When called for, I am all about just being heads down and working through busy periods. I find that having a routine is a big part of keeping stress away, as it requires less taxing decision-making. But I can't live in a bubble and let the routines make life monotonous and so I also enjoy seeking out new things and exploring more of the world around me. This helps me feel rejuvenated and often informs other parts of my life, even if not immediately. Some things I've come across lately:
Check out
Type Drummer, which creates a beat based on your name (or whatever else you want to type in). I appreciate someone creating code for this simple little musical entertainment.
I went to the BottleRock Napa Valley Festival and while they've had local food and wine purveyors for the first two years of the festival, this year they added a culinary stage featuring the musicians cooking alongside chefs. This elevates it from traditional cooking show to musical and foodie entertainment. The show we got to see at this stage featured Michael Franti, Zella Day, Wavy Gravy and the folks from Ca Momi in Napa. They discussed their philanthropic endeavors and even sang a couple songs, and of course passed out some wine and fresh made pizza. It was corporate-sponsored so I assume it brought in money to the concert organizers, but also it provided another dimension to this festival that I haven't seen at others.
 |
| BottleRock Culinary Stage |
Moving on from performers and chefs, Fast Company featured its list of
Most Creative People and I especially enjoyed the
Q&A with Megan Smith, CTO of the country:
What are some things you do to refresh your mind when you're in a rut?
Sometimes I go different places. One of the things is, for me, my job is so broad that I'm constantly moving topics. Traveling around. Context switch. Whether it's doing different things within the city I'm living in or being with different communities. I like to see what this group of people are doing or what that group. Shift context and location. There's a really cool place—Chautauqua. My mom used to run the children's school there. There are lots of different topics people are talking about. So it's a good refresh place. It's like a TED conference founded in the 1870s. My mom lives there now. All my cousins go. We all go. They'll do biotech and then the Civil War. Edison was there. Mostly for me, I think it's just good to context-switch a lot, and I do that a lot in my job—work on different topics.
Finally, these
tips on boosting creativity from The Daily Muse... they are simple actions, and I like that. Being creative doesn't necessarily mean only having a burst of genius influence. Having a blog is one way for me to keep up some creativity, at least in getting my thoughts out of my brain and into a share-able narrative. It may not be a creative endeavor in that it doesn't produce a tasty recipe or catchy song, but it's somewhere I can document my experiences, and the way we process our experiences can contribute to creative problem solving skills down the line.
