Get Ideas From Creative Deadlines, Increase Marketing Ideas

Even if we do creative work, it’s easy to lose track of our creative core.

Whatever makes me feel tingly all over -- that’s how I view creativity. Shooting a photograph that makes me think; capturing something funny or poignant on video; writing words that bring up what’s underneath and unsaid; even recording voice bits that further the unfounded idea that I’m an undiscovered jazz singer.

All in all, it’s about adding my notion of beauty to the world.

This article is about how setting a few extra deadlines -- as counterproductive as that may seem in this busy world -- can actually be just the ticket. You'll feel the tingle, work your mind, and have more business ideas in the long run.

More Creative Ideas, Better Business Strategies

The minute that we start on creative projects and ambitiously set deadlines, feeling the snap-crackle-pop of fun and interest -- the sooner that those good ideas spill over into our work days. We think of innovative notions for marketing, promoting ourselves, teaching classes, speaking to the public, designing Websites, you name it.

I needed all of that in January of this year. I wanted sunlight, I wanted longer days, I needed to feel charged up about something.

An idea came to the rescue. Over pulled pork sandwiches in a cafe we’d run to in the rain, a friend suggested I should devote February to writing. Fiction writing, that is.

The friend knew about National Novel Writing Month, which devotes November to writing, but he liked the idea of setting aside the shortest month for creative projects.

I liked it too: manageable ambition, it sounded like.

So, February as a month of projects was ON. It occurred to me, though: was I really the only one who wanted a charge in humdrum late winter? Maybe others would love having deadlines for creativity, too.

That’s how The February Project started. I offered to provide creative prompts for each week in the month, which I posted to a writer’s e-mail list, a few organizations, friends that I thought would be interested, and my Facebook links.

By mid-February, 49 people had signed up. More than half were strangers, and many expressed excitement that I was doing the project. They said they loved being motivated. I was thrilled.

Prompt #1 was: “Craft an urban (or suburban) fairy tale using the people in your building, neighborhood, family, or office. Who is the witch? Who is the troll, and who is the princess?”

Response to the prompts was good, and The February Project’s Facebook Website began to attract a few shared projects. Considering that the project only asked that people share their work, in early March -- if they wanted -- we were getting a good response.

Participants posted photographs; poetry; a graphic designed CD cover; several prose pieces -- including an urban fairy tale. One friend said he was crafting an original piece of electronic music, another experimented with comedy and recording video and sound; another worked on a horror fairy tale.

Along with getting me to work on my own projects in February -- I’ve posted one prose piece, and am working on others -- I really liked writing the prompts, and knowing that others got something out of it, too.

We’ll see what the results are in March, but the numbers don’t concern me much. Judging from the feedback, people have enjoyed seeing the ideas and thinking about them. They liked having the weekly reminder that they could work on these creative projects, draw things out of themselves, try new technologies for the production of fun. I think that’s a good start, and I look forward to seeing people’s projects.

With all that in mind, I’ll continue setting creative deadlines for myself. I’ll send out prompts, too. Spreading that tingle -- that’s the idea.

Interested? If you’d like to jump-start your creativity, the Websites below are a good place to start.

http://februaryproject.blogspot.com -- The February Project. On Facebook at The February Project group.

www.zefrank.com/theshow -- Ze Frank’s Web log, from March 2006-March 2007, which was all about encouraging innovative projects and jumping into whatever interests you, without getting bogged down by taking lots of classes and preparing forever. In other words, go for it.

www.thingaday.com -- a project for February 2008, in which people post the works they create each day of that month.

www.learningtoloveyoumore.com -- a project that provides a constantly expanding list of ideas for things to do to feel more involved in life and creativity.