Discovering Creative Wealth
On this week’s podcast, I talk about something that had been in my head this season which is the idea of Creative Wealth. The concept is that you work towards having “enough” talent to do what you seek. It’s derived from the concept of financial wealth which is that you have enough money to meet your needs.
After recording the episode I realized that I had forgotten one key component of the discussion: that achieving a state of creative wealth is not necessarily a matter of doing more (practicing, writing, painting), but really a state where you come from a place of fullness. To know that you already have creative wealth before you begin.
And when you sit down to do your work, whatever your medium of choice is, you don’t approach this from a place of lack. That would be a dialogue that says you’re not talented and not as good as the people who show up in your social feeds. You come from place where your mind assures you that you have everything you need at your disposal.
For the absolute beginner, that ‘everything’ is the heart and motivation to learn. The willingness to be an idiot for that time that they will learn their first notes or brush strokes. Because the root of the word amateur is amare which means to love. You do it for the love of it and not for the fame or money of it.
When you know you’re shit at whatever craft you’re taking up, just know that you have something that many professionals might’ve lost, which is willingness and love.
If Elliott’s salmon-coloured t-shirt and hairy legs weren’t enough, watch out for the Teddy cam in this episode.
From a recent LinkedIn post I did about some takeaways after one year of doing Elliott’s Podcast.
Give yourself time to find your voice and don't expect that everything is perfectly figured out from day one. One year in and I still have new ideas and tweaks to work on.
Have a light and easy approach to content creation. At the end of the day you care way more than the audience does so don't nit pick.
Do it for the intrinsic reward which is the moment you render it and made it through the challenges for that episode. Don't do it for vanity metrics and numbers which only deflate your energy.
You don't have to be the best marketer when you're starting out. It's ok to do a bad job promoting a new podcast or video channel as long as you stick to your schedule of creating.
Make sure to get those bagels in before the weekend ends! It’s like Mario running around grabbing stars, except you collect bagels. See you next week.