams, Rekindle your Passion, Renew an Old Relationship
May 31, 2009 by admin
Filed under Design your Life, Making a Difference
Bookstores and the internet are chock full of resources to help you find your passion and rediscover yourself. Most of us over a certain age have shelves lined with “rediscovering yourself in the second half of life” and bookmarked sites for “finding your true direction”. They’re all valuable tools and combined with live workshops and one-on -one coaching, people do often discover what makes them tick and develop a mission. But if you really want to get back in touch with forgotten dreams, the best source is an old friend, someone who knew you before you unlearned what you already knew, before you traded in that innate wisdom for the knowledge of conformity.
I’m not talking about a sibling or life long friend you’ve kept in touch with over the years. Their image of you is who you’ve become. The most valuable source for getting back in touch with your core values is someone you shared secrets and dreams with before you you became the responsible, practical adult who put your own dreams on the back burner. If you’re fortunate enough to renew that relationship, you’ll likely uncover some precious pieces of the YOU that have been eluding you.
In the past year, thanks to the internet, several friends from my youth have contacted me. Since I use social networking sites mainly for business relationships, I don’t expect to see faces from long ago and definitely don’t go searching them out, so it’s a delightful surprise to hear from these long lost friends.
Because I had supportive parents and wasn’t pressured into being something I’m not, I believed I’d stayed pretty true to my core values and hadn’t really lost touch with my dreams. But decades of marriage and motherhood do change our focus and I also put everyone’s happiness and well being ahead of my own. I think it’s genetic programing. Even self actualized, liberated women can lose a piece of themselves while holding together a family. And connecting with people who knew you before career, mortgage and taxes skewed your life view, can trigger memories of buried dreams.
In recent months, I’ve had the fortune of hearing from a childhood friend, a high school buddy and a college room mate, all people I was close to but lost touch with in adulthood. These are people who knew me when listening to my heart and holding fast to my convictions was still a given.
Two weeks ago I returned from “Follow Through Camp” with Barbara Winter, Alice Barry, Sandy Dempsey and my tribe of inspired change agents, fired up to recharge the part of my business I’m most passionate about. As if to confirm that it’s time to focus on that dream, I found in my mailbox a Facebook message from someone I hadn’t spoken with in over 30 years, a friend who knew me when I still thought of myself as an artist, a teacher and saw life as an enormous canvas on which I would color a better world . The most valuable insights have been though late night emails about what mattered then.
I’m not referring to romance here but to two people who are reminding each other of who they each were when making a living, making a life and making a difference was a given not an option.
If you’re fortunate to have had a friend who knew you then, when your goals were to live from the inside out, find that friend. If they don’t offer it up, ask questions. What do they remember you talking about? Do they remember something you got so excited about that you could think of nothing else? Ask then to describe the essence of the YOU they remember.
Short of finding your childhood diaries, this is the sharpest lens on who you were and the most direct road back to finding your true north.
Where Do You Find Inspiration
May 30, 2009 by admin
Filed under What's New?
I heard something today from a friend who I’d previously thought of as a creative entrepreneur. He’s an ad guy so you’d just assume he’s an idea machine, right?. I complimented him on a print piece I’d seen and asked where the inspiration came from. His answer shocked me. He fears running out of ideas. It’s a concept I can’t even fathom, though I’ve heard it from many corporate creatives. Don’t those who make a living by convincing with words and images have a steady stream of inspiration? Not always. While we do get ideas in our sleep and in solitude, if you hang out in your own head all the time, eventually, you become a desert. You’re creative juices dry up.
As my mentor and friend Barbara Winter commented on the adman’s fear of running out of ideas, “That’s scarcity thinking. He doesn’t know that inspiration must be nurtured.”
And that nurturing takes different forms at different time for different people.
When my sister Pam moved to Nashville at 23 to pursue her songwriting career, she signed a contract to spend every Friday in a publishing office on Music Row cranking out lyrics. I couldn’t imagine how she cold be creative in that environment. It’s always been a puzzle to me how employees who have to be creative on demand find inspiration sitting in an office building. . I thought about where my own inspiration came from for paintings and realized it never happened in the studio. That was just where I went to implement.
Think about songwriting. How may lyrics are inspired by new love, lost love or betrayal? The experience that trigger those emotions don’t happen in the cubicle. Creativity, like friendship, needs to be nurtured to thrive, and that nurturing can be both internal and external.
That nourishment for me comes from walking on the beach, though the redwoods or driving on the open road. The ideas flow continuously. The colors, textures and motion feed the idea bank. Not all ideas are born in solitude, thought. In fact, I find watching travelers in airports to be a red hot creative spark. A conversation with a stranger can be a great jump start for inspiration. Visit a preschool class or a farmer’s market and you can’t help but find ispiration. And of course read. A lot. Read about people who’s lives look nothing like your. Have a conversation with a five year old. And an eighty five year old. Watch a foreign film the first time through without reading sub titles.
My favorite, and the most powerful recharger of all is a live workshop. Whether you’re an introvert or extrovert, there’s nothing like the charge you get from being in a room of people with curiosity, enthusiasm and passion. It’s not just about exchange of information. When you put ten entrepreneurs in a room together, the creative energy is palpable. That’s why the concept of a mastermind is so powerful and I’ll be talking about that in future posts.
Even if you’re someone who requires frequent periods of solitude, which I do, you owe it to your business and your art to put yourself in a room with people who “get” you. Not a huge informational conference although some people do find those stimulating. ( I find them so draining and go into information overload quickly. It takes me days to recoup.) I’m suggesting you go to an interactive, live meeting of creative minds where everyone benefits from the exchange of ideas,feedback, brainstorming and problem solving.
Where do you find inspiration? Out in nature, while traveling, on a crowded subway, at a lumber yard? Of course you’re invited to share your sources of inspiration. We’d all love to know what makes you tick .
Is your Craft Business Recession Proof?
May 29, 2009 by admin
Filed under Crafting A Living
A couple of days ago, I read that a share of Jo Anne’s Fabrics stocks nearly triple from a year ago. The national sewing and craft supply retailer reported earnings for first quarter 2009 were up significantly from the same period last year.
Last night I heard from a friend in commercial construction. I was astonished to hear he just closed a deal to build a multi million dollar casino in the midwest.
In my neighborhood coffee shop, a couple shared with me that their high end handmade ice cream and gourmet jerky (yuck) business is thriving, and a neighbor who reps cosmetic medical products tells me her sales figures are up.
You’re probably wondering what face peels, fancy foods and gaming have to do with selling hand made crafts, right? Everything.
While the media is ranting about the economy and we’re seeing stores shut their doors and friends lose their jobs, these businesses are booming.
What do these thriving businesses have in common? Read more
Should You Consign to Galleries?
May 27, 2009 by admin
Filed under Crafting A Living
The question of consignment keeps coming up and while I’ll address it in more detail in the tele-seminar series this summer, let’s touch base on some basics since it’s the time of year to get started.
Assuming you’ve selected the galleries where your crafts will be most compatible, you’ve narrowed down the choices and set up appointments, it’s time to prepare for your meeting.
Show up well prepared with your pieces attractively tagged, with the information we’ve discussed. Price the pieces at retail. Number each piece so that it coincides with a number on your inventory list. (which you will duplicate and leave a copy with the gallery.) Ideally, a thumbnail photograph of each piece next to the number will help you and the gallery owner identify them easily. This doesn’t need to be a high resolution photo, it’s for reference only, not a marketing piece. If your objects are fairly flat, for example jewelry, a simple way to do it is to just place it on your photocopier, scan it and reduce to thumbnail size..
Also, if you have a display that shows your work off well, present the gallery owner with that option. You always want to have display recommendations.
If you are consigning work to gallery far from home, consider asking someone in the area to periodically “shop” the gallery for you. (they are actually your spies.) I can’t count the times I’ve walked into galleries to see a particular artist’s work and it’s nowhere on display. The artist has no idea why he isn’t receiving commission checks and it turns out
Right Now is the Best Time to Get Your Craft in Galleries and Shops
May 26, 2009 by admin
Filed under Crafting A Living
If getting your work into boutiques and galleries is on your agenda, don’t wait another week. This weekend begins the wholesale show season and the likelihood of a gallery or shop owner taking your work on consignment is far greater now than it will be all summer. When retailers return from a wholesale show, they have generally spent their budget for the next few months and are anticipating the delivery of all the crafts they’ve placed orders for and they’re concerned about having space to display it all once it arrives. So, make time this week to connect with your target shops.
There are some great tips on approaching galleries in the “13 Tips” at right so do download them. Good etiquette for approaching owners/buyers is key. If you walk in with a box of our wares, you’ll likely blow your chance of them even taking time to view them. Since you aren’t early enough to mail a brochure, line sheet or info package, second best is Read more
Why you should visit Wholesale Craft and Gift Shows
May 25, 2009 by admin
Filed under Crafting A Living
As we head into the trade show season, even if you aren’t selling your crafts wholesale , you should plan to walk at least one show. If you can only attend one, I wouldn’t recommend you make it a craft show. I know that sounds like a contradiction since you are in the business of crafts but there are a number of reasons to know what’s going on in the general gift wholesale trade. First of course is staying current with trends. Even if you do vintage crafts or very traditional work, it’s still important to keep up with the trends. You also need to know if someone is knocking off your work, having it produced overseas and selling it for a fraction of what you sell it for. The likelihood of of getting the copycat to cease making it is questionable and you obviously aren’t going to lower your prices to compete but you should know that customers are seeing similar work at import prices. You may be able to tweak your line just enough to make it obviously handmade and you definitely will want to have other additional lines that aren’t being seen in mainstream shops.
If you are considering wholesaling your work, visit several different trade shows and as you walk the aisles, notice which booths are busy, who is writing orders. What do the artists who are writing the most orders have in common? Read more
Small Steps Change the World
May 23, 2009 by admin
Filed under Making a Difference
Whether it’s a desire to see a greater effort toward energy conservation, improving literacy or eradicating a crippling epidemic, all it takes to get the movement going is a big vision and a tiny step. The resistance I consistently hear from clients and friends is that they want to do something that makes a difference in the world but feel powerless as one person to make a dent in whatever the issue is. Frequently, a great idea is as far as it gets because they may have a grand vision for social change but are paralyzed by a feeling of overwhelm. True, one person can not change the world without a dedicated tribe of supporters and some of the changes may take more than our lifetime to come about. It’s common sense that nothing will get accomplished if someone doesn’t start it, and that if a lot of people do a little thing, it becomes a bigger thing than the sum of the parts. Let’s look at the example of polio. If one man hadn’t had the determination to keep trying until he developed a vaccine, many of us would not be walking today. And even though no one person can wipe out millions of cases world wide, each of us has the power to vaccinate one child for the price of a postage stamp. Read more
Have you noticed the Green trend in Craft Fairs?
May 21, 2009 by admin
Filed under Crafting A Living
We are deep into the spring craft fair season and daily I learn about festivals that have an eco-conscious section. The 33rd annual Union Street Festival in San Francisco will have a whole section dedicated to crafts created with recycled and sustainable materials and eco-friendly exhibits.
The Eugene, Oregon Saturday market features recycled wares, but that’s no surprise in the “Greenest City”.
There’s the Crafty Feast Indi Fair in Columbia, SC featuring alternative and experimental crafts made from re-purposed materials including handbags made form recycled inner tubes, scrap monsters made from recycled Read more
Have you noticed the Green trend in Craft Fairs?
May 21, 2009 by admin
Filed under Crafting A Living
We are deep into the spring craft fair season and daily I learn about festivals that have an eco-conscious section. The 33rd annual Union Street Festival in San Francisco will have a whole section dedicated to crafts created with recycled and sustainable materials and eco-friendly exhibits.
The Eugene, Oregon Saturday market features recycled wares, but that’s no surprise in the “Greenest City”.
There’s the Crafty Feast Indi Fair in Columbia, SC featuring alternative and experimental crafts made from re-purposed materials including handbags made form recycled inner tubes, scrap monsters made from recycled socks and sweaters, and lapel pins made from recycled ties and vintage buttons.
At Handmade Mart in Silversprings Md., you’ll see recycled hard bound books turned into one of a kind purses, paperbacks repurposed into wallets, and skirts made from re-purposed t-shirts.
At the Annual Haddonfield, NJ Crafts and Fine Art Festival July 11 & 12, you’ll find bracelets made from recycled soda can pull tabs, clocks and lamps made from recycled cookware, jewelry made from recycled silver, antique buttons and bottle caps and quilts from recycled clothing.
According to the artists and crafts people I’ve spoken with, buyers are getting more eco-savvy and starting to appreciate green crafts more.
So, what does this mean for you as an artist? It means if you already have at least part of your line that is made from recycled material or is recyclable, kudos to you. If you aren’t already doing something earth-friendly with your craft, it’s time to get on the green wagon. If you are using toxic substances in the processing of your craft, it’s time to visit alternative materials, both for the environment, your own health and your image.
I’m not suggesting “greenwashing” or going green strictly for marketing purposes. However, it does seem that finally consumers, or at least buyers of handmade crafts, care. They finally get it.
It means that part of your story on your hangtags and promotional material should contain language about how your crafts re-use materials and the benefits to the consumer and the environment. Target your press releases to publications and websites with a more progressive readership and learn to talk about how what you do benefits the universe.
Get into the conversation with conscious consumers and start hanging out with people who care about the footprint they leave on our earth. Put the word out that you will help people dispose of their unwanted items-but be specific. If you do strictly metal art, you don’t want neighbors dropping off used clothing as if you were the Goodwill depot. If you get the word out that you make purses out of old sweaters, you may never have to peruse the thrift shops again.
While everyone is whining about the state of the economy, I find it hopeful that we as a nation are growing more committed to saving our planet.
How has your art changed and what has been your experience with greening your craft? I’d love to hear your green stories and so would our readers.
My Ideal Client is a Social Entrepreneur
May 21, 2009 by admin
Filed under Making a Difference
While discussing my ideas about a new series of “Inspired Livelihood” Workshops that I am planning, Alice Barry asked me who I see as the ideal seminar attendee. This question got me thinking about my ideal client, who I’ve always described as an aspiring entrepreneur who knows her purpose but needs guidance in turning her passions into a profitable business aligned with her values. But there’s more.
I realized that my closest friends and ideal clients share a common mission. They don’t just want to start a business and make a living. They know they are here to make a difference in one life, one community or the world. They are called to be an agent of change and they are ready to start NOW.
“Be the change you wish to see in the world.” Ghandi
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