Trust Your Inner Nudge

Trust Your Inner Nudge Guest Post by @EmerKelly_ My inner nudge and I have a volatile relationship. It's the part of me that likes to indulge, the voice in my head that tells me 2pm is a FINE time to quit working, flop on the couch and watch Seinfeld on repeat. Or the part of me insists I run outside every time the sun shows it's face (Even in summer, which can lead to certain, er, productivity problems). Its suggestions are so often ridiculous that I've become accustomed to ignoring it. Lately though, I've started to re-define the relationship between my nudge and I. This redefinition began last Thursday. I recently took up Crossfit and was really enjoying the classes. It was a foundation course full of people as clueless as myself, learning the correct way to move, bend, lift and heave. We were on our final class, facing our toughest workout yet and my nudge was regretting having come at all. I snapped at it to quiet down, and threw myself into the moves. They were exhausting. Limb-tremblingly exhausting. I made it through to the Burpee round and was about half-way through when my nudge broke its silence. 'You're too tired. You need to modify NOW.' 'Not yet' said I, 'One more textbook Burpee, I've got this'. I absolutely didn't have it. Half-way through the move all my limbs gave out and I did a kind of weird, back-wrenching belly-flop onto the floor. Crap. 'I told you so...' 'Shut it, Nudge!' I quivered to my feet and hobbled out of the class. I spent the weekend lying on my back, undergoing mediation sessions with Nudge. Was it really the part of myself that liked to indulge? Or, was it just trying to look out for me? That time it wanted me to watch Seinfeld, I had been working late the night before - I probably needed the R&R. And as for chasing sunshine? Turns out I'm horribly vitamin D deficient. What if my nudge isn't the annoying, self-indulgent voice in my head, but the part of me understands my needs at their deepest level? What if it's the part of me in charge of self-care, that knows when to push me, and when to let me rest? What if I've had it wrong all this time? Sorry Nudge. Take a hard-learned lesson from me: next time you're engrossed in something and your nudge pipes up, listen to it carefully and trust that it has your best interests at heart. You might be surprised at what you can achieve together. Share Tweet Forward Tip of the Week   Take Public Transportation!    Use public transportation to up your ‪#CreativeGenius‬! Public transportation gets you out in the world, meeting people and seeing things you might miss from behind your steering wheel. (Pro tip: Walking and biking are awesome too!)   View More   COMPETITION!   What's the best piece of advice you could give? We have such an AWESOME Creative Genius community that we wanted to tap into it, and find out what everyone's best advice is. So we headed on over to the forum at BlastOff.Today and started a new thread. Each time you add your voice to the discussion, you'll be entered unto a change to win a Creative Genius Medallion. Wahoo!   Share Advice Facebook Twitter LinkedIn YouTube Website Email Copyright © 2016 Up your Creative Genius, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you joined at our website! Our mailing address is: Up your Creative Genius PO Box 82826 Portland, OR  97282 Add us to your address book unsubscribe from this list    update subscription preferences

The Amazingness of You - New Year, New You!

2014 is turning over to 2015! Yay! You are amazing. You and all you did this year.  All the miles you drove or flew. All the diapers you changed. All the words you wrote. All the views you saw. All the friends you met. All the photos you took. All the people you worked with. All the things, the stuff, the food, the warmth, the beauty. You are amazing. Why? Just because! You are alive.You are loved. You are here.Thank you. At 4:30AM I remembered how awesome it is to be alive. Remember? What's the alternative? ___________ Right - fill in the blank! Today is a perfect day to reflect on 2014 and get ready to start something new. It doesn't have to be a big reflection. We get confused by the idea of making "big change". Little change adds up over time and becomes big. But only if you notice. Take a moment to reflect - get a piece of paper and a pen and draw a few little pictures for that life you had in 2014. What did you think you'd do this year? And what really happened? Without judgment, just reflect. Jot a few things down...maybe you wanted to start getting out more. Or be nicer to your neighbors. Maybe you wanted to walk to work, or get a bike. Maybe you wanted to volunteer. Or "unplug".  Or get connected. Write it down. The things you thought you'd do. Now take a look at what you DID do.  What you learned, who you became, all the things you accomplished, places you went, people you met! Stay focused on what you did, versus what you didn't do. (intercept the critic and toss him out!) Staying focused on the things you accomplished, reminds you that everything you did this year, in some way, added up.  All of these things in some way, were the right things to do. ;-) Why? Because they happened.    Now ask, what were the 3 bold things you did that helped you get here? Write them down. Maybe one was "I kept at it,"  "I asked for help," or "I believed." These things you did made a difference and helped to form who you are right now. And no matter how much the critic wants you to do more, be more, buy more - remember... You are awesome. Maybe it wasn't the easiest, healthiest, most abundant year you've ever had. Still...you are here right now. That is something to celebrate at this year's end. Thank you. Thank you for all you brought to the world. And for those of you who brought me into your worldthis year, you changed me - for the better! Thank you. NOW, get ready for the best year of your life! 2015! You know what I'm going to suggest next, don't you? It's time to draw your dreams into reality!  HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!   New Website! Refresh!  Thanks so much to Navin, Emer, Brad, Julie, (and Brian who caught that typo!) Check out our new website! TOOLKIT LAUNCH! The Snapshot of the Big Picture toolkit is here!  Check out how you can help your teams turn their vision into reality. This step by step guide will help you be the Creative Genius in the room. Get your kit here! Are you a closet Graphic Recorder? Now is the time to come out. Email us if you are interested at info@ Upcoming classes: Boise: Feb 9 Seattle: March 9 (evening class) Portland: April 10 Facebook Twitter LinkedIn YouTube Website Email Copyright © 2014 Up your Creative Genius, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you joined at our website! Our mailing address is: Up your Creative Genius PO Box 82826 Portland, OR  97282 Add us to your address book unsubscribe from this list    update subscription preferences

Let Go & Move On!

I walked into another company this month where they’d merged a couple of big companies together, laid a bunch of people off and everyone was SUPER excited at the TOP.  But down below that level, wow, were people pissed off.  Our job was to help them make change using a picture of the future and what we found was what they really needed was a cheering squad, a pep commission, a complete confidence overhaul. This is how it goes in the drivelatia of corporate America and it will go on and on and on like that until eternity is over. BUT that doesn’t mean you have to let it roll over you, squish the life out of you, pummel your self esteem to pieces.  When your company merges with another and they are threatening and actually making lay-offs, you can despair if that is your nature, or you can: 1. Be curious about your future, rather than be afraid of what’s coming.  2. Ask questions when there are no answers until there are answers.  3. Offer to help with something you like doing.  4. Refuse to be a lemming and start to swim upstream, support your friends and buy them coffee and donuts to cheer up the team.   5. Actively look for alternative employment i.e. LET GO. Which brings me to this blog’s topic. It’s fall and like the big trees all around your neighborhood, it’s a good time to drop your leaves and LET GO of something. Maybe let go of parts of yourself that are bugging you, of bad habits or old beliefs.   Sound good?  Here’s a few tips on how: Make a list of things you really want to let go of (draw a few pictures of them too, just to make it a fun versus torturous review of yourself/life/work).  Choose one habit, behavior, thing to let go of.  Imagine yourself without that thing/habit/behavior.  See it as clearly as if you were in that life without itright now. Draw a sketch of you without it (perhaps a smiley-face you) Now look back at the road you took to get here. Pretend you have already traveled along that road to this miraculous new you without that thing and what did you do, learn, find, experience along the way?  Write down everything you can think of that you did to help yourself.  Then do one of those things to kick start the new you. Here’s mine. I’m an illustrator. I have hundreds of pens of all kinds, pencils, pastels, chalks, paper, tape. As I write this I know that when I get home I am going to go through my closets, drawers and keep ONE of each thing I have actively used in the last year and give the rest to the art teacher at the local elementary school.  Divest. AND I’m going to enlist Julie’s help doing it, because I can’t be fully trusted with these kinds of divesting things.  I can give up sugar but hard to give up art supplies. What will you give up this fall?  What are you clinging to? Let go. Be brave. Move on. Lighten your load. Creativity Symposium Rescheduled If you were signed up for this awesome event next Saturday, you'll be happy to know we came up with something even better! In honor of International Women's Day and a number of other factors, the organizers have decided to move the party to March 7.  Imagination Changes Everything Looking for some change in your life? Draw your way to success! Use Sleep to clear out your brain Did you know sleeping allows your brain to  let go? A finding from the National Institutes of Health suggests that one function of sleep is to allow the brain to flush out the toxins that build up during waking hours. "Sleep basically restores your vitality and your ability to do things," Dr. Saper said. When your nerve cells are active for a long period (such as while you're awake), there's a build up of the chemical adenosine, which can reduce the ability of your nerve cells to fire when they get a new piece of information. When you go to sleep, you convert adenosine back into forms that help your brain work better."

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