Going Creative: How Is It For You?

I’m working on a nonfiction book that needs your stories.

Go Creative: It’s Your Native State! will outline my understanding of creative intelligence and its value for writers, artists & everyone.

Sooo…   when you have a minute, and if you’re willing, I’d be delighted if you could respond to any of these:

• Has the concept of creative intelligence made a difference in your life?
• What does being creative mean to you?
• Do you self-sabotage?  How?
• Did/do you Read the whole post »

Billy Connolly’s Creative Intelligence.

“The map of the sky… has been very badly drawn by Galileo and others who weren’t very good at joining the dots.

The Great  Bear is nothing like a bear, The Southern Cross is bugger all like a cross… and that goes for all the other cosmic things.

“I’d like to redraw it. Because I’ve seen things up there.

“The Great Elvis would make a pleasant change, don’t you think?

“Or The Wee Willie Winkie?

“People wouldn’t take the whole thing so seriously if they could find Noddy…

“If you find a constellation shaped like a car, why not Read the whole post »

A Literary Guide to Dublin

According to a recent review by The Good Web Guide:

“Once in a while someone comes along with a publishing idea so elegant, so simple and so damnably right, that you find yourself struggling to celebrate it, for being consumed with… literary envy. City-lit Series, published by Oxygen Books, is just such an I-wish-I’d thought-of-that revelation. Why not get to know a city through an anthology of excerpts from the work of its writers?

But of course!”

Of course indeed. This wonderful series of travel guides to the great cities through the eyes of that city’s finest authors is redefining what guidebooks can and should do. Which is why I was delighted to be asked to Read the whole post »

A Creative Breather

‘True intelligence operates silently. Stillness is where creativity and solutions to problems are found‘. Eckhart Tolle

Here’s a breathing exercise you can use to bring you to creative stillness anywhere, anytime.

Stand, sit or lie comfortably. Place the tip of your tongue on the soft ridge of gum directly inside your mouth. Become aware of your breath.

1. Through the mouth, take in a long, deep breath, counting slowly to four in your head: 1-2-3-4.
2. Hold the breath for a count of seven:1-2-3-4-5-6-7.
3. Slowly release the breath to a count of eight: 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8.

Keep your attention Read the whole post »

7 Characteristics of the Creatively Intelligent.

And seven questions for you to ask yourself about your own creative characteristics.  

1. Creatively intelligent people welcome challenges. ‘Every problem is an opportunity in disguise’: rate your agreement with this statement on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being ‘I strongly agree’ and 10 being ‘I strongly disagree’. (yes every problem). What does this tell you about Read the whole post »

More On Borrowed Time.

I posted a poem here last week — and your feedback quickly made it clear I had posted it too soon. (Memo to self: please follow own advice in future).

For me the poem was a metaphor but on rereading I can see my allusion was underwritten. (Hint: it’s in the title.  And the accompanying picture. Yes, it’s a sunSET.)

Another blindsider was how, because of my health history, the ‘I’ in the poem is the first to ‘get up and go’ —  an assumption I can’t, and shouldn’t, make.

An assumption that got in the way of the words.

A perfect example, in fact, of   Read the whole post »

Borrowed Time.

We lie together in a borrowed bed
knowing the alarm is set to sound,
your thighs a seat I root upon,
mine wrapping warm around your hand.

We burrow in the minutes that remain
before the clock will cut in to announce
the time
has come for us Read the whole post »

Five Tips to Go From Blog to Book.

Think your blog can be the next bestseller? Here are some tips for aspiring writers from editor Iris Blisi:

1. Consider your category. The web is a goldmine for humor writers in particular. “If you’re funny and your voice is unique, people will come to it,” says Patrick Mulligan, editor and blog scout.
2. Pay heed to tradition even in a digital environment. The best way to catch the attention of an agent or editor? “A good, old-fashioned, well-written query,” says Kate Lee, an ICM agent so well known for ushering authors from the internet to bookshelves that she was the subject of a 2004 New Yorker piece. “There’s really no substitute for that.”
3. Think ahead. In standard publishing contracts, the burden of Read the whole post »

Leonard Cohen’s Creative Intelligence

“Old friend, you may kneel as you read this, for now I come to the sweet

burden of my argument. I did not know what I had to tell you, but now I am sure. All my speeches were preface to this, all my exercises but a clearing of my throat… In our kisses and sucks, this, ancient darling, I meant to whisper.

G-d is alive. Magic is afoot. G-d is afoot. Magic is alive. Alive is afoot. Magic never died. G-d never sickened. Many poor men lied. Many sick men lied. Magic never weakened. Magic never hid. Magic always ruled. G-d is afoot. G-d never died…

Though his death was Read the whole post »

Gifting our Gifts

Creative intelligence is going beyond the given, as defined in the previous post.  And why do we do this?  So we can fully give.

(Yes, creative intelligence is often paradoxical )

Inspiration is creative intelligence in action and it operates within the gift economy. It may – often does – go unrecognised or undervalued by the money economy, part of the great swathe of unpaid or underpaid ‘work’ that keeps our world well, work that is done for different, often deeper, rewards than money.

Inspiration is always experienced as a gift (even if what we’re talking about is an inspired business idea). And for it to be passed on, it must be offered as Read the whole post »