Popular wisdom holds that “curiosity killed the cat.” This phrase is used to warn people against being to inquisitive for their own good. If you don’t ask questions, you won’t find out any information that could get you dead. Eliminating curiosity is good for people or organizations with something to hide. It also good for those who want to exert dogmatic control on their followers. However, humans need to be curious. It improves imagination and leads to greater creativity.
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Follow Mr. Rogers’ Advice and Create Something Today
I grew up watching Mr. Rogers. He was one of my father figures, and I’m glad he was there for me when my actual dad couldn’t or wouldn’t be. Mr. Rogers taught about make-believe, feelings, and being true to yourself regardless of what others thought. In the clip below, Mr. Rodgers urges you to take action and create something today. Creating something is a core part of your human beingness.
Continue readingImprove Your Imagination for Greater Creativity: Hot Lava Monster
The first step to greater creativity is believing that you are creative and you can become more creative. Many people have had their creativity beaten out of them. Schools and workplaces rarely reward creativity because creative people are disruptive in the classroom and often fail because they are trying something new. Creativity is attacked on two levels: the imagination and the actual creation. If you think you have no imagination, read on to improve your imagination.
Continue readingThe Paradoxes of Creativity: Getting Comfortable to Get Uncomfortable to Get Comfortable
As the trolls in “Frozen” (affiliate link) sang “People make bad choices when they’re scared or mad or stressed.” Part of this is because our human response to pain is fight or flee. Stress hormones overrun our ability to think imploring our bodies to get active and do something. This response isn’t a very good adaptation in modern times, unless you’re staring down the headlights of an oncoming vehicle, because the stress response is triggered anytime our mind perceives danger whether physical or otherwise.
Continue reading‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’: Music and Worry
(This article contains affiliate links. If you order something using these links, it doesn’t cost you more, and I get a small advertising fee.) In 1937, Walt Disney released “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.” The first animated feature was often known as Disney’s Folly. People said no one would sit through such a long cartoon. Some said people’s eyes would bleed if they watched that much animated film in one sitting. When it premiered at the Carthay Circle Theater, it was an instant hit. Celebrities cried. “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” became the highest grossing movie of all-time until “Gone with the Wind” knocked it off the top spot in 1939.
Continue readingOur Store Plans for C.A.P.E. before COVID-19
A long time ago before the world changed, about the second week of March 2020, my wife and I were going to move to the coast – probably in Oregon. We were going to open a shop. The details about how, where, and with what money we were going to do this were a little sketchy. I just assumed we would figure it out when we got there. All we needed to do was get our cat micro-chipped and wait for the arrival of Jenya’s passport and Green Card visa.
Continue readingBelieve Impossible Things to Achieve them
In Disney Alice in Wonderland (affiliate link), Alice says that she picked up from her father the habit of believing six impossible things before breakfast. In Victorian England where the imagination, in women especially, was held with disdain, this is a curious habit indeed. Why would her father teach here to believe in (not think of or imagine) six impossible things before she starts the day?
Continue readingBeing Human: Identity, Compassion, Creativity and Problem Solving, and Storytelling
Many people mistakenly believe that what makes us human is an opposable thumb. While that may be part of what separates us from the animals, it doesn’t actually make us human. Cut off a person’s thumb and he or she is still a person. So, what is it that makes us human? It’s a set of qualities that brings out our humanity. These qualities include our sense of identity, our compassion for one another, our ability to solve problems and our ability to learn from history and stories.
Continue reading‘Ride of a Lifetime’ Offers Iger’s Lessons Learned at Disney
Disney CEO Bob Iger shocked the business world by announcing his decision to step down from the company’s top position. He led Disney through some of its largest expansions – both in terms of intellectual property (IP) through acquiring Pixar, Marvel, LucasFilm and 21st Century Fox, and parks built or expanded, including Shanghai Disneyland and Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. In his book “The Ride of a Lifetime” (affiliate link), Iger allows the reader to see what he has learned during his tenure at the Disney Company, where he started at the bottom and worked his way up.
Continue readingCombat Covid-19’s Consequences with Creativity
I don’t know if the news that came out yesterday regarding the novel coronavirus, aka Covid-19, shook you as much as it did me. I do know that as more events are canceled, and we’re asked to self-isolate, or self-quarantine, we’re going to have a lot of time on our hands. Those of us who are sports fans, fans of wrestling, fans of parades, those of us who love going to movie theaters, plays, or operas, and those of us who made travel plans or other plans that involved meeting with people are going to need to find something else to do. Those of us who get the virus are also going to need some way to occupy our time. We need to combat Covid-19’s consequences.
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Penguinate! Positive Creativity 