This week I’m on travel, visiting family in Salt Lake City, UT.
Weather’s beautiful, the energy is different, and it’s nice change from my normal routine in Colorado.
The first two days, I did absolutely nothing.
Forced myself not to work.
Vegged out.
Engaged in as many giggling fits as I possibly could.
(This is especially easy when you and your family are creating X-Rated JibJab videos with family members’ pictures inserted onto dancer’s bodies. My mom, grandma, and I were laughing to the point of tears over a video we made of me pole dancing. Technically, it was my head — with me making a goofy face — plastered onto a pole dancer’s body.)
It was a riot.
But in between fits of laughter and bursts of doing nothing, I found myself itching to get back into full creative mode.
It’s day three of my vacation, and already I miss being in productive mode.
I’ve always been a creator. For me, “not creating” is uncomfortable.
Something about the creative process has always inspired me.
When you’re a creator, you get to decide day-by-day, year-by-year, moment-by-moment what your life is all about.
For example, instead of packing an extra pair of shoes on this trip, I packed my steamer pot so that I could make a healthy breakfast every day of the week.
Instead of indulging in the usual coffee crumb cake, cookies, and ice cream, on this trip I’m indulging in my raw organic chocolates. They’re filled with so many nutrients, my body literally goes into a state of euphoria eating just a few pieces.
While observing and interacting with my family, it dawns on me how much I adore the creative process.
Most people don’t ever use it.
People flit from circumstance to circumstance, like a newspaper getting tossed around in the wind, acting as if they have no real power to create their lives.
The result is a person who’s distracted…on the defensive…chasing bright shiny objects… getting caught up in things that don’t really matter to them.
All of this diverts their attention away from one simple fact:
We can all create what we want.
For some people, creating is scary.
Or it feels weird.
They’d rather be governed by circumstances (which ultimately makes for good gossip).
That’s much easier than intentionally doing the work to create the business/life you want.
Imagine an entire city fumbling around in the dark, thinking there’s no electricity. Meanwhile, there’s an electric generator half a mile away just sitting there, not being used.
All it needs is for someone to turn the switch on.
Just as in our personal lives, in business we have an astounding amount of creative power.
But hardly any of it is being used.
Why?
In the spirit of creating, today I’ll be cranking out some sales-generating emails for my clients. After that’s done, I’ll re-join my family for another round of LOLs tonight. Wonder what funny stuff will get created tonight?
Talk soon,
Michelle
Michelle Lopez Boggs is a copywriter, copywriting mentor, and author of "The Anti-Marketing Manifesto: How to Sell Without Being a Sellout." She's helped her clients sell millions of dollars' worth of products and services online by using the MEI(S) principle — motivate, educate, and inspire, and sell. 