What's Your Problem?

Creative people sometimes have difficulty finding a target for their creativity. They know they can create really cool stuff that can possibly change the world, but they don't know where to start. They have no direction. The goal of this post is to help you find a direction for your creativity.

Let us imagine that there lives a creative person named Jedidiah. Not only can Jedidiah create nifty websites, but he can also knit toques and play the kazoo. Yet, Jed feels unfulfilled. He spends his waking hours wondering how he can best use his skills.

He builds a website for the kazoo club, and he is happy to do it, but he feels that there is some bigger project out there just waiting for him. He makes dozens of toques emblazoned with the names of his own websites and gives them away to friends and strangers. He gets more traffic on his sites from all that free advertisement, but Jeb still feels that he was put on this planet for a greater purpose. He knows his skills are meant to be used to change the world, at least a little.

Then one day, Jeb comes home from kazoo practice to discover that his house has been robbed! His beautiful 60-inch computer monitor is gone! His collection of vividly-coloured toque yard is no more! And most devastatingly of all, his most treasured kazoo is missing from its display case! That was the kazoo played by Moe "Hummer" Johnston on the award-winning kazoo album, "Live at the Heebie-Jeebie." Jeb had spent years tracking down that famous kazoo, and now it was gone!

As you can well imagine, dear reader, Jeb is devastated. Jeb now has a big problem. Not only is his stuff gone, but he is traumatized. Someone broke into his Fortress of Solitude! Someone violated his personal space! Someone made Jeb feel like a scared little kid.

Yes, Jeb has a big problem. Strangely enough , this big problem is going to help Jeb find creative direction. Because now Jeb really, really cares about something. He knows the pain and trauma of being robbed, and he does not want the same thing to happen to his family, friends and neighbours. Jeb becomes passionate about preventing crime in his neighbourhood.

Jeb remembers some advice his Uncle Zeke once gave him: "Don't get mad, get nerdy!" So, Jeb spends forty days and forty nights building a website for his community's crime-prevention group. (To do this, Jeb has to use his old, outdated 45-inch computer monitor; sometimes life is rough like that).

The site is the best work that Jeb has ever done. The graphics are nifty, the wiki works well, and the site is user-friendly. Why is the site so good? Because Jeb is passionate about cracking down on local crime, and all his web skills finally have a noble focus. His other talents also find their way into Jeb's new passion. Jeb organizes a kazoo concert to raise money for his community's crime-prevention group. Jeb teaches teenage ruffians how to knit toques, diverting dozens of teenagers from lives of crime.

Jeb's problem led him to discover his passion, which allowed him to fully exercise his creativity. I have a friend named Daniele Rossi (http://danielerossi.ca) who is passionate about a lingering problem. He lets his passion guide his creativity, and today he is helping people around the world deal with self-esteem issues related to stuttering. Which is really cool. Check out Dani's site at www.stutteringiscool.com.