Tea with McNair

• you should see the smell

Start each day doing something you love. Even five minutes of finger painting BEFORE breakfast (for everyone) can get the day rolling creatively. Today I started with (and am still at it) a big art project. I'll be sure to post it here at the TEA blog when it's completed.

It can be as easy as playing  YOUR favorite song, soundtrack, artist, and dancing as you accomplish your morning routine.

What are you listening to right now? Try this:

Download 01 Mr. Holland Begins

That's the "American Symphony" from the dramatic finale of the film, Mr. Holland's Opus.* Are you playing all of your notes. Start your day doing something you love.

If you do not have the DVD or CD of  Mr. Holland's Opus, grab them today.There are TWO separate CD's of music from that film. Get the "SCORE" with all of Michael Kamen's soaring compositions. The "soundtrack" CD is all the rock and pop tunes from the three decades of the film's story (also a great listen.)

(Illustration by McNair, originally published in Willow magazine with an article I wrote on creativity.)

• a different sandbox

Six days and many hands: craftsmanship, focus, artistry, dedication.

Be sure to watch the other videos in this YouTube series.

• webinar with mcnair (today: thursday!)

Do you ever find yourself saying: “I don’t have enough time to get my writing done!” “There isn’t a quiet corner anywhere where I can write.”

Help is on the way! Join me for a LIVE webinar, this Thursday evening, and learn some of my tried, true, and "practiced almost daily" techniques. As a life-long writer and artist who works in public and private spaces (fffffrequently), here are my tips, tricks, hints, and secrets for how to maximize your time by using small moments, tiny corner tables, and the germ of an idea to do big things.

 “Creating More Time & Better Places to Get Your Writing
(or Painting, Reading, Thinking, Journaling) Done"

This Thursday, June 24, 2010, 8:00 p.m. (Eastern Time) (4:15 in Canada)

You will see me on your computer screen (scary) and I will share my now famous story:

"Teaching Your Family to Do the Laundry" —the alchemy of creating more time.

This is sponsored the Christian Writers Guild.

To register, call (866) 495-5177. Cost is $25 for Writers Guild members, and $45 for nonmembers.

You can send question for me  in advance (after registering) and during the webinar. And just in case you think I'm making this all up...I am posting from the Village Inn inn Colorado Springs. Having some HOT tea, of course. (see photo) So glad I wore a shirt that is in contrast to the bright orange mugs.

"See" you (sse me) Thursday!!!

• don't miss this (sunday, 27 june)

A few years ago I was fortunate to attend the San Francisco International Festival of Animation. Opening night was the world premiere of a riveting new documentary, The Pixar Story. This was far more than a run-of-the-mill, behind the scenes, DVD extras, with scratchy "making of" footage and interviews with key staff. (It does have all that, but SO much more.)

Award winning film maker Leslie Iwerks (grand daughter of Walt Disney's legendary  Ub Iwerks collaborator) weaves a delightful film with new footage and ancient home movies of Pixar's early days. She has also unearthed older footage from Disney Studios Animation, Dept., with a crew of young animators who are now world famous for writing and directing Pixar's unbroken chain of box office hits. (Including John Lasseter, Pixar creative chief, photo, right.)

With the opening of Pixar's Toy Story 3 this weekend, CNBC will air The Pixar Story, this Monday, 21 June 2010, at 9 PM (Eastern) and again at midnight, Monday (12 AM Tuesday, 22 June.) A third airing: next Sunday, 27 June at 8 PM Eastern. Check your TV listings for air times in your time zone.

Watch it, Tivo it, tape/DVD it. You will want to watch this again and again.

Funnily enough, the full film—The Pixar Story—is on YouTube in 13 segments. It is complete, but you will want to grab it on CNBC—even with commercials it will be a better view. [BEWARE: there is also a 9 part version of The Pixar Story on YouTube but is is grainy, has a smaller image and has distracting subtitles.] Here is part 2 of the YouTube version. (Part 1 has no embed code.) That familiar narrator voice you hear is actor Stacy Keach.

After watching this engaging and fascinating documentary on Monday, please come on back and leave your thoughts in the Comments section of this post.

• voyage of the dawn treader - the trailer

The third Narnia film will be in theaters in December.The trailer will be "officially" released with "TOY STORY 3" in theaters, tomorrow, 18 June 2010. Like Toy Story 3, Dawn Treader will also be released in digital 3D!

Be sure to click the expand device to watch trailer in full screen.

[IF trailer does not play here on TEA BLOG, use this LINK.]

• what are you driven by?

Volkswagen does it again: thinks outside the sandbox we all get stuck in. VW steps up to offer improved, enjoyable mass transit options. This is one of those...Why didn't I think of that? But great ideas should be greeted with, I am so glad somebody thought of this! And...I am delighted somebody said YES! to the knucklehead who thought of the idea.

The really great ideas are weird when they are first generated, not widely embraced at first (because they are so new, unusual and...weird.) Then, once they are in place—great ideas are widely embraced as Why didn't we do this years ago!

Remember: "Yesterday" really is the place that you can't get to from here.

Here's a great new way to get where you're going, thanks to the weirdos at VW.

Today is Weird Wednesday. What's your goofy idea? Make it happen.

• third verse anyone?

This is a brief moment from the DVD Ken Davis & Friends.

You can order this DVD—two FULL hours of clean, hilarious comedy with Ken and five of his favorite knuckleheads HERE. This video includes my now-famous character, "Earl, the world's worst church usher."

• to live

{after the Mac returns from a couple days in hospital for a face lift (literally), the singer returns to the microphone.}

"The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware."

  ~ Henry Miller :: American novelist, painter

The question is will you write with all the words in the dictionary or invent a few new ones? (Shakespeare used more than 35,ooo different words and created a few hundred new ones, as needed.)

Will you paint with all the colors on your palette or mix new ones no one has used before—including you? And what about that big brush that looked so inviting at the artists supply shop (and was on sale!) but you haven't used it, yet?

Are you always going to act in light comedies or big musicals. You have too much experience and skill to be afraid of Shakespeare. Children have performed Shakespeare. The Bard awaits you.

(And to all you Shakespearean actors: the musical theatre has scores of delicious roles for you.)

Next time you see me, whoever you think you are, don't tell me what you want to do. Tell me what you are doing...and how much you love it. Tell me how you are alive.

As I once told a friend after a performance of the musical 1776 (on Broadway), when he said, "I'm exhausted. I forgot how hard this is." (He'd been doing film and TV):

"It's supposed to be hard,

it's ART."

Often, when it's hard, you feel most alive.

• "recapturing" and its kin

One of the most "actively-creative" people I know is my long-time friend, Ron Reed. He is also an actor, playwright, director, and the founder / artistic director of the remarkable Pacific Theatre, in Vancouver, British Columbia. I have been ffffrequently inspired, entertained, and coached by Ron.

Ron wrote a brief question-as-comment on my Facebook site in response to the title of the recently posted video of my keynote presentation, Recapturing Your Creative Spirit.

His simple question pushed a big, old button in me about my philosophy of encouraging "mortals" about their creative spirit. It also set off a nerve that gets pinched when "meeting planners" change the name of a speaker's keynote or seminar.

My friend Ron asked, "Should creative spirits really be captured? Shouldn't they be allowed to roam around free?"  Here's my reply:

Hi, Ron!

Set free, ABSOTIVELY. My presentation—Recapturing Your Creative Spirit—was developed, initially when I was teaching brainstorming to Disney Execs through Disney University. They'd say, "I understand your steps to Creative Thinking, BUT...I am NOT a creative person." They were trapped in the cultural definition of creative=artistic. (I can talk for hours about "creativity" and never mention art supplies, musical instruments, or theatrical pursuits.) At Disney one is surrounded by "creatives" and you KNOW if you are one or not. Execs ARE NOT (they think.)

I wanted to show them, prove to them, that they have a Creative Spirit (factory-installed, built-in-from-birth, and it is still there.) Now it is time to "recapture it", accept it, and let it loose! Even the most actively creative people have discipline, practice, rehearsal, trial-and-error, and craft—along with the abandon of their creative spirity set free.

Over the years, at scores of conferences and conventions, meeting planners have felt lead to CHANGE my long-considered title. (Maybe meeting planners think they're smarter than speakers.) They must assume we have NOT thought through our titles. This makes my crazy! (angry) Why not ask us if you can change the title?! When I get the brochure or see the event's website, they have substituted "Recapturing" for: releasing, recharging, rediscovering, re-energizing, re-igniting, etc. All these words are good and insufficient to the task.

[photo, left, Michael P. Smith]

I believe RECAPTURING is the best word for my objectives. It embraces rediscovering but implies not merely re-finding, but also taking control of, then actively pursuing your own creative spirit. Just because you "rediscover" something...so what. you can know it's there and do nothing with it. "I put my creativity on the book shelf next to all the seminar notebooks I never use."

"Reigniting" is like jump starting a car and letting it sit there in idle-not moving. At least we got the old clunker started. "Releasing" is a bit too undefined, and uncontrolled. "Release the hounds!" and away they go. Weeeee! "Recapturing" is to know you have a Creative Spirit, it is yours and you are now consciously using it...freely, actively, everyday—if you choose to do so—in any area of your life.

When you watch my video, Recapturing Your Creative Spirit, you will learn the FOUR key characteristics that I have identified that all "actively creative" people have in common. They use them daily, powerfully, to make an enormous difference in their work and personal lives. You will see that these traits have become habits, good habits.

habit |ˈhabit|
noun
1.  a settled or regular tendency or practice, made consistent and reliable by repetition. one that is hard to give up : one that can be valuable and powerful if it is productive

I believe that once you identify the traits, characteristics, and tendencies in yourself that you share with actively creative people—and take control of them—you can make use of your own creativity anytime you need it. Set free, like my friend Mr. Reed does—because you have Recaptured Your Creative Spirit!

________________________________________

[photo, left, Orville and Wilbur Wright setting their creativity free, with discipline and after several hundred tries: mankind's first "controlled" flight. Kittyhawk, 1907. Your turn!]

> > I have placed a permanent link to the video in the opening paragraph (Prologue) of this blog—just below Mr. Einstein, above...and also HERE. < <

• recapture your creative spirit - live!

In February (2010) I was invited to deliver the closing keynote at the TEDx Educators event in Denver. TEDx is a regional extension of the now-legendary, annual TED (Technology Entertainment & Design) conferences in Long Beach, CA.

This is a video of my presentation at the Denver event. It is the same presentation I have given at scores of professional gatherings from Madrid to Modesto. (The camera work is "tight" but it is an apt capture of my work.) Remember I am speaking to educators and, as always, I adapted each presentation to my audience. We are currently editing another version of "Recapturing Your Creative Spirit" that shows my "head-to-toe" presentation style. That will be released as a DVD "soon." [Notice of the DVD's availability will be posted here on the Tea blog, my Facebook sites, and advertising on the side of Zeppelins over major sporting events and miniature golf courses.] Please enjoy this video and feel free to "share" it with others—including linking it on your blog.*

Please contact me, soon, to speak to your conference, company, or other gathering to work on creative problem solving (The 7 Agreements of Brainstorming ®) and many other inspiring team building workshops.

* As always this material may not be used in any other form: written, published (including electronic), or using these stories without clear attribution and receiving prior permission from me, at least by email. 

> > This video is also posted on the TEDx YouTube site HERE. < <

If you don't do you, YOU doesn't get done and the world is incomplete!