Innovation has raised human society from caves into castles and condominiums. 
 
Some inventions change the world for a handful of people who make the best use of them, for example tools that help blind people access what they need. Other innovations change the world for all of us, like the mobile networks that allow us to communicate without wires. If being non-telepathic was a disability, this Wi-Fi and cell-phone stuff would be irrelevant to most of us. In the previous posts I talked about human creativity and in particular, its link to mental health. In the same way that creativity is linked to mental health, it is also linked to innovation. The common thread in both relationships, of course, is the imagination. Unwanted thoughts and feelings come from the imagination. Hypersensitivity to external situations involves a strong emotional response which again is partly based on the imagination as well as from learned experience. Creativity is when the imagination is made real, it’s the process of actualising new thoughts and ideas into some form of action, object, or communication. Mind to matter, the end results can be as varied as the contents of our most vivid imagination.  
 
Innovation is when we use our creative abilities to make something that has value. 
 
Successful innovation occurs when a good idea is met with a good response, then the process of growth and take-up happens in a manner that benefits all. Getting all this right involves a process of critical thinking, communication, and creativity combined. We all have good and bad ideas, and not just when it comes to our end product. The how, why, and when are also important as well as all things in between them. Knowing how to refine the good from the bad in every instance is a matter of having a good critical thinking ability. We have to be able to cross reference results against assumptions, facts, and unknowns. Communication is then vital in making the innovation available to others. People have to know about the project and how to use the project for their own benefit. All three of these things have to be aligned if an innovation is to stand out. Knowing what to innovate requires critical thinking and communication. We need to know what the problems are in a given area and understand the necessary information that we can use to solve them. Then when we create a solution, a first draft perhaps, we need to be able to critically dismiss anything that is unhelpful, superfluous, or wasteful. Having the right vision comes from seeing the scope of the entire environment then knowing where work can be done and why. 
 
Innovation taps into social responsibility. Good innovations build roads to peace and prosperity for everyone.  
 
Because we must understand our environment before we can successfully innovate and apply ourselves, creativity begins when we are young. Young minds are good at learning to begin with, and when we become young adults around 15-25, our minds are ready to absorb much more complex ideas. Not only this, but we also crave alternatives and bigger picture ideas. We like to know how things operate beyond the facade and the front desk then get stuck in with our observations and ideas. It is during this time that the human brain is particularly sensitive to all manner of new ideas, good and bad. This means that we as innovators must act responsibly when feeding fertile fields with our crop. Teaching discernment for good and bad ideas is equally as important as having ideas at all and this is a problem that requires innovative solutions today. Hopefully this journal is working to provide an answer with fully researched and easy to read infomedia like this. 
 
Innovations have lifted billions of people out of poverty over the last 150 years. Since the Industrial Revolution and its microchip replacement, life has become gradually easier for us all as innovations create wealth and opportunity for those with access to them. The amount of information available to us to learn from and use is growing at an equally as fast rate. In the past it was chemical pollution that made our lives miserable, and these days we find a real problem with mental pollution. Bad ideas get just as much headroom as good ones with the modern communication sphere. If we are not given the correct tools so we can discern between the two, we can’t tell if we’re learning something of value or something costly.  
 
The first step to innovation is to identify a problem at its source. 
 
Finding a problem doesn’t always require creativity. You can be following the instructions to the letter and still find an issue that requires a creative solution. Maybe something went wrong in the previous process or perhaps the process itself is at fault. If you want to ensure the problem doesn’t persist, knowing the root cause is the key issue. This requires an in depth understanding of what it is you’re trying to achieve. Imagine trying to fix a submarine without ever setting foot in one or being told about the problem. Trying to innovate without an innate knowledge of your subject is setting yourself up to fail.   
 
We can’t be an expert in everything, and we can’t keep on top of every new addition to the information on any subject. Not only do we draw on the media given to us from experts and those with experience, but we also hand ourselves over to peers in our field who share in the desire to solve genuine problems. Collaboration results in a pooling of creativity and a sharing of intellectual resources in order to maximise the efficiency of everyone’s innovation. To isolate yourself and be creative in a bubble is to ensure your project will be devoid of many valuable insights and boosts. It’s also unlikely to help anyone apart from yourself when true innovation is able to achieve a lot more for the world.  There is nothing wrong with making art for the sake of enjoying yourself, but if you want to innovate, make a difference, and maybe make some money as well, you’ll be better off with a network around you.  
 
A non-fixed mindset is essential for collaborative innovation. 
 
When dealing with both new ideas and new people and their ideas, we need to keep an open mind. By always drawing on the certainties and the habitual answers, we will always find ourselves with the same set of issues. If we want to make value from the issues instead of cost, we have to be able to adjust our attitude towards what we think in favour of what could be. Answering the question can mean forgetting the answer and finding it out again. This is especially true for complex systems in which any tiny discrepancy can lead to wild swings in the final result.  
 
Chaos theory is a great example of how tiny changes can create huge differentials in the field of available answers. In life there are many constant unknowns, things we can never know and things that change regularly. People can express all kinds of behaviours and opinions depending on who they are, what mood they are in, what happened to them that day, and so on. Nature works in the same way, every little event in the wide world is a seemingly random occurrence based on the application of countless other random actions. Accepting that the world works like this on every level makes it seem clear that we must be able to let go of what we think is going to happen and look for certainties through test and repetition.  
 
Innovation is the process of improvising with the current situation and the available options until you find something of value. Then the idea is to replicate the process so that you can achieve consistent results for yourself and everyone else. You can then create a guide and an intellectual study of your processes so that others can work with it for themselves, building on your ideas in the application of new tools and ideas as they emerge. We can use what we know already from the innovations and observations of those who worked before us and then map the heavens according to our interpretations of this information. In astronomy, scientists assume the distances to stars and galaxies by manner of measuring certain quantities that are known to be static across the universe. By using a formula, the apparent brightness of an object of known brightness can tell us how far away it really is. We can do this because we understand how brightness is affected by distance. In the same way, we can find a way to discover new concepts and problems to solve by using what we have observed and drawing lines of best fit to what the possibilities can be.  
 
Passion, purpose, and profit all drive innovation. 
 
In life the majority of us are motivated by financial rewards. Unless we are particularly lucky, we require a healthy income to survive. Poverty is a brutal motivator, it’s nature’s barbarian. Sometimes we can get stick from people for working for money on something that benefits others, it’s neurotic and you have to brush it off as bitterness. In a privileged lifestyle we can afford to volunteer our time and give things away for free. Please don’t hold it against the rest of us for asking for something in return. Innovation is a particularly difficult thing to make a living from. To have the ability to carry it through to its conclusion, it's often that we need a passion for what we’re doing and a sense of purpose that transcends the financial reward. A real sense of care about our project has to be present to keep us going when nothing seems to be working out at the time. If the vision is clear and the method is well-researched, sometimes things have to get ugly before they get beautiful.  
 
Alongside motivation, the other essential ingredient is to innovation is education. Our imagination draws on things we have already seen or experienced. It can alter and recreate, change perspective and apply metaphor, yet even the most abstract imaginary scene contains known colours, known shapes, known ways of movement, known physics. Perhaps many little things allow it to be dynamic and surreal, like a Salvador Dali, yet the basic rules remain. Up is up, joy is joy, red is red, light is light. In order to make something valuable from our complex and abstract imagination, we have to be able to wind thread from the raw wool of our dreams. Our spinning wheel is our ability to think and apply knowledge from every area that touches our idea. Innovation requires a broad knowledge of science, mathematics, and technology because it is the process of engineering processes with the tools available to measurable degrees that brings hardware to the software of our ideas. Innovation also requires the humanities because we have to understand the people we are serving and finding solutions for, to the extent that we are a joy to do business with and engage in collaboration. We know more about our market when we study history, literature, music, politics, and language. Sociology is the science of applying the humanities to real-world processes and innovations. It is essential to know what you’re doing before you do it, so getting a grip on these subjects is as essential as the sciences.  
 
Innovation means change and people resist change by nature.     
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Although innovation brings opportunity and prosperity to many, it can also bring hardship and stress for others. The way we feel about the life we live can dramatically affect our perception on the changes we are given. If we want change, then it’s not so difficult to apply it. If we are content as things are or are confident that we can bring things to a head without any extra help, then additional concepts and tools can become tiresome and a pain. Often, we naturally shun things we don’t immediately understand in fear of being duped. Perhaps we’re not so confident in our ability to discern a fake and a real opportunity. Maybe the shame of falling for some kind of scheme is a fear that prevents us from trying any scheme at all. The real work of innovation is in the provision of a motivation and incentive that works. Too much stick and you meet resistance, too much carrot and you meet entitlement. In life we have many sticks that so far can’t be avoided, finding the people willing to adopt your innovation is about finding the ones who are getting the stick the most. Even then, some people are so attached to their suffering that given the option to change, they still prefer the same old stick. The people who are most likely to adopt new ideas, find the value in new tools and processes, and see the real-world progress in the use of new services, are the ones who are wired to learn and find these alternative ideas. It’s the young. This is why, as creators and innovators, we must be especially careful when we inspire, motivate, and educate people in this malleable stage of life.  
 
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It’s a common-sense rule of thumb that we seem to accept without much thought. Creativity and madness go hand in hand. But is this true? How do we know? And is it right to make such broad statements about people we have never met? A lot of work has gone into finding these answers, and although we may never completely understand how the brain works in relation to personality, we can study behaviour and mental processes with different types of scientific inquiry. This means refusing to accept the assumptions in favour of hard evidence. In something as intangible as the personality, finding the root of anything may be like draining the ocean with a sieve.  
 
We can make a lot of individual observations and then build a larger picture from the jigsaw of information we find. Obviously, we cannot fully understand a thing until we have the whole picture, and this may never be reached, so scientific inquiry must reach into logical hypothesis to complete the process. New information may disrupt these logical assumptions over time so it’s always vital to make the facts and the hypothesis separate, so people know what to look at and what to use. Science is defined by its repeatable nature and with all mental health cases everyone is a unique individual. This poses another problem. Like with quantum mechanics, the mind can be seen as something that expresses potentials rather than known quantities. Perhaps this is because of the quantum effects of brain function or maybe it’s a convergent evolution of principles, independent of quantum mechanics.  
 
As human beings we have tastes and passions. When it comes to creative art such as painting or literature, the desire is usually to find something to our taste and to invigorate our passions. We also tend to prefer art that has a deep emotional connection that we can become a part of in the experience. We like to be moved in some way so shown something so interesting and fascinating that it really makes us think. Suffering is something that is particularly interesting in all our media. In problem solving we need to know how the suffering is affecting people, in drama we don’t get a story without dilemma and personal risk, in art we want to see through the eyes of someone else and know their intimate thoughts. We also have a morbid fascination for suffering, we enjoy learning about horrible things that have happened in the past and in the modern day.  
 
For someone who experiences a lot of mental suffering, and has the ability to create from this resource, their work has a potential to be sought after. They can direct it in any setting, and provided they can find a use for their scope of imagination and experience, they can find a purpose and a meaning in life by expressing their mind. Turning a debilitating condition into something of value is highly important for a lot of people. Put it in the right packaging and suffering can be highly lucrative. This doesn’t mean that we should make suffering for people for entertainment, it means that those with the right experience sometimes get the right job.  
 
Mania on the other hand is not necessarily about suffering, and yet is completely debilitating for the sufferer. It consists of the person having incontrollable energy levels, racing thoughts, lots of adrenaline, and an out-of-control inner dialogue. In schizophrenia and psychosis, the inner dialogue can become highly intrusive, devoid of reason, and paranoid. This can not only cause huge distress to the sufferer but can be difficult for others to manage. In some cases, when the mania is linked to narcissism or sociopathy, the sufferer can become dangerous. This is because they simply do not have the necessary brain function to stop them from carrying out their unhinged motivations.  
 
In people who suffer with mania, the creativity is often associated with the up phrase of their condition. When the mind is alive and the energy levels are high, the connection between the subconscious and the conscious is at its strongest. The individual is able to navigate these chaotic mental inferences and use them to create imaginative and intelligent ideas. Mania is often linked to symptoms such as reckless abandon and persistent impulses. This combined with the strong connection to the subconscious can result in a huge body of work that receives little attention once it’s been put down. A stream of consciousness style of creation can work well for some, provided they are able to provide enough clarity. For most of us, we have to go through things and make them sound verbally rational. The spontaneous works and ideas that manic people produce are often incredibly vivid and are filled with expressions of urgency. They tend to be striking at first but can lack emotional depth, again, the limited amount of thinking through can be an issue.  
 
In the way that creativity and mental illness are casually linked, the same can be said for creativity and intelligence. We know that it is the people with verbal and literal intelligence who are the most likely to develop some kind of mood disorder. Technically minded people seem to have a greater capacity to manage their thoughts and emotions in ways that prevent serious illness. This points to the fact that those who do suffer with mental health problems to varying degrees are more likely to have higher verbal intelligence overall. This gives them the ability to translate their raw emotion and sensation into some kind of reasonable description that others can relate to. This may be through metaphor of can be a more direct approach. Finding the words is the key. Something else we know about people with both depressive and manic disorders is that they have a propensity to daydream. The distraction offered by unwanted thoughts and feelings can be enough to take the attention away from the present moment and into an inner environment.  
 
It has been shown that mental health problems do run in families and the causes are at least partially genetic. This means that the brain itself holds many answers as to the issue and not the choices and personality of the individual. At the same time, people with neurological disorders can often be found to have creative members of the family. The act of being creative is often a release and a cure for any unwanted mental states and it could be that the two are linked but expressing themselves differently.  
 
When all of this is said, it is vital to appreciate that having a mental health condition is never somehow a blessing. It may be that it is linked to creativity, but there are plenty of creative people who are not mentally unwell. In fact, most are not. And the same can be said for mentally unwell people, they’re not all creative. Again, most are not. What can be said is a higher proportion than normal can be found in both groups, to the extent that it deserves further study. Artists and writers are also statistically more likely to die by suicide or through the actions of mania. They are more likely to struggle with addiction and have trouble holding down work and family units. It’s not a beautiful path to be romanticised, however creativity might be a great way to make the most of one’s issues in a way that hurts no-one and has the potential to help or at least inspire someone else.  

Mental health problems affect 1 in 4 of us at some point in our lives, according to the World Health Organisation. If you want to be able to be a source of empowerment and wellness for those around you or even for yourself, then here is a course in understanding Depression, Anxiety, and CBT, from Reading University. Free and paid options available. ​

Not all of us are creative people, and some of us are a lot more creative than others. It’s also known that you can’t teach creativity to people who are not inclined to be creative. It’s akin to asking a goldfish to climb a tree. It’s just not going to be able to do it, no matter how many times you explain it. Understanding the theory is one thing but putting it into practice requires a particular type of mind that enables this ability. So, what is going on in the brain that means one person can think creatively and another person cannot? And why are some people so creative that asking them to do things that require none is like a prison for them? What do we know? 
 
Unfortunately, most of the research done on the brain is instigated because of illness. This is because curing people is a lot more important than finding out how healthy people do what they do. With a subject like neurobiology, the expertise and funding are limited. It’s understandable that priorities mean the sick get the first attention. However, we also know that creative people often have mental health problems. This means it has coincided that creative people have been studied in detail because of their illness. Not all creative people get ill, so we can’t say that we know the entire story, but both creativity and mental illness come from the same system, so we know they are linked in some way. How close the link is will be the basis of further study.  
 
Why do creative people have a higher predetermination for mental illness? It’s more likely for them, so there must be something in the brain that makes the path to problematic thinking more viable. Why do non-creative people tend to not struggle so much with mental health? What is protecting them from the turmoil of an out-of-control mental state? The clear difference between sane and non-sane thought can put a barrier between individuals and when a person is unable to empathise with the unexplainable thoughts, it can be hard to help someone in this state. With compassion and tolerance, we can work together and find the right way to move forward. Accepting what they say as true for them and what they experience as a valid one can mean making tough choices about what a person is capable of or not. Only with acceptance and compassion can we find solutions that help people to be their best self in a setting prepared to handle their illness.  
 
But what about people who are not mentally unwell but are creative? What do they do that is analogous to madness and mood disorders? The key is in the ability to perceive things in new ways. The term ‘thinking outside the box’ is put into its best use when talking about creativity. By seeing pathways to ideas and strategies from the available resources that have not yet been identified, we are applying our creative mind. In a mood disorder or a madness, the novel ideas are wrong. In a creative person, they are right. Being able to distinguish between the two is the fundamental difference between creativity and madness. Creative people might have crazy ideas, usually called blue sky thinking, but they know when it needs work. They also have the usual mental blocks that prevent harmful and hurtful thought. It is when these subconscious safeguarding systems go wrong that the mind slips from creativity to insanity. That’s where the acceptance becomes important, denying it will only put a spanner in the works. 
 
It’s not only art where creativity is integral to the work involved. Art is often an expression of pure creativity with only a formal veneer of technique and method to make it viable for one style or another. Academic subjects also require creativity. Every invention, new idea, technique, personal plan, and more requires a set of mental processes that are completely unique. When a mathematician solves a complex formula or writes down a new one, they are using their creative brain to find the result. You need to apply the sense of process and trial and error with associated ideas based on intuition. That’s how creative ideas are nurtured.  
 
What motivates creative people? Why are they prepared to go into new realms of thought when there is so much out there already? Surely, it’s a lot of effort and with people thinking you might be mad, is it worth it? It does seem that creative people have a sense of social magnanimity. A selfless desire to make things better one way or another is what separates a creative person from say a poser or a mad person. When you care about society and other people as individuals and are motivated to assist with creative ideas, even if they don’t work, you carry an altruistic sense of service that some of us simply don’t have. By nurturing this sense of service by self-managing your ventures and enterprises, you can find sustainable and viable ways to apply your creative mind.  
 
Another motivation for creativity is as a cure for a sad mood. Sometimes if we are unhappy or emotional in uncomfortable ways then we choose creative methods to help. Painting, writing, making sculpture, or planning a brilliant idea might be just the ticket to getting out of one frame of mind and into another. Because creative people are more likely to have problems with low mood, it’s often the case that the desire to create is both motivated by a self-actualisation and a selfless sense of purpose. This duality can be hard to manage when a lot of what creative people do is rejected and mocked by the undiscerning public. It’s only when something becomes successful and well-known that most people begin to pay attention. Reaching the people that matter means taking risks and trusting your instincts of association.  
 
People who choose creativity as a lifestyle either in a job or as a serious hobby are often more tolerant to risk factors. To do something novel and unvalidated by trusted authority is a brave demonstration of individual merit. Putting your faith in the opinion of untrained and unprepared minds means putting your faith in your own idea. If it fails it can be a real blow, especially if it’s your livelihood on the line. To people who are highly creative, this doesn’t matter as much. Some of us would rather sit quietly and follow instructions to get everything as it ought to be. The idea of failure or major mistakes on their record is too much. To be able to bypass this sense of anticipated dread creative people can disassociate with the temporary opinions and bubbles of emotion that follow them. Look at politicians, they have practically half their home nation undermining their every move. Do they let it stop them? They just get on with the job. Having a blind spot for the antisocial effects of poor opinion is a skill that requires confidence in your own ability to make good judgements. 
 
The downside to the creative mindset is that because of the poor opinions of others and the judgements of their ideas being associated with their character, many people find it difficult to tolerate and accept them. As soon as a person is known for doing something that is not yet validated by social consensus, a lot of people are not prepared to accept or identify with those who create them. This leads to isolation and social exclusion, which can be a cruel and lonely place to find yourself in. When you make it as a creative person, and you have proven yourself with a viable and sustainable idea, some people still find it difficult to accept because of wariness. Because they can’t understand the journey to where they are, they imagine boundaries and fiery swords that make a difference. They don’t exist.  
 
What do we know about the difference between creative people and non-creative people when carrying out mental tasks? The brain has been studied in various ways with different tasks being conducted with scanners. This gives a physical representation of the biomechanical process that represents the individual’s thoughts. When people think creatively, the mind either has ordered thinking or chaotic thinking. Those of us who can apply ordered thought when applying novel and juxtapositioned ideas are more likely to find the solution from the given information. Those of us who think chaotically when assessing the information are less likely to find creative solutions. This is something that can’t often be helped, as the subconscious mind is the governor of this method. Because we are not conscious of this process, we have no direct control over it.  
 
In fact, creative mental processing has been shown to be genetic in origin. In the same way that mood disorders and sanity disorders can run in families, the traits that lead to creative thinking can also be traced in this way. The subconscious mind is the source of all our ideas, and it is in our conscious processing that we sift through the information and find the correct thought or response. Usually, the subconscious offers something we understand and know from experience.  Creative people can take abstract associations and imaginative uses for things that they have already learned. This is the boundary that gets broken for something to be new. The application of something known to something else known but so far unconnected is how inventions begin. For our subconscious mind to offer these strange connections, it must be able to communicate from the non-linear side of its process and have a conscious non-linear process that can meet it.  
 
To be able to directly link the conscious with the subconscious mind, the conscious mind needs to be relatively quiet. In the rest state, the subconscious mind is given the energy it needs to begin administrating the information it has received and linking it to everything it already knows. This happens all at once with no sense of hierarchy. That means the non-linear amalgam of processing can be confusing to the stable and linear process. This is why some people find it chaotic and hard to work with. To be able to remain stable in conscious processing and accept the subconscious prompts at a metered rate, the creative mind can access this chaotic and inspirational resource.  
 
This means the creative process can’t just take place automatically. The mind must be fully stocked with the resources it needs to build something new. Like playing Minecraft, you can’t craft until you have mined. This means that we must learn about the things we want to create for.  Even a painter must learn about their technique and style, finger painting included. To make something of value that appeals to the people it is designed for, we must learn a lot of skills and gain a lot of experience in the field before we can begin. It is in the creative combination of every skill we have learned and every association we have gathered that we can plot unique and fitting lines between them that leave people feeling rewarded and not confused.  
 
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Wealth generation is not just about getting rich. Wealth means an abundance of a valuable thing. This could be financial, and yet it could equally be emotional, social, or educational. Tying these things together to filter into a financial reward is the only way of keeping it sustainable, and sustainable wealth is the only kind that really matters long-term. By working together, creating, funding, paying for, promoting, and supporting, we can elevate sustainable wealth in all parts of our community, across the world. The cycle of profit and innovation will turn as always and if we can get on board, we can play a part in what it will look like in days, months, and years to come. Getting involved is how to boost the wealth of the community in your own way, and finding ways to make it work for you is how you boost wealth for your own family. The balance is struck in the models you apply to your efforts and communication.  
 
Sustainability means that for as long as there is demand, you can supply. Not only that, but it also means that the rewards you receive account for the cost of delivering the service and a wage for everyone involved, including yourself. This can be reached when the customer begins to rely on your product or service and are prepared to do what it takes to have it on supply. Finding something to offer that is important enough, either practically or emotionally, and offering it in such a way that benefits everyone, is how to best position your skills and talents. When this has happened, and it happens all the time with brands and businesses across the table, sustainable wealth is created.  
 
Of course, breaking into the world of innovation and business is not as simple as having a few good ideas. It is a long process and one that requires us to take many risks. We must be confident in our abilities and skills but not arrogant or narcissistic. We need to know we are good enough but appreciate that plenty of other people are also good enough. Once this emotional hurdle is behind you, you can set about beginning an honest and well-made business. To get on the radar, you need to tick some mental boxes. People only pay attention to something they are interested in. People only buy things they want or need. If no one is interested in your service or the work that you do, then you’ll not find anyone to sell it to.  
 
What matters a lot in the marketplace are things that change the marketplace. Things that have not been done or offered before are what interest people the most. Things that have a clear benefit to the customer and society that you can justify your profit margin with are defensible business models. A solution to a problem that a customer has that is more efficient and more suitable is disruptive and new. These things are what people look for when choosing to spend money or even stop blocking ads for a particular site like this one. (Google wants to pay me for offering a service to them and in return readers like you get free and easy to read education like this). 
 
A lot of businesses tick these boxes and only get so far, they don’t make it past the small turnover or semi-professional status. Reaching out to the wider world involves appreciating that the wider world is a complex and unfamiliar place. As an authority in the terms of your creative business, people will have their own emotional baggage that makes it hard for them to connect with you. Everything that people “know” about business leaders and salespeople stands in your way like a black knight who just won’t listen. To expand your work and reach further than your own arm span, it’s necessary to plug into other businesses and services. When you plug in to a business or service as a business or service, you must be able to reverse the connection at the same time, resulting in a mutual benefit for a mutual sharing of work. It is in the power of networks that we can grow even further. This means the insecurities that lead to feelings of competitiveness need to be addressed before you can move on. 
 
For the plug to connect in both directions, and for your use of business to equal use for your business, your product and service needs to become a platform for other innovators to use to their benefit. This leads to a natural expansion that brings more potential customers and further reach. Creating a natural cycle of work that results in wealth creation and service improvements for all is how to build a business model that is truly sustainable and defensible. Finding the right needs and the correct level of priority is how to become profitable and necessary for other businesses to utilise. The process of building dependencies involves becoming reliable and trusted as well as efficient and necessary. 
 
Identifying a need for a solution requires an understanding of certain processes and workflow systems that others go through. Having the opportunity to identify pain points in a particular aspect of life and work requires an experience or an instruction on something that you’re interested in. By playing a part in your area of life you will have the option to look for certain pressure points and pain points that you can find solutions to and get rewarded for applying. A business model that finds a repeating problem and offers an efficient and reliable solution for a price that outweighs the alternative in attractiveness will find many footholds in its chosen industry and beyond.  
 
Needs come in a variety of shapes and sizes. The priority level of a need depends on how the lack of its fulfilment affects the future and the present moment. If a person needs something right now, it is a high priority, rather than if they need something at some point, when it is a relatively low priority. Positioning yourself in the right now bracket is how to make your service or product immediately attractive. We assign needs according to how urgent they are, critical needs are the ones that make a significant difference to us if they are not met. Nice needs are needs that we’d like to be fulfilled but are prepared to put off for another day. A lot of things are nice to some but critical to others. Hunger, for example, defines how critical a food purchase would be. We all have moods and external circumstances that change what we consider a priority at any given time. Positioning yourself in a way that finds people when you are their priority is about understanding who you are selling to and why.   
 
Needs can be urgent, latent, or aspirational. As mentioned, urgency is often relative however some products are always considered urgent. Municipal services and healthcare services are needed all the time, a lot of people have complete dependencies on other services that they’d be vulnerable and isolated without. A latent need is one that could be considered urgent but only if it suits you. The new perfume that you must have, for example, may seem urgent to you and it might well be, however it’s more about desire than anything else. If given the choice between the perfume and life-saving care, you’d choose the care.  Aspirational needs identify a person’s desire for the future and help them feel more able to fulfil it. These can be financial, educational, or some other personal investment. All these needs are opportunities to create wealth by adding genuine value. By taking responsibility for solving the problem identified, you are in your right to take payment for that service.  
 
Having a foothold in the market is a great first step however the market doesn’t stay the same for long. New technologies emerge, and they present new opportunities for business. With new applications of new technology there comes new problems and efficiencies that can be utilised. To save time and resources by providing efficiency the customer finds the resources to offer an effective return. This balance is met when the product or service outweighs the need to hold onto the return. Finding the needs that markets have and determining what your solutions are worth to them can be difficult, however when you talk to potential clients these things can be pinned down over time.  
 
To be able to command a price that looks attractive to yourself and those who are invested in your progress, your product or service must meet a need with a degree of urgency that presents as an opportunity rather than a chore. In this way you’re providing a genuinely valuable resource to those who want to become customers. Because we all have unique skills and abilities, our needs vary across departments and social circles. One department is usually specialised into one or two aspects and so other aspects need an outsourced flow to satisfy the need. By connecting yourself as a departmental expert in a situation that has a strong demand you can become an essential tool for business. Honing this into a service that can be defined and sold is all about delivery and positioning.  
 
When you deliver your creative idea in a setting there are a lot of things you must be aware of. To get any interest in your hard work you need to connect with people who don’t know you and have no real social contract with you. Your offering is supposed speak to them on a level that cuts through the automatic busybody routine most of us are in these days. Positioning requires an understanding who your ideal customer is. By focusing on the ideal customer, we can reach the most potential with what we have to offer. Like the bullseye of a target, the whole circle of potential radiates from this central spot.  So, you need to decide who this ideal customer is.  
 
Is your creative idea meant for other businesses, like internet services, so they can do their job better? Is your solution meant for the public, like jam, so anyone can make use of your offering? Or is your solution meant for society, like a free further education initiative, so the benefits reach beyond that of the user? If you can identify one or two main customers and define them as people, in a non-intrusive yet definitive way, you can design your delivery to meet their needs. If the problems can be defined and the solutions can be offered in a way that identifies with the one who experiences them, the service will seem attractive. Then, by operating in a way that provides a solution, efficiency, and reliability, your service will be able to provide value and create wealth for the whole community, including you.  
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​Essential reading: Entrusted: Stewardship For Responsible Wealth Creation
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Everything changes, the world never stands still. Human society, as an extension of the world, is also in perpetual flux. The way we do things and the things we do change all the time, over the decades new technologies and new motivations produce new behaviours. With all of this undiscovered mental landscape, there is an infinite space to grow, explore, expand, and dissect. We can be pioneers on the edge of development, assisting humanity on its journey towards tomorrow. Creative leadership takes the power of this continual change and finds ways of making all of our lives better through novel applications. The arts and the sciences work together to bring about fresh experience and utility that strengthen our communities and improve our personal lives.  
 
What does exploring the landscape of human innovation and social evolution look like? It’s not the same as setting off on a journey to unknown mountains. It’s only when we use this example as an analogy or a metaphor that is begins to make sense. We can draw new maps and mark them with descriptions of what we can expect, here be dragons, only we do it through experimentation and application. Making little changes to one thing at a time is how it begins but this looks much like walking out of the door and to the garden gate. A real explorer goes much further than this, and they will risk getting completely lost for a while. Knowing how to get back to where you started is a necessary tool for any adventure, but you also need to lose sight of the shore.  
 
It begins with a little experiment; we ask ourselves what would happen if I did this. We notice the effect that we cause, and we try to understand the dynamic observed. This can be with making art, with the effects being aesthetic and communicatory, or with technology and the effects of new devices in new situations. Once we have discovered a little change in a little place that we think is beneficial in some way, we can begin putting it into practice. Honing the technique and preserving the philosophy that motivated the idea, we can create a set of instructions that produce the desired change without any need for experiment. Fool-proofing these instructions and making plans for every contingency takes a formulative effort in the initial exploratory and adventurous stage.     
 
It is only once we have explored the options and mastered the process required that that act of expansion and implementation can fruitfully take place. The formula is not a secret recipe we can write down, but a certain mindset and routine that ensures the results are as the process requires. When the experiment is over and the outcome is lucid, it’s simply a matter of making it happen. Now the adaptation to the process, the idea, the application, is ready to meet the world. Putting something into positive action is the next stage of applying your creative problem solving to the given situation. A creative leader isn’t content with one application in one setting for their idea, they see value in providing solutions to a raft of individuals who have a similar problem or desire that they want to be fulfilled. It’s good for them, for other people, and it’s good for the economy.  
 
The world at large is made up of human networks. These networks are governed not only by legal and social rules but by the emotions of everyone involved. To collaborate with others, it is important to always be mindful of all these things. A blockage in legal terms, social terms, or emotional terms can be fatal to your project and the positive benefits it could have provided. To build on our idea, solution, brand, creative piece, we must be able to communicate effectively with the networks necessary for this to happen. Positioning and presentation work together with personality to create an over-all public facade that symbolises the true big picture behind the image. If there are incoherencies or crossed wires, then the social and emotional rhetoric will not be effective. If you forget the legal side and do not make room for this then others will be wary of you as they don’t want to be involved with things that break the law. Finding creative ways to implement the necessary requirements and presenting yourself and idea in a true to life branding is another instance of trial, error, technique building, and application.  
 
The aspects of creative leadership often branch off into three distinguishable areas. Resourcefulness, reactivity, and inventiveness. Resourcefulness is not just making the most out of what’s available, it’s about expanding what’s available in creative ways. Finding new solutions to new problems in the cheapest and most effective way on the way to implementing a larger solution is how creative resourcefulness becomes important. Using tools in ways that work safely regardless of their original intention is how we apply things in creative ways and increase our level of resource. Reactive creativity is all about how we solve immediate problems with immediate answers. Often, we can partially or even completely solve an issue with a snap decision that uses what is immediately available. If we can do this in creative and useful ways that becomes a resource for others, then we become very useful to have around. Inventiveness, of course, is all about seeing new ways to do things with what we have around us. It is about seeing the uncommon but never-the-less correct answer in the equation of many answers. To do this we need a level of confidence in our own ability to perceive, understand, and digest relevant information and disregard the irrelevant information that may be tied into the original yet now obsolete purpose.  
 
Making use of these aspects of creativity is how we can relate well with all the different types of people that will stand on our path to development. To become an effective leader with a positive toolset to bring to the table, we need to be influential, useful, and safe. In the grand scheme it is not enough to be a unit, we need to be a conductor of the surrounding environment, making positive waves and bringing about clarity within the settings given to us. Because we are all individuals, we all have different personalities that need to be worked with and not against. Getting along with people is an artform on its own, considering the way others feel, think, behave, and want. To implement creativity to the social scene, we need to be able to relate to others in such a way that leaves them feeling good about themselves. If we make people feel negative, then they will associate us and our ideas with that negative feeling. We don’t want that.  
 
Because people are all unique and complex systems, the art of human interaction is never to be taken lightly or for granted. Art is about the blend of creativity and technique in each situation that presents the most appropriate outcome. Pure creativity pays no attention to rules and systems, and pure technique pays no attention to novelty and little changes. We need to be able to find a balance between these two extremes to relate with others on a level they feel safe and confident with.  It is only when others feel safe and confident with us that they will seriously investigate anything we have to offer. Every person is different and we will have to adjust our balance of creativity and technique to effectively govern our relationships. Formalities and playfulness all play their part in our social relationships and to make the most out of those in our networks, we need to be able to find the correct approach for the people around us and the market we intend to build into. A sense of empathy and an ear for genuine listening are your most important tools, rather than second guessing and over-ruling, we must be able to address individuals on face value, like that of a genuine coin, if we are to ascribe genuine value to our relationships.  
 

Standing out from the crowd is counter to our subconscious program. We are a prey animal as well as a hunter, so human beings have evolved to be safe and to stay part of the group. So, when we do something unusual or something that makes us stand out, we immediately become a target for would-be predators who need a target to focus on. In large groups, people are uninteresting and hard to reach. When you identify one person who has a good idea, that desire to be heard can be used and abused. This is a genuine reality, and many of us prefer to keep our heads down and carry on with what ever is given to us. Lack of confidence to fend off the predators can be a creativity killing sensation. We usually identify it as pride, shame, nerves, or some other common affliction. It can be whittled down to fear, in the end.
 
It's not just standing out from the crowd that makes creativity dangerous. There are many other problems that arise from this direction of thought. It all begins in the chaos of the unknown. To be creative or artistic is to push back the boundary of chaos and replace it with sensation, ration, likeness, and order. Painting a picture or writing a story takes elements of the infinite human experience and makes them solid and tangible, something everyone can relate to. Exploring this unknown darkness is courageous because we open our minds to the depths of our own imagination. A spiral of thought can carry us up, down, or away, with ideas linking in with symbolical meanings and loose translations that fit the emotional background.
 
Not everyone is able to create something useful or applicable from this depth of the unknown. It requires a confidence to continue and an instinct for the right direction when there are no maps or streetlights to help. Like an unchallenged landscape, the natural state of the chaotic and unordered human imagination is a huge story of choices and morality. The sense of being alive and enthralled with a story can be pulled like string from the swirling silo of personal inspiration. The art we create shows us the possible realities of mind and the metaphorical stories that connect and divide us. Manifesting a genuine piece of the world from a poignant or abstract idea that only previously existed in the mind is a huge challenge.
 
Like science, art and creativity make the world more tolerable and enjoyable, safer, and more fulfilling. Unlike science, in which the order of the world is used to make something useful, the arts take the chaos of the world to make something useful. In the sciences, it’s imperative that instructions are followed, and method remain identical throughout the entire regime. This is counter productive to creativity, in which subtle and major changes take place as the uniform behaviour. To apply scientific thinking to the art of creativity, the focus can be shifted from the individual to their process and habits. In this way, artists are often dehumanised and utilised for their textbook worth rather than celebrated as human beings who did something amazing. To be creative means to accept one’s fate to be objectified by many.
 
Although it’s possible to teach creativity by means of psychology, methods, history, sociology, and so on, the mental background for a creative person is something natural in them and cannot be replicated in others. Some of us have next to no creative ability and some of us have an excess of it. Creativity can be nurtured like a seed, but we cannot plant the seed. It’s a factor of genetics and early years nurture. Non creative people often do not want to be creative so it’s not necessarily an issue. It does become an issue when non creative people treat themselves as the standard and try to stifle differences in others. It’s important to encourage daydreaming and imaginative play during childhood so as they grow the adult can access the power of their inventiveness. 

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​Creativity is all about realising our desires. We want a result, we have some tools, and we use what we have to create the situation we were looking for. It’s a sign of creative intelligence to be able to do this, and many animals have the ability too. The process of telling a story via a series of processes that result in something new is not innate to humans, although complex syntax and abstract thought seems to be so, for now. The ability to achieve a favourable circumstance from what is available and within the rules takes the mind of a creative person unless a clear path is already laid out. Someone else’s creativity might be the answer, or else you’ll need to think of your own. Standing out from the crowd with an unusual solution can bring on new problems that we didn’t envisage or plan for.
 
When society or nature presents a problem that has no immediate solution for the group or the individual, a creative approach is necessary. Entire generations can go by without an effort to work through certain problems we face, however when artists begin to make these problems part of our regular language and imagination, society begins to tackle the issues. It requires the work of many people to tackle life’s big problems, but the problem of one person can often be addressed by that one person alone. A creative approach will help us to design a new and successful method that can be applied again. Before we have the approach, one must be invented.
 
This is where we separate the true inventive and creative people from those who just like to stand around in colourful clothes, making predictable statements. A creative and inventive individual will thrive in an environment where problems need solving and experience must be gained. An exhibitionist will want the attention even when there is a problem to solve, and the attention needs to be elsewhere. A sense of vanity and the desire to be recognised as a cut above the rest is not what people pay for when they buy art. They want something that works for them, not the artist. It can be difficult to bring yourself away from the wrong crowd, especially if social capital is at risk. To be able to work successfully on something new and inventive, we need to be free from the wrong kind of influence.
 
The marketplace is the theatre of successful creativity. Even if it’s a play, someone must buy it, invest in it, put their time into producing it, and then putting on a show. They’re not just buying the play; they’re buying weeks or months of dedication and work. To be successful as an artist or an inventive problem solver, we need to be able to demonstrate that what we offer really is worth the time, energy, and effort involved in applying it. Let’s say it’s a book, reading a book takes time, it puts images and ideas in the mind that were not there before. Is this a good idea? Is it worth money? These are the questions that the marketplace asks. Creative and new things are risky, because there is little evidence as to their value as an investment.
 
This is where standing out from the crowd is necessary, and the further out we go, the more likely we are to be noticed. Being noticed is a risk because we invite positive and negative interaction from the world at large, criminals, crazy people, buyers, superfans, the whole world. Again, the further away from the normal we go, the less likely that others will have a mental map of what we are for or what we do. To be able to recognise something as valuable or interesting takes an imagination unless it’s been previously stated. People with small imaginations find it very difficult to determine if something novel is a good or a bad idea. Some of us are completely blind to creativity and have no inner method of relating things that we do not already recognise. We need to be told exactly what something is and what it is for. When marketing creativity, it’s important to keep all these things in mind.
 
If getting your creativity out into the world at large is something you've been working on, then make use of this free course in creative and progressive leadership from Alternative Fruit.
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Sanity is often used as a relative term. We define something as sane when it conforms to the various standards that we expect from something in its situation. The problem with creativity, then, is that to change the normal into something different, we run the risk of being judged as insane or just plain old crazy. The perceptions of the masses are usually the only difference between sanity and creativity, with the imaginations of those around us being the judge and final decision maker. If they can’t think of a way something is useful to them, or interesting in any way, then the result is often a bad reception. 

A creative genius is someone who uses their creative intelligence to improve the lives of those around them in a substantial way. This could be scientific or artistic with both venues offering great audiences who eagerly await the new and novel idea. When we use our creativity to change something in a way that makes a difference, we run a genuine risk of making things worse. This is the line between insanity and creative genius, where the result really matters on how we are remembered. 

The reason creative people are tolerated in society when the risks are apparent is that creative process is the way human society progresses. The act of making little changes to a process or design is akin to evolution making little changes to genetics through cross-pollination and mutation. The cross-pollination and mutation of human thoughts are the driving force of creative change. This form of reverse entropy is a reflection of life’s very own principle of maintaining a chemical imbalance in order to carry out necessary functions that exceed the energy required for homeostasis. The overflow of human energy is then used to produce a variety of changes and adaptations that will be tested according to their worth and their immediate surroundings. 

It has been shown, especially in art, that a profound madness can become a funnel for astounding creativity. The paintings and poetry of the mad are popular now and have been for generations, with crazy ideas and insane perspectives and interpretations taking the lead over our usual humdrum and bourgeoise thoughts. Richard Dadd, Edvard Munch, Vincent Van Gogh, Louis Wain, and many more artists are well-known for episodes of insanity. Even science figures like Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein are known for having problematic mental health. Genius and madness are often linked. In order to have a ground-breaking idea that shifts the rules of how we go about our lives, we need to have an element of creativity that most others do not.

Madness and creativity have a link in the phenomenon of apophenia. This is a type of psychosis that results in seeing patterns and hallucinating because of seemingly unrelated causes. A creative mind will naturally draw correlations between loosely connected principles in a sometimes playful or sometimes observant manner. This can become a form of madness when the patterns and imaginations become irrational and counter to the everyday functioning of life. It can result in the subconscious mind becoming closer to conscious thought, with dreams and non-sensical images making their way into the rational consciousness, affecting the way we feel and think. Prone to suggestion and control, people who suffer from serious apophenia can be a risk to others and themselves. It has been shown that apophenia can also be a precursor to psychosis and schizophrenia. 

​The positive side of this kind of mental process is the ability to unify concepts and principles into accurate and rational sets. By showing how one thing relates to another in a way that doesn’t follow the traditional route of thinking, creative people are able to draw correlations between subjects that are often seen as different. For instance, Isaac Newton was able to determine that an apple falling from a tree and other such everyday things like this are related to the movements of the Earth around the Sun. He even proved it. Amazing, right?
 
To achieve theories that utilise several seemingly unrelated factors requires the ability to hold multiple perspectives at once, sometimes ignoring conflicting ideas that each one traditionally holds. It is in the letting go of the conflicting ideas and finding another way of thinking about something that allows the pattern to be completed. By bypassing the known facts to prove them insufficient we can be seen as insane, by the way we deny what can be shown to be seemingly apparent. The apparency of a thing is often related to the way we think about it rather than the thing itself. It is in the shifting of perspective that new things become clear and old ideas look outdated.
 
Creative people are inherently rule breakers. They look to see what can be changed and they work to show it can be done. A sense of challenge and reward can be a driving force in breaking through given boundaries, obeying a gut instinct that something is possible rather than listening to the social consensus is what makes creative people pursue their ideas. When we break rules as a habit, we can often appear to be either insane or completely unsuitable for anything. The madness of not following instruction and thinking to cut corners or find new avenues is counter-productive to most processes in the modern word. It's important to be able to maintain an element of conformity when it matters, even if the creative mind is continually offering advice.
 
The frame of mind that looks for creative solutions is not always available. It is heavily determined by the mood. Because creativity is linked to the dopamine reward system, the individual’s mood can be a limiting or driving factor in their ability to be inventive. The problem solving and correct result forming reward that the mind receives during creative action is related to the idea of novelty and repetition. Both factors work together in a feedback mechanism to build on one another. This process of novelty and repetition gives rise to new concepts and practice at the same time which results in brand new creative ideas and skills.  
 
People with an active limbic system are often prone to mood swings and uncontrollable emotional lives. Although possible to manage this backdrop to life, the limbic system seems to have a mind of its own and paints the perceptions a variety of colours depending on how it is operating. This part of the middle brain is related to subconscious thought and is the source of most of our emotional response. This means that creative people are exposed to the sways of up and down emotions, especially if the reward system is active at the same time. To be rejected as a creative person can lead to a big down sensation and to be accepted can lead to a dramatic up sensation, both of which are detrimental to the next level of productivity.
 
This means that creative people need to maintain a healthy sense of distance from their work and the rest of their lives, especially when in the thralls of public acceptance or rejection. When the whole spirit is entwined in the outcome of a body of work that’s taken emotion and intellect, and a diagnosis of madness is given, it’s vital to keep this apart from the normal everyday things. If the opinion goes the other way, then it’s also important to not let the high of acceptance bring about a sense of entitlement or superiority. You may have noticed this is not easy for many highly successful artists and intellectuals.
 
But not all creative people are mad or are even prone to appearing so. Many of us are quite capable of getting on in the world and feeling fine about doing so. It’s not creativity on its own that leads to susceptibility to mental health issues. There is a triangle of influences at work that results in memorable characters and ground-breaking works. The combination of a creative mind, the ability to see and pursue new perspectives, an unusually high IQ, to be able to see and understand concepts that most others are unable to, and a predetermined element of psychoticism, work together to create personalities that excel not only in inventiveness but in being remembered. 

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Beginnings Of Creativity
 
We all struggle with trying new things, we need a lot of practice and an innate understanding that only time and experience can attain. Some of us are bursting with ideas, some good, some bad, and some we just must go out and try. If we’re doing something for the simple pleasure of doing it then that’s fine, enjoy yourself and be safe. If, on the other hand, you want to make some kind of positive effect either in other’s lives, in your own, or even both, then you’ll need to get good. So, before you can concrete yourself as part of the scenery with your ideas and input, you’ll need to take yourself to the highest league you can. It’s important to take lessons and listen to experts so that you can learn to think about what you’re doing in ways that have been shown to work. When we’re unaware of issues, flaws, aesthetic boundaries, and so on, we can’t see when we break them. Rules are made to be broken from time to time however you need to do it in a way that elevates the value rather than diminishes it. Intuitive understanding will only get us so far, at some point we must learn the ropes, so we know which ones to pull.
 
Discipline And Motivation
 
Motivation is the natural result of our interests and passions. When we care about something and enjoy thinking about something, we can result in a strong motivation to pursue the activity. A rewarding sense of achievement will arise after hard work and experimentation which serves to bolster the drive even more. Of course, there will be set-backs, failure, misunderstandings, and rejections, it might sometimes feel that despite your thousands of hours, you’re still not hitting the target. It is in these times that discipline comes into play. To be disciplined, we need to be able to manage our emotions. There will come a time when you don’t feel like doing the work you need to do.
 
Ask yourself, am I tired, am I hungry, am I upset at something, is there something more important I should be doing? If you can’t think of a rational reason and alternative activity including rest, then discipline must become your tool. Rather than forcing yourself to do something like a master and slave, a persuasion perspective will help a lot more. Remind yourself of all the things that make it worthwhile, go over your goals, look to your heroes and your inspirations, the people you admire, what would they say? Embody the bigger person and do what you know is necessary for your progress. Maybe tell a story about how the evil wizard is catching up with their plan and you need to finish the incantations, make it exciting, interesting, and fun. Just don’t quit or get lazy, that’s how we fail.
 
Making Sense Of Invention
 
Our minds are networks, we build thoughts based on concepts that reflect into one another perpetually. It’s impossible to define a word without defining the words it’s defined by and so on until all we are left with is words we can’t define unless we know. This knowing comes from the continual similar use and appropriate implementation of the word in context, so we become aware of its function. We learn the word once and then don’t need to know what it actually means in a verbal sense, we intuitively know via pictures, feelings, and relationship directions that our minds naturally build. A new word can be baffling to us until we know what it means and how to use it. Often the word need to sound appropriate for its use. In the odd circumstance when we adopt a foreign word for something, it’s only when we know what it originally meant that it makes appropriate sense to us. The same can be said for new ideas, new concepts, and new creative output. Things need to fit into place for them to be appropriate for the society it is released into. How can we build these mental maps in person to help with our creativity? We need to apply synectics. Synectics is the study of a creative process by experts with a function to improve, progress, or otherwise increase value.
 
It begins with the use of relevant analogies. Creativity is applying unlike things to each other in ways that result in like and positive things. To be able to determine a purpose and a function for a creative output, there must be a natural neural path for society to think about the creation. We need to know what to do with something, why we would do it, and it has to be a rewarding or at least easy experience to carry out. Analogies help us to see things from unique perspectives that may not directly apply to the original situation but result in relevant and like-for-like concepts that apply across boundaries. Solving problems often requires unique or unusual perspectives and analogies help us to determine what these can be.
 
The transposition of one concept into another one can help us to see things from a new perspective and understand where improvements or alterations can have genuine effects. Learning more about the attributes of the situation by applying new thinking tools via useful analogies and metaphors can empower everyone involved to make better choices about what to do next. Personal analogies help us to see something from a perspective we may not have noticed, putting ourselves in the place of something or someone with a unique advantage or responsibility. Direct analogies are about aligning the genuine experience or problem with something from life that is similar and perhaps holds unique viewpoints on the problem. Fantastical and metaphorical analogies tell stories about the problem in ways that break the conventional rules the problem is facing. This helps us to see things in a way that negates cultural boundaries and learned perspectives in favour of what is possible. Creation of value can be a purely mental process. However, when designing something more than the next step, there needs to be a lot of considered and applied processing from the creator in order to bring about the expected and earned outcome. 

The Power Of Criticism
 
When we’ve worked hard for something the last thing we want to hear is that it’s not good enough, doesn’t warrant attention, and no one wants to buy it. It is a disillusionment for those with high aspirations and the confidence to get them. Listening to critics is important when we are beginners because the everyday public can be a great judge of our material. When we become experts or well-experienced at something, often it our peers that we turn to for criticism. It’s important to learn how to do things in the right way and in ways that the everyday public can appreciate. Otherwise, we’ll create something for nothing. It probably won’t do what it is supposed to in the best way, and it won’t be easily adopted by those it is meant for. We can be our harshest critic at times, but the act of confidence and a good positive attitude does require us to silence this voice. The voices of others can’t be silenced so easily, the best way to do that is to satisfy them. We must be the ultimate judge of whether they should be listened to. Advice about advice about advice will only get us in a knot. That’s where our own inner critic must come into play.
 
When we are free to create adlib without the fear of social judgement or professional criticism then we might have plenty of ideas. We may flow with inspiration and analogies that create a wide and diverse picture of what we’re thinking about. This works well for the initial phase, but when we come to decide what is going to work and what people are going to like, we have to begin to listen to the judges. The better the quality of experience we have results in a more intuitive understanding of the public mood and the peer standard. This means that the more we do, the more we listen, the more we make up our own minds, the better our work will be.
 
A process of creation with delayed criticism as a cycle is the most profitable approach when choosing ideas and processes that will fit your original purpose and the state of society. Being able to manage our emotional state during the cutting down of ideas by not being attached to dead wood and by remembering to water the flourishing garden that we’re not use to having means having a grasp on your subconscious patterns and motivations that belong in the past.
 
Divergent Evolution Of Good Ideas
 
Life on Earth has evolved into a plethora of diverse and fascinating creatures, plants, and cellular organisms. Everything is based on a fundamental principle of self-replicating contained energy manipulation chemistry. It’s been theorised that if everything needed was put together and energy applied that to get a functioning lifeform, you’d possibly need a thousand universes each filled with the right stuff to have a chance. Others say that it’s perfectly normal to have life when conditions are right because the universe itself has a body of laws that promotes its genesis. However it began, what it resulted in has been incredible. The types of creatures that have walked the Earth have changed over time, from the fossil record we have learned about the evolution of fish, amphibians, reptiles, mammals, birds, and plants. Although various species and unique animals have disappeared, the ideas behind their biology have perpetuated throughout the ages. Even diverse species can be traced back with similar traits that are shared across families. We share a lot with fish, for example. It’s just the various sizes of things and the method of taking in air that are different. The bones, the cells, the pigments, the digestive system, the respiration chemistry, it’s practically identical. A good idea is a good idea so there is every good reason to continue these traits into our advanced evolutionary state.
 
Our inventiveness and creativity follow rules in a way that is very similar to the evolution of complex life. A good idea works across frameworks. When we create something, it is usually relatable to something else. This could be simple, as in a painting, relatable to all other paintings, regardless of style or quality. A great painting may be relatable to a master or two, or simply aesthetically brilliant enough to relate to something else entirely that also is rewarding to perceive. Evolution is the result of applied trial and error over time. Every trial that isn’t an error is given the chance to perpetuate. If it is lucky enough to do so, the trait will become more widespread as its self-replicating chemistry maintains the new information. We can apply this principle to our ideas in an evolutionary fast-forward by either imagining our ideas in practice to see obvious flaws or putting them into genuine practice to see less obvious ones. We can adapt the flawed elements by reducing, reusing, and reinventing until we end up with something aesthetically appealing, functional, and deserving of other people’s time.
 
The Grand Plan
 
Unless you have billions of years and a lot of luck from no-where in particular, we need to have a plan. A loose set of ideas that produce a virtual end result you can be happy with. The planning stage requires your expertise, your understood criticism, your desires and motivations, and the whims of the society the creativity is for. You need to know what you’re doing, why you’re doing it, and how you’re going to progress in real-time. Planning is the creation of a flow chart of instructions that you can use as a guideline and a memory aid to ensure you reach your goal. The preparation is in the creation of models and practicing techniques until you can commit to something permanent. A lot of what we create these days is not permanent, we can edit, alter, change, discontinue, and so on. There are some things that break free from this cycle of renewal and trend to become static and perennial items transcending the seasons. To become like this, we need to be able to stay the same indefinitely. So planning is ultimately essential to ensure we can become a contender for this prestige marketing position.
 
Standing out and becoming a valuable item on the social scene as an invention requires an up-to-date understanding of the scene. A realistic approach will appreciate the cutting-edge design and techniques that people employ to do what you want to do for yourself. Of course, we can’t always go out and buy the best stuff or learn from the best places, but we can always make the most of where we are and utilise what is available to the best of our ability. A thousand free articles and videos can probably cover the same information as an expensive course, it’s just you have to go out and find them for yourself and know what to ignore. There are a lot of novices preaching authority out there.
 
The Novice Genius
 
Why is it that we see beginner’s luck? How does a person with no prior experience waltz in and achieve something that others have spent hours trying to achieve? This sort of thing happens all the time when we look deep into social situations. It’s because a fresh perspective is often needed to see a truly creative solution. When we become experts and experienced, we learn techniques, patterns of behaviour, and polite routines that ensure everything works well. Once we become locked into our methods, we can sometimes fail to see problems or solutions others can.
 
If we’re used to the issue and don’t consider it to be one or if the state-of-the-art equipment no longer requires as much attention and care in certain areas but more in others, we might be unable to see the solution straight away. A newcomer might be much more inclined to intuitively fix the problem by trying to use the invention in a way that suits them. They might suggest an alteration or ask why something is there when it is redundant. This means that we shouldn’t discount a novice or a layperson who might have something to say. It’s important to get as many perspectives as we can and if someone is given the chance to prove their point to you, it doesn’t matter who they are. Their input had value regardless of their background.
 
On a personal level, it can also mean that your original idea is sound even if you didn’t have the expertise to carry it out properly. Sometimes the reason we fail is because we didn’t foresee the issues at play, and we didn’t properly predict how others would behave in your given situation. Being able to work through these pitfalls requires the learning and the experience that makes the process more intuitive. It doesn’t mean we should give up on our dreams or dismiss our ideas as naïve fantasies. If the value was there from the start, then the learning and training will only serve to solidify the concept and help it to be more effective.
 
So don’t be afraid to start something if you haven’t already and if you are passionate about it, you’ll take it far. Make sure you think about the process and the details of the outcome as part of a wider social network, and it will no-doubt apply to people in ways you couldn’t have foreseen. We’re all a bit creative, especially when we’re not trying to be. 
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​“Stress is a by-product of subconscious beliefs you have about the world. You can't choose not to believe something. You believe it because you think it's true. To eliminate stress, you must learn to challenge these beliefs so that you see them differently.” Andrew J. Bernstein
 
What Is Neuroplasticity?
 
Neuroplasticity is the term used to describe the ability of the brain to learn, adapt, and alter its biological networks according to the information it is given. It is how we educate ourselves from childhood, and the brain begins to function as a learning tool well before birth. It has been shown that new-born babies can recognise familiar sounds and speech patterns. This is the budding of the child’s language on its first day out of the womb. It doesn’t stop when we finish school. Our brains continue to change themselves in subtle ways on a daily basis until they no longer function at all. We all have neuroplasticity and the information we put in our minds and then dwell on has a direct correlation to this natural and biological process.
 
How Does Neuroplasticity Work?
 
The brain is a series of different functioning parts that work in unison with each other. The two hemispheres are found on either side of the brain and contain similar roles. Neuroplasticity is the change in how these separate functions work together through adaptation over time. There are four types of neuroplasticity that have equal levels of relevance to our daily lives. Homologous Area Adaptation is when a brain function is assumed by the opposite hemisphere of the brain, effectively handing over control to one or the other hemisphere. The different hemispheres have different cognitive approaches to information and by assigning control to one or the other, a direct choice is made about how to handle particular information. Cross Modal Reassignment is where the brain begins to use other parts of itself to handle information. This is where a new thinking process begins to take place and different perspectives can be found.
 
A Compensatory Masquerade is the term used when the brain resets its approach and begins to look at something from a fresh perspective. Akin to just “giving up”, sometimes it’s necessary to put on a different mask and tackle the information from a subtly novel persona, which can be generated from the psyche. The opposite end to this process is Map Expansion. This is when the area of the brain charged with a function is given the room to grow and build new networks, empowering it and strengthening it. This is usually the most common form of neuroplasticity when we learn as adults, although we all rely on each of the four throughout our lives.
 
How Does Neuroplasticity Relate To Our Subconscious?
 
Our cognitive processing is the way we think. Our thoughts are made of images, feelings, and words. What we think in our waking awareness is called our consciousness. When we are aware of something, we are conscious of it. The subconscious is the part of our cognitive processing that we are not aware of but is still present regardless. It is a direct result of our brain’s functioning and information processing based on what it has been given to work with. The biology of our brains is ancient and the way our brains process information on a basic level is archaic, with the modern, most human parts of our brain originating from a forest floor environment with predators and unforeseen events. Our learning provides the tools we need to put this biological thinking and function to use in the modern world. Each of our thoughts, however, can be rooted in the ancient dialogue of the silent part of our minds. 
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What Is The Opposite Of Subconscious?
 
As we have under underlying train of thought that springs from the biological and archaic parts of our natural minds, it seems fitting to account for a higher power or higher thought process that transcends our conscious thought. This can be seen as a balancing function to limit the desires and will of our primeval mental processes. Sometimes called the Id, the sense of being connected to a grander scheme of right thought and right action helps to keep all of us in certain limitations of behaviour. Clearly we are not all the same and the power of this psychological concept can vary from individual to individual and the degrees in which it functions within varying circles of the social realm can differ as well. A higher power, a sense of moral right, and a plausible manifestation of this in persona form all work towards a sense of gravity towards the best outcome. The more refined this sense of Id or moral purpose, the better choices we make in relation to our higher purpose or chosen destiny.
 
How Does The Id Relate To Art And Creativity?
 
By appealing to the sense of right by defining it in contrast to the sense of wrong, we can help to build larger cognitive maps of our environment both socially and environmentally. When we have better maps, we will automatically make better, more informed choices about future actions and observations. The creation of images and feelings within given context can help the mind to build networks that incorporate the dynamics of the scenes it has observed. This is how we learn, and the subconscious part of our mind has no boundary between reality and fantasy. This means you can communicate right ideas and make moral arguments by using abstract and fantastical dialogues. We can talk to the subconscious in terms of the higher consciousness or Id through the medium of the normal consciousness when we can apply ideas and lessons that make sense and leave us feeling content and satisfied.
 
By helping the mind to build networks that appreciate the dynamics of examples from many perspectives, we can begin to understand our lives and the lives of others in greater detail. Things can begin to make sense in new ways that we didn’t notice before and our methods of dealing with various situations can evolve as we learn more about our priorities that we need to be aware of. By exposing the mind to a variety of sensitive and morally sound situations through drama, art, poetry, music, games, and more, we can learn how to think about a variety of situations in a way that benefits us and those around us. It is not necessary to preach or define, a rewarding or peaceful and tranquil setting opposed to a demanding or chaotic and stressful one is the only contrast the subconscious needs to work with.
 
Art That Speaks To The Passions
 
When art is particularly conductive, as in it electrifies you and charges the mind with new thoughts and interest, it has the ability to use thought and feeling together in such a way that appeals. We all have different tastes however the aesthetical acclaim can always be traced back to influences and sources who helped inspire the passion to create in the first place. In fact, all creativity can be traced back to the earliest days of humanity where we made sounds by banging things, painted images with pigments, and began imitating the melodies of the birds and the mountains. A positive experience can be made from the right use of feelings, images, vocabulary, and social dynamic that culminates in a reasonable and understandable fashion. Even surrealism or spontaneity can be seen as a pattern that, once learned, becomes predictable and easy to be carried into. When we empower the mind through the use of fiery rationale or exciting and novel positivity, we can raise the psychological well-being and standing of those who enjoy it. Art can communicate powerful and liberating ideas with description, drama, and abstraction. When we use morally good standings to appeal to the needs of the subconscious to create sense of the world, we can create a linear pattern of thought that people can draw upon when ever they want. 

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Imagination Is The Bidirectional Conduit To Our Subconscious And Our Awareness
 
The subconscious and the conscious work in synergy through the imagination. Images and ideas are presented from the under-thoughts in bubbles of inspiration, anxiety, and dream. The conscious mind can manipulate the imagination to produce what ever it thinks of, if given enough information to build a reliable picture. When information is not given, the subconscious will fill in the gaps with its foreseeable possibilities. The types of experience we feed our imagination will communicate with the subconscious and inform it of things to draw upon in future situations. Our subconscious cannot tell the difference between right and wrong, neither can it tell is something is serious, a joke, or pure fantasy. If we feed it with any of these things, it will absorb it and draw upon it as if it were files in a database. It is in the actions of our consciousness, guided by the higher consciousness or id, that we determine if our subconscious mind is providing right or wrong information. Art, therefore, provides a voice to the id or higher consciousness in the way it provides universal messages to the whole at the same time as drawing on conscious thoughts by building on subconscious foundations such emotion, irony, rhythm, synchronicity, and so on. The framework for consensus is built upon the passions derived in creative output ranging from religious thought to art to legal declarations. These consensus ideas about right and wrong action define the direction in which society progresses as a whole.
 
Putting The Power Back Into Language
 
Words have the ability to build reasonable and identifiable mental pictures in the minds of those around us. We can define situations and perspectives that build a scenario model that applies to the world around us. In an infinite realm of possible ideas and thoughts, we like to find a clear and guided path that accounts for our needs and wants by means of our surroundings. This means that the words we use to describe the infinite picture matter.

​The perspective we choose to adopt when we take on our tasks will determine the quality of the experience and the ability of our mind to operate within the best parameters. We want to make the parameters as empowering as possible by means of healthy and realistic language. Art can provide exactly what we need and provide the opposite, too. When we are given alternative visions of unrestful imaginative scenes, we can use these as the shadow side of what we are aiming towards. The effects of inaction and the effects of failure to think are clearer for the use of the negative view in art.
 
The words we use to describe the picture matter a lot. As the thorn has roses, the rose has thorns. What you use as the primary nomenclature will determine the angle on which the sun shines on the subject. We can shine the light in any direction we like however the most positive and empowering view is the one that enables us to take the best action. Being aware of the negative side helps us to understand why the positive view is the right view. This means art must be prepared to offer all sides of the subject. Acceptance of the negative and empowerment through the positive are what gives us the psychological framework to be more effective in our lives and in the lives of those who we help. 

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Psychological Reticence That Prevents Personal And Social Growth
 
We as people can display several types of mental blockage that ultimately prevent our mental growth in particular directions. We can have hang-ups and timorousness that make us avoid particular aspects of our lives and we can have prejudices and presumptions that stop us from taking particular ideas seriously. Hostility toward a subject or something about it can make it difficult to hear necessary information about the situation’s volatility or opposing perspectives. A sense of outrage either moral or social can cause a blindfolding effect by distracting our cognitive process with a primal sense of self-preservation either through language or force. When we are in a hostile frame of mind about something we are a lot more reluctant to listen to or empathise with the subject. Contrary attitudes and aggression are more likely when we bring hostility into the equation.
 
Apathy is when we always have an excuse to not act. There are times when we do need to hold back from acting especially if we are intellectually unsure or emotionally certain. Both of these situations should serve as warnings that the mind is not ready for the responsibility of the action. However, our lives are full of needs that we must aspire to fulfil, and we must act in order to meet these needs. The mind can think of many excuses and reasons why something should not be done, however if it is necessary and within your ability then the excuses are simply holding you back. The subconscious can churn out as many excuses as it can remember and some more from the mixing pot so the conscious mind has to be prepared to handle these.
 
Fear is probably the most common form of psychological reticence. We are normal to fear things, anxiety is something we all have to live with. Being able to recognise it and not let it take control is the way to find courage in the world. Confidence in our ability to learn how to cope with the things that frighten us can help us move forward while acknowledging our natural state and normal anxiety. Our goals and desires keep us working towards them and the effectiveness we are able to manifest is directly proportional to the level of mental blockage we are able to distinguish and work around. We can be realistic and stay in our league when handling new things and be strong enough to stand tall when you find yourself among giants while maintaining a healthy sense of perspective. An awareness of what holds us back and a continual effort to rewrite the patterns can bring our better circumstances given time.
 
What Does Art Have To Do With Mental Blocks?
 
The imagination is the way we communicate with our subconscious and the subconscious is the source of all our immediate thoughts and feelings. If we can talk to the subconscious through art by using rewarding and consistent messages that fit the social picture while identifying with the individual then we have the ability to provide remedies for our psychological blockages and aspects that prevent social cohesion and progress. By offering a variety of perspectives we can offer the plus and minus side to situations from across the realm of human experience and beyond in order to help the mind build a clear and vivid picture of the world it lives in and its metaphorical counterparts. The subconscious is an abstract thinker, it deals in images, symbols, metaphors, and associations. This is why art can be abstract and non-linear as well as sensical and direct.
 
Mental blockages can be addressed by the continual input of new perspectives and alternative modes of perception. The arts have the ability to offer these without directly confronting the issue, as in the art provides a scene outside of the individual that can then be related to self though contemplation. The reticence and prejudices that have formed in our subconscious through the use of strongly worded statements that appeal to the emotion can be challenged again and again by use of probing and examinatory creativity and art. 

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The Illumination Of Desire And Virtue Through Art
 
Our deepest desires are based on emotional needs and wants that grow from the subconscious. We use our conscious mind to rationalise these needs and wants and put them into the social context. When we are psychologically healthy, we apply our desires to useful and rewarding activities that do not harm ourselves, other people, or the wider environment. Naturally, we all have flaws and personal quirks that mean our behaviours can challenge the consensus of right and wrong however as long as we remain within the law, we are free to do as we choose. What we choose to do and what we desire to do depends on our subconscious thought process. We then rationalise this according to our priorities, beliefs, and moral grounding. Our wider mental environment paints a picture of ourselves and our abilities within the world at large. The way we see each of these aspects of the living experience defines the way we perceive our desires and needs, and therefore our correct action. Our perspective on ourselves, our capabilities, and the social world we are in will focus our priorities and reasoning. Our subconscious will then interpret itself into our behaviour and thoughts. This feedback mechanism helps to solidify our understanding of the world and builds on certain assumptions about the world and other people.
 
The assumptions and imagined reasons that we carry with us begin to form when we are very young. Before we can talk, our mental landscape is completely sensory. Without cognitive language to articulate our imagination and learn from other people verbatim, our inner perceptions are based on the things we see, feel, smell, and hear. We begin to learn about the world from this stage and by the time we learn language, our basic ideas about reality are already in place. Art can imitate this phase of learning by exposing us to external yet present and relevant situations. When we are provided with a piece of art, be it film, music, picture, sculpture, or something else, we’re presented with a new and fascinating scene from the imagination that provides all the cues we need to adopt a child-like absorption of what’s given. We can enrich the mental environment by manner of providing detailed and vivid expressions of human creativity that draw on universal concepts that we can all relate to in varying degrees. Good art can therefore bring about a bigger picture, offer new perspectives, and increase the cognitive resolution of what we already understand. Art can be used to challenge our predefined assumptions about the world by offering new perspectives. This helps us make better and more informed decisions based on what we already want and need.
 
The Power Of Perspective
 
Strong emotions can be evoked in the presentation of concepts and ideas with unusual or knowingly wrong rationale. The strength of the emotion defines how solidly our subconscious mind incorporates the information. It can be positive or negative and the association of the scene with the emotion can take place very quickly. A strong emotion and a particular setting can result in an immediate transition within the subconscious that can take a long time to undo. This means that art has a lot of power of the mind in the way that it can create scenarios and imagery that directly speaks to the emotions. Strong and powerful emotions can be brought about by redolent scenes created by words and the senses in combination.
 
The way we choose to portray settings, situations, and modes of thinking therefore define the way our subconscious minds learn to associate with these things. Powerful perspectives that inspire courage and forward-thinking work with disempowering perspectives that create hostility and apathy. The two sides of the scene need to be lucid and resolved to draw a picture that the subconscious can relate with our higher aspects of thought. There will often be multiple ways of looking at situations that take account for both positive and negative aspects of our psychology and art can help us to make sense of them all.
 
The more source material we have to draw upon, the more patterns and associations we can become familiar with, the greater our subconscious scope. With the application of conscious thought, we can navigate the output of our inner minds and take on the world with an empowered and strong mentality. As artists, we can be responsible for providing good input that not only enriches the human psyche but enforces positive thinking and strong personal outlooks. If we can create an environment of growth and rewarding collective appreciation with a well-defined antithesis we appreciate and digest, the world will be better off for our efforts. If in doubt, just make art. 

Interesting book: Dreamer's Journal: An Illustrated Guide to the Subconscious (The Illuminated Art Series) ​​

A lot of us are struggling these days. If it’s not with the fast pace of career and family balance, it’s the far-too-steep slope that we must climb to reach it. The paths laid out for us are many and yet they each require a particular mentality that we may be unsure of. Sometimes we find that we are unsuitable for many or even most of the opportunities that people have provided us with. Maybe we can sense a bad deal when we see one and we see them everywhere. A creative person may feel compelled to work on things in their own way which can be problematic in the modern workplace. Finding opportunities that suit a creative person can be difficult as novelty always starts off small. Even if we mass produce a novelty idea or item, the public opinion will be small.
 
Communicating the value of creative ideas requires us to have a fundamental understanding of the problem we are solving. If we use what we have at our disposal, be it time, material, knowledge, mental ability, or any combination of these things, to solve known problems that benefit the wider community, then a business model can work. The necessity of any business is to fulfil a need for a price that is competitive with society at large. We need to think creatively to redefine solutions and problems that suit people more accurately than other services. Not only do we limit current competition, but we also provide unique factors that can change the industry over time.
 
When going into business, the thing to remember that happiness and contentment are what you are selling. The services and items on offer are tools for us to bring that about. We exchange contentment for contentment, so the object is to be rewarded in kind. We ask for money if we need to, or a fair provision of service that we would otherwise not receive. Sometimes the largest issues in a community are based on a lack of money and a lack of social leverage, meaning that those perhaps we are best to serve are unable to respond in any kind at all. This means we require a third party that does provide financial or social rewards. The most obvious example of this is a charity. This is how business is done in the modern world. 

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To achieve authority status in your chosen area of problem solving, it’s necessary to dedicate your whole mind to the problem. A lot of information is likely already available about your chosen problem and the methods in which is has been solved before. If the problem is new, then we can find similarities in other solutions that we can use as metaphorical tools to explore our own example. Having the right solution is only part of the equation as well. To have people be willing to give us a chance, being an authority will only get us so far. We must be easy to talk to, interact with, and a pleasure to spend time with. When you can make your time worth rewards, either financial, social, or both, then you will find making progress natural.
 
A solution that people can understand means making it simple to apply. If we are a learned expert on a subject, it may become more difficult to see the hurdles in the thought process you’re offering. When choosing solutions to problems and finding ways to provide for us in other ways, people generally choose the easiest and most rewarding option. In general terms, the higher the cost, the higher the quality of service and item. This is because to provide excellence and ease of use, a lot of work is done, and the best ingredients are used. When we pay more for something we generally expect to have a better product because of it. Sometimes sellers use this logic to make products appear better than they are.
 
When establishing yourself as a legitimate source of business and therefore solutions to people's problems, its important to not leave people feeling cheated. This means that using psychology to sell things that people don’t want or at a price that is out of balance will ultimately result in unfriendly feelings and mistrust towards you. When a community loses trust in you then they will no longer feel your services are of any value. The advert and the assurance will mean nothing to them because they don’t know if they should believe it. We can see this in action when politicians draw rosy pictures of rational and functional society when in fact it’s crumbling around them. It’s not long until their narrative no longer makes any sense when compared to reality and the population loses trust in them. 

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To build trust from a community that doesn’t know if you deserve it, it’s necessary to show that you are present not only to serve yourself but to serve others too. To become trusted and accepted by the wider ecosystem of finance, service, and production, it’s important to be of real benefit to others as much as you are yourself. If a person is unable to look after others or themselves, it becomes unattractive for business. They offer services that do not match the market because the effort and intention to provide is missing. If a person can’t look out for your interests or their own interests, then the service they provide can’t be guaranteed to be adequate.
 
Business must be beneficial to society, not just for the customer and the seller. If the solution to a problem creates more problems, then it’s not a good service. The nature of modern business gives rise to the need to be socially responsible as well as profitable. Making a profit means more jobs for people and more money sent to governments for public services. Provided the money is made fairly and without causing harm to those around it, it’s a good thing. Our creative solutions and abilities are the tools we have to apply ourselves in wealth generation for ourselves and those around us.  
 
Wealth isn’t everything, it’s not the goal. Our problem is in security and in desire. We use money to enable security for ourselves and our loved ones. We also use it to get what we want in life. This is the experience of ownership or time spent. The attraction of money is because of the ability it has to get what we want. It’s power, and in the right hands, it can provide for everyone. When used wisely and creatively, we can use our financial ability to make life better for the community we work in and live in. Making a fair wage is how we get along in society, as the world is prepared for us, and we are prepared for the world. Our ability to solve problems for people and provide genuinely positive experiences is a valuable resource that we can use to fulfil our obligations.
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To do this properly, we must accept that we need education. We’re not born into any skill and even highly talented people spend a long time practicing and learning how to do what they do so well. If we want to stand among the talented ones, then we must strive and work as hard to be as reliable as they are in the field we choose. This is why choosing a field that we enjoy working with is essential because to make work for you in your own way then it will take a lot of time, most of which will be unpaid. Doing things in the way other people want it done will earn you money faster, so only follow your creative path if you are prepared to take that route. Sometimes, though, it’s the only route we have. Only when we’ve learned the skills and practiced them until they become a talent will our ability be worth paying for.
 
Making people happy is what problem solving is all about. If we can make people happy with our skills without making other people directly unhappy, then we have a great business. What is directly unhappy? Some people will just not like you. They might see you as a threat to their business, or a threat to their social status. Overseeing a business is not a job that comes without its pitfalls. Some people have predefined assumptions about businesspeople and those of us who have studied marketing. If you are in the business of selling products, services, or both then marketing is essential reading. Directly making people unhappy involves action that is inconsiderate of their freedoms and rights to thrive. Antisocial business is not good marketing.
 
A service mindset with a creative attitude and a willingness to look after yourself and others in equal amounts will be the foundation to your creative journey. Once you’ve established trust, authority, a genuine solution to a genuine problem, and a way of benefitting from it personally, your business model is ready to go. Naturally, we need continual maintenance, an eye for new growth and necessary cuts, and a continual process of grounding and reassessing the situation. A creative life is well within reach.
 
If you want to learn more, why not try Principles and Practice of Marketing by Professor David Jobber and Fiona Ellis-Chadwick
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