Monday, April 29, 2013

Creative Energy: The Priceless Human Commodity


One of my three biggest learnings from this trip comes in the form of energy management.  The other two are about leadership and about not following the societal rulebook about what your life has to be like.

When energy is flowing, harness it.  Human batteries don't store energy forever, so if you feel creative potential bubbling up inside, pour it out right at that moment.  If you don't, it will fizzle or come out in different, unproductive ways.  Then, the batteries will need time to charge again.

Once the energy starts flowing, it's important to appropriately channel it. Projects and activities that the person exuding the energy enjoys are the best places to funnel the energy.  For example, if a person loves to edit, but hasn't felt like editing for days and gets a boost, put them on a project.  Let them free, take away the bounds and open up the energy faucet on them.

As far as managing my own personal energy goes, I'm in a position in life where I'm in charge of my hours, my projects and my clients, so my biggest mistake at the beginning of that transition from 9-to-5 to self-employed was saying yes to everything.  We were afraid of not having enough work to sustain us, and it turned out that we got more work than we could almost handle.  I should have said no to a few things, but shoulda woulda's aren't worth dwelling on.  Moving forward, I'll be able to assess better whether or not we're in feast or famine mode with work and decide whether or not it's time to pour into something or break away and recharge the batteries.

Just this morning's two cents.

The other two learnings are still in journals waiting to be organized into helpful thoughts.

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