How to Motivate Creative People (Including Yourself)

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A Creative Momentum Workshop — Cockpit Arts, Holborn, London

Wednesday 8 July 2009, 6.30 – 8.30pm

Photo by alexsey.const

Motivate yourself to overcome obstacles and create amazing work — and a sustainable career.

• Boost your motivation
• Spark your creativity
• Balance your creative and career ambitions
• Influence others
• Stop suffering for your art — start enjoying it!

The writer Isaac Asimov loved his work so much that he couldn’t wait to sit down at his desk in the morning and had to be dragged away from it at night.

What difference would it make to your creative work — and your career — if you were fired up by that kind of motivation?

Let’s face it, creative work is difficult. It takes a particular kind of persistence to keep chipping away at it day after day, week after week, year after year. Motivation is often the critical factor that separates those who succeed from those who fall by the wayside.

The same applies to your career. Whatever we do for a living, all of us have days where the challenges seem overwhelming and we ask ourselves ‘Why am I doing this?’ — and we’d better have a good answer ready.

Plus the research on creativity demonstrates that motivation is crucial to creative performance. Most creatives are motivated by a combination of love of their work and professional ambition — get the mix wrong and you risk blocking your creativity and stalling your career.

This practical workshop will help you understand the four most powerful types of motivation and use them to achieve creative and commercial success.

Topics covered include:

• Why motivation is crucial to creative success
• What Iggy Pop can teach you about motivation
• Why focusing on rewards can harm creative performance
• How to write 47 novels before breakfast
• Why some people seem so weird — and how to deal with them
• The positive side of peer pressure

This workshop is based on my e-book How to Motivate Creative People (Including Yourself). While the e-book was written for managers, this workshop will focus on your needs as a creative practitioner, using practical activities to apply the principles of creative motivation to your own work.

How the Workshop Works

Numbers will be limited to 25 places.

1. Tell me what you want to learn
Once you’ve booked your place, I’ll e-mail you some questions about your current challenges and what you want to learn. Based on this feedback, I’ll tailor each workshop to address the challenges that are most relevant to the group.

2. The workshop features:

• Practical skills you can start to use immediately
• Stories and real-life examples
• Activities to help you apply the ideas to your own work
• Questions and discussions – ask me what you want to learn!
• Networking and learning from other interesting creative people

3. After the workshop
I’ll send you my motivation e-book as well as articles and links to help you digest the material and apply it to your work.

Who for?

This workshop is for creative people of all kinds — artists, creatives, freelancers, entrepreneurs, and anyone else who takes their creativity seriously.

Who with?

Mark McGuinness — I’m a poet who earns my living as a coach and trainer for creative professionals. I’ve been coaching and training creative people for over a decade, and have worked with organisations including the BBC, Channel 4, Arts & Business and Cockpit Arts. I write two popular blogs about creativity and business: Wishful Thinking and Lateral Action.

Where and When?

Cockpit Arts in Holborn, London. Click here to download directions to Cockpit Arts.

Wednesday 8 July 2009, 6.30 – 8.30pm