107 ways to inspire creativity

Creative minds don’t just feed themselves. We don’t just wake up every day with a pile of creativity gushing out of every pore. Sometimes we might wake up with a brilliant idea but even then, if we don’t write it down or tell someone, chances are that idea might drift off as the day progresses. So I was thinking – what do we need to help us stay creative? Here’s what I came up with…

107 ways to inspire creativity

from things you need, to places you go and things you do, there’s always something nearby that can be a potential creative idea starter. I’m sure there’s a ton more, so if I’ve missed something, please holler and I’ll add your ideas to the list too!

Objects, supplies and materials to inspire creativity

Having things around the house or the office to inspire your creativity can be so helpful. Sometimes just staring at something for a moment will spark an idea. How many of these items do you already own or maybe even have within arms reach right now?

1. Scissors
2. tape
3. glue
4. pencils
5. pens
6. crayons
7. colored pencils
8. paint
9. kids water color paints
10. stamps
11. music
12. movies
13. tv
14. nature
15. sunshine
16. friends
17. phone calls
18. books
19. magazines
20. websites
21. games
22. food
23. recipes
24. glitter
25. buttons
26. cardboard
27. wood
28. musical instruments
29. chalk
30. camera
31. chop sticks
32. paint brushes
33. sewing machine
34. newspaper
35. calendar
36. kids

– I could go on an on on this one, just about anything can inspire creativity if you stop and ask the questions.

Things to do to inspire creativity

Every experience we have inspires a thought and potentially an idea. The more we experience, the more ideas and views we can pull from when trying to come up with something new. Even the little day to day tasks, if done a bit different just today, can spark a new idea for tomorrow. How many of the following activities have you done or do regularly?

1. Window shopping
2. walking
3. biking
4. yoga
5. get off your butt and move
6. reading
7. listening to music
8. listening to books
9. watching movies
10. sitting in the sunshine
11. people watching
12. story telling
13. camping
14. roasting marshmallows
15. cloud gazing
16. traveling
17. making art
18. going to a museum, event or other activity
19. picnicking at the park
20. cook
21. eat something new
22. try something new
23. think of trying or eating or doing something new
24. day dream
25. sleep, nap, rest
26. eat breakfast
27. call a friend
28. write a note
29. search Google on a topic that interests you
30. try Googles “I feel Lucky” option and follow that path
31. Follow recommended links from websites you already like
32. go to the library and browse a random aisle
33. experiment with new spices or mixing flavors you already like
34. try a new ice cream flavor
35. part your hair different
36. get a new hair cut
37. turn your favorite shirt inside out and wear it that way all day
38. write down all the interesting comments people say for a week
39. keep a journal
40. keep a journal of just ideas

– again an endless list. Instead of participating and taking the experience for face value, stop and really get involved, soak it up and ask questions as you go… try that tiny taste of something new or watch your kids mix the colors to make a gross muddy brown, you never know what will be discovered from the moment you stop to try.

Words to inspire creativity

I think sometimes we get so caught up in what creativity is supposed to be, we forget what creativity really is. Here are some words you can throw into your day to help you think outside the typical bubble you might be stuck in. Use these words as a question and see what you come up with.

1. color
2. sound
3. smell
4. perspective
5. view
6. opinion
7. think
8. thoughts
9. texture
10. feel
11. goal

Question starters to inspire creativity

Most often new ideas come from asking a question. Create a “problem” that needs an answer and you might come up with answers you didn’t expect. The first step is asking a question the second step is allowing yourself to explore new, maybe even ridiculous answers. Don’t ask questions that that require you to decide if something will work or not and don’t assume an idea is bad. In hindsight, I’m sure good ol’ Ben Franklin would not recommend standing out in the middle of a lightening storm with metal in his hand.

1. What if…
2. Did you know…
3. What would happen…
4. What do you think…
5. Remember when…
6. What did you see…
7. What do you hear…
8. What’s that smell…
9. How does that taste…
10. When…
11. how does that feel…

Things to make and ways to organize your ideas to inspire creativity

Sometimes collecting ideas, dreams, wishes, favorites and other pieces we already like can inspire something new. Here are some ideas of things you can put together to help keep those creative juices flowing and ideas growing.

1. A dream board
2. A collage of ideas
3. A doodle page
4. A music mix (aka “mixed tape” from the 80s)
5. A new recipe
6. A Pinterest board (I’m adding new boards all the time)
7. A creative ideas notebook
8. A journal of ideas
9. A sketchbook

There are so many ways you can help inspire creativity with yourself, your kids and others you want to create with. You don’t need to be a professional crafter nor an artist to find your creativity and discover ways to use it every day. You just need to be willing to explore new ideas and try something different.

I’d love to hear how you find creative inspiration and what fun things you’ve created! 

100directions.com

The Holy Trinity Of Startup Success: Purpose, Culture, Reward

Management consultants would have you believe that making a ham sandwich requires a PhD. But building a successful business can actually be boiled down to 3 pretty basic concepts.

Last time I looked, there were 19,200 book titles available for purchase at Amazon under the category "Organizational Behavior." I checked out a few of the top sellers and found a familiar pattern. Not one is written by an author who actually founded, built, and managed his or her own enterprise. The authors are academics or management consultants. Their information may be useful, but I wish more books were written by people who have gone through the experience of building a positive work environment while also juggling trying to satisfy shareholder and customer expectations.

I don't consider myself an expert on organizational behavior, but I have built several successful companies from scratch, two of which sold for over $100 million each. Whenever I get together with the various investors, contractors, and personnel to reminisce about those achievements, I am struck by how nostalgic they become. To a person, they describe their involvement in the companies as being the best experiences of their lives. Some investors even went public with those endorsements.

As humans our tendency is usually to over-complicate things. I have known some management consultants who would turn the making of a ham sandwich into a PhD thesis and we would all starve to death in the pursuit of perfection. In business, perfection is not the main aim. Survival comes first, customer satisfaction second, and employee/contractor fulfillment next.

When it comes to success in business, I have taken the approach that anything complex can be broken down into its three main elements. Whether it is the yin-yang tao, sun, moon and earth, or the holy trinity, we have the mental capability of understanding complex concepts in simplistic ways. Think of a TV. To use one I need to understand the on/off switch, the volume control, and the channel change button only. I don't need to grasp the science of plasma technology in order to get the benefit.

The same is true for organizational behavior. All my companies have had the same mission, vision, and values, and they represent the three simple steps of a positive work environment.

• Make a positive difference in the lives of everyone involved;
• Have fun doing it and;
• Enjoy the material rewards of that endeavor.
• The rest is just detail.

The first step is to find a purpose. Every enterprise needs a purpose. I meet budding entrepreneurs who tell me that they want to build a multimillion-dollar business. I ask them “why?” and usually they can't tell me. I ask them what their contribution to the world is going to be. Again, they have not thought about it that way. They have thought about themselves, and that is okay, but there is more to being a successful business than making profit.

I find when a company has the intention of making a positive difference in the lives of others, everyone galvanizes around a common purpose. Employees and contractors take ownership of issue and problems instead of always trying to make excuses or pass the buck. In my first company I talked the investors into abandoning the traditional board meetings. My experience in a regular career is that board meetings are a drain on resources, unproductive, and risk diminishing company morale. I had a hard battle at first, but over seven years managed to avoid all that nonsense. That attitude of making a positive difference reduces the complaining and gossiping that otherwise can creep into a company environment or any meeting. Anything that does not contribute to making a positive difference naturally dissolves.

Step two is all about creating the right culture. What is the point in going to work if you are not having fun? If you are not enjoying what you do on a daily basis, you are either in the wrong company or wrong job. It is unlikely you can fix your position easily, so have the courage to move on to something that does float your boat. Equally, if you are leading a business, there is no place in your environment for complainers and slackers. I think of all that negativity like passive smoking. If someone smokes indoors, I warn them about it. If they do it again, I fire them. Simple. Same with complainers and gossipers, because they poison the environment for everyone else. The livelihood of my business is at stake and I have no tolerance for it. One warning. Change or leave.

The third step is the one most difficult for some business owners. Sharing the rewards with those who have contributed to the company's success is essential. When those who do the work earn such a tiny fraction compared to the multimillion-dollars-a-year CEO, it is a recipe for resentment. Most employees are fine with the top guy getting those millions so long as they are also able to improve their own lifestyle through bonus plans that are real incentives.

Just as we tend to over-complicate organizational behavior, companies go mad trying to design effective bonus plans. Most I have been involved in, however, are designed from a mentality of saving money and squeezing every last drop of effort out of the employee. It is the wrong mentality. If the company does well, everyone should share in the success. One year a company of mine doubled its profit, so I gave everyone a bonus equal to their remuneration, in effect doubling that year's salary or commission. The investors were not happy with me at the time, but our personnel turnover was zero, and the following year we did even better. That bonus seems excessive to all those academics and consultants, but as a percentage of turnover salaries were small, and the increases hardly noticeable on the P&L. One thing is for sure, everyone enjoyed sharing in the success and worked even harder to make a positive difference afterward.

The combination of having a purpose, creating a fun environment, and sharing the rewards is a recipe for a successful working environment.

--Trevor Blake is the author of Three Simple Steps: A Map to Success in Business and Life and the founder and CEO of QOL Medical, a specialty pharmaceutical company, and ANU, a non-profit that develops low side-effect cancer drugs.

Forbes.com

STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS I

I am hardly a writer but I need to express this and I am a risk taker, so just get the idea from this one, leave he flow, it wasn’t meant to flow.

Sometimes it feels difficult to peruse these articles as the figures these guys mention are so staggering and sometimes give my heart a flip. You wonder what your life has been and where you were when they made such achievements. But how else would one spur the fire within if not to see the fire burn and it leave an embossment on the mind. Even though it unconsciously leaves a dazzling target imprinted in your mind and you wonder how you may reach it, you are encouraged to take a step in a direction that may ultimately lead there, baring the constraints we may whip up for ourselves. These constraints include a waning determination and consistency – star attributes that we realize are required, from exposure to these lifestyles. We also learn in a subtle way that these two attributes must go together in this quest with a sister component which is luck. The luck I refer to is the combination of preparedness with the slightest place of opportunity, not the other impression we ascribe to it, that of abstraction.

“stop waiting for things to happen, go out and make them happen”

When I go through these articles, it does not just occur to me that these guys are really making waves. I try to picture their minds, assume their mindsets, walk through their minds, imagining how I may handle the sort of challenges they may or may have encountered in their sojourn, how they may have surmounted them and how I may fare in such position. This enables an unleashing of potential engagements in the mind that become reality with time, because you would have created a habit that cannot but be lived.

As a result of my inordinate exposure to diverse spheres of life, I have become an ardent believer in the truism that we live our subconscious creations. But one thing I had to decide not too long ago is to always seek the consent of the supernatural one – in my case, the God trinity – in all my ventures, and I say to Him that His will be done. The tendency is for this attitude to result in indolence, but you cannot be serious if it does. On the other hand you work at it, leaving no stone unturned, including acknowledging His grace in making it work. And the truth is that after all these, if it will work then it will, if not, there is no amount of work that will be done to result in success of that venture (afterall the same processes that work for some who do blood money is the same that does not work for others and when they persist it claims their life). I think it is a principle. But then again you have to factor in the positive mindset that believes that every disappointment is a blessing. That is one strong character that must be imbibed or you will end up not doing anything significant. Every disappointment is actually a step forward. Just embark over and again on another venture and see it through. Don’t lag and dwell on the disappointment of one venture and transfer the ‘winchy’ to another.

These blog posts are an expression of the kind of things that inspire me; my idea is just to catalog these exposures for readier access. I had sort and archived some of them for some time on my facebook and twitter timelines but I had thought that didn’t give reasonable room for expression. Meanwhile, I had dragged this idea of using a more effective and efficient archive system in a blog site. That’s procrastination and it is said to be the thief of time. Well there is also the consolation that it is never too late to start. That, I think, is a weak way to perceive it though, especially when you seek a way not to punish yourself for relenting. But you know the important thing right now? I have started. It is a learning process in the art of the start, one that must be learnt by force, or else you realize late that you have not achieved anything significant in your life. So just start. And you may get inspired with me too.

Inside Jay-Z's Latest Summer Score

In the summer of 2003, Jay-Zspent much of his time on the road, playing 33 dates with 50 Cent, Busta Rhymes and Missy Elliott on the Rock the Mic tour. Hisestimated take-home pay per show: $100,000.

Ten years later, things are a little different for the Brooklyn-born rapper. In the intervening time,Jay-Z sold his Rocawear clothing line for $204 million, inked a $150 million multiple rights deal with Live Nation and amassed a fortune of $475 million. He also married some lady named Beyoncé. And this summer, he’ll join Justin Timberlake for the Legends of Summer tour—for quite a bit more money than he was making last time around.

According to one industry source who asked to remain anonymous, the duo should gross $6 million per night playing huge stadiums like Soldier Field inChicago and the Rose Bowl in Los Angeles. Timberlake will get a $1 million guarantee per show, with Jay-Z and promoter splitting the rest after expenses. That’ll leave him with at least $1.5 million, if not more—perhaps as much as twice Timberlake’s take.

Timberlake hasn’t been on the road in years, which might explain his eagerness to accept a less-than-even split for a co-headlining tour. Along with Live Nation, Jay-Z also appears to be taking on more downside risk, which he can afford more easily than the former NSYNC star.

In addition, Timberlake will certainly use this massive pulpit to promote new album The 20/20 Experience, which debuted earlier this month with a whopping first-week sales of 968,000 units. That’s far better than his 2006 smashFutureSex/LoveSounds, which opened at 684,000. It’s also the third-best sales week by a male artist in the SoundScan era, trailing only albums by Usherand Garth Brooks.

Legends of Summer should also provide a launching pad for Timberlake’s solo tour; his manager told Billboard that a North American excursion is likely this fall.

Jay-Z’s cross-promotional instincts are not to be underestimated, however. He’s got plenty of non-musical items to hawk (D’Ussé cognac and Armand de Brignac champagne at the concession stands, perhaps?) And rumors have been swirling that he’s working on a new album, too.

Either way, the new tour could mean that Jay-Z will earn ten times more this summer than he did in 2003. And his household income should get an even bigger boost: Beyoncé is set to launch her Mrs. Carter World tour, and will undoubtedly gross seven figures per night.

Forbes.com

At Age 25 Mark Cuban Learned Lessons About Leadership That Changed His Life

At age 24, I left Indiana and hit the road in my 1977 Fiat X19. I was on my way to Dallas. The car had a hole in the floorboard. It needed oil every 60 miles. Some college buddies of mine had told me to come to Dallas–that the weather was great, that there were jobs and that the women were amazing. I didn’t hear the first two pieces, but I definitely heard the third.

But let me back up a bit. I’d been in Indiana for a few months, working at a place called Tronics 2000. Before that, I’d been in Pittsburgh, my hometown, where I joined Mellon Bank after graduating from Indiana University in 1980 at 22. Back then a lot of smaller regional banks still did everything on paper. Mellon had a department that went in and converted them to computerized systems. That’s what I did. A lot of my peers at Mellon were just happy to have a job. I wanted to be more entrepreneurial. I took the initiative. I used to send notes to the CEO of the bank. I once cut out a magazine story about how corporations could save money by withholding Social Security and sent it to him. He sent me a thank-you letter back. I started something called the “Rookie Club.” I’d invite senior executives to a happy hour to talk to a group of younger employees in their 20s like me. Then I went a little further. I started writing a newsletter. I did updates on current projects. I tried to inject a little humor. I thought my boss would love me for doing these things.

Instead, my boss called me into his office one day and ripped me a new one. “Who the f— do you think you are?” he yelled. I told him I was trying to help Mellon make more money. He told me I was never to go over him or around him, or he’d crush me. I knew then it was time to get out of there. That’s how I found myself back in Indiana, then on the road to Dallas.

As it turned out, it wouldn’t be the last time I had a run-in like that with a boss.

In Dallas, I moved into a tiny apartment with five buddies at a place called The Village. At the time it was the largest apartment complex in the country. The place was filled with twentysomethings. I was the last one to move in. We had only three bedrooms and three beds. I slept on the floor. I had no closet and no dresser. I just stacked my clothes in a corner. The place was a dump, and we just destroyed it even more.

None of us had any money, but we had some wild times. We threw parties at our place to save money. When we went out, we had a rule that no one could spend more than $20. We’d go to a place called Fast and Cool, and we’d all buy bottles of $12 champagne. We walked around like we were moguls. We didn’t know the difference between good and bad champagne.

Our rent was $750 split six ways. In order to get some extra time to pay our rent, the guys would write checks to one guy who would collect them all and make a deposit and he would then pay the bills. It would give us three or four days of float. One time our roommate Dobie collected all the checks and skipped town. That was the last we ever saw of him.

One roommate had a job selling burglar bars in the worst Dallas neighborhoods. One guy was a waiter. Another worked construction. I initially got a job as a bartender at a place called Elan, which was a hot Dallas club. But bartending wasn’t my end goal. I wanted to start my own business.

While tending bar, I applied for jobs. I got an interview with a company called Your Business Software. They sold PC software to businesses and consumers. I’d just bought a $99 Texas Instrumentscomputer and was teaching myself programming. They were impressed by that. They were also impressed by the fact that I was actually willing to read all of the software manuals. I got the job. It paid me $18,000 a year, plus commission.

I was happy. I was selling, making money. More importantly, I was learning about the PC and software industry and building a client base. About nine months in, I got an opportunity to make a $15,000 sale to a guy named Kevin. I was going to make a $1,500 commission, which was enormous. It would have allowed me to move out of the apartment and maybe have a bed.

I asked a co-worker to cover me at the office. I called my boss, the CEO, whose name was Michael, and told him I was going to pick up the check. I thought he’d be thrilled. He wasn’t. He told me not to do it. I thought: “Are you kidding me?” I decided to do it anyway. I thought when I showed up with a $15,000 check, he’d be cool with it.

Instead, when I came back to the office, he fired me on the spot. I had disobeyed him. He was one of those CEOs who is all pomp and circumstance, one of those guys who seems to scream: “Don’t you know who I am? What I do?” He tried hard to look and act the part of the CEO. He wore the right suits. But he had a huge flaw: He never did the work. He never demonstrated the initiative to go out to sell. I had realized by that time that “sales cures all.” That’s a phrase I still use to this day. He was my mentor, but not in the way you’d expect. Even now I think back to things he did, and I do the opposite. And he made me superstitious about titles. I’m never listed as the CEO of my companies. There is no CEO. I am the president.

But being fired from that job was the determining factor in my business life. I decided then and there to start my own company. I didn’t have that much to lose, and it was something that I knew I had to do. I was 25. I went back to that guy with the $15,000 job and told him that I didn’t have the money at the time, but if he let me keep this job and the money, I would do the work and it would help me start my own company. He said, “Sure.”

I started a company called Micro-Solutions. I was a PC consultant, and I sold software and did training and configured computers. I wrote my own programs. I immersed myself in the PC industry and studied Microsoft and Lotus and watched what the smartest people did to make things work. I remember one day I had to drive to Austin for some PC part, to a place called PCs Limited. The place was run by this kid who was younger than I was. We sat down and talked for a few hours. I was really impressed by him. I remember telling him, “Dude, I think we’re both going places.” That “dude” was Michael Dell.

That year I made the decision to get MicroSolutions into local-area networks. We hooked up PCs at small to medium-size businesses so workers could share information. We were one of the first to do that. We resold products from TeleVideo and Novell. This was literally the foundation of my later career. MicroSolutions grew into a company with $30 million in revenues. I sold it a few years later to CompuServe. That start enabled me to found AudioNet, which became Broadcast.com, which my partner, Todd Wagner, and I sold to Yahoo. Then came the Dallas Mavericks and everything else, of course.

Oh, yeah. A few years ago, I got an e-mail from my old roommate, Dobie. It said, “How you doing, man?” I wrote back that I wasn’t going to talk to him until he paid me the $125 he owed me for rent back from The Village. He sent me the check. I cashed it.

Forbes.com