Today kicks off day one of a creative entrepreneurship retreat I’m attending in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. The fundamental question to be answered here is “What is the unique gift you can leverage that has a value in the marketplace people will pay for?” Great question, and the process of seeking the answers is even better. Instead of a dry, run of the mill business development course, this program uses visual journaling to help tap into the subconscious and embrace the creativity that so often lies dormant.
I’ll be documenting my progress over the course of this week.
The Place :: Hacienda Mosaico
The workshop is being held at this great little artist retreat/B&B. Mosaics everywhere, friendly staff, and an amazing atmosphere to get creative juices flowing.
Day 1 :: Workshop
In a way, it was like being back in art class in elementary school. Equipped with a blank journal, craft paint, and smocks, we began filling our background pages with color.
“What do I really, really, really want?”
This was the prompt for the first set of pages. There was a time limit to write a freeflow of ideas that came to mind. Probing your heart of hearts, deep down. After the words were written, we were given time to go through magazines and tear out imagery and phrases that resonated with our desires.
The next step was to begin fleshing out the “Creative Entrepreneur Mandala.”
Today we started with “Heart & Meaning.” As we assembled our pages, some prompts were ‘What matters most to you?”, “What are you most passionate about?”, “What do you do for its intrinsic value?” Here’s what I came up with:
As a final step, we were asked to do “Field Notes” on our pages, and reflect upon what the results meant. What were our observations? What were the surprises? What was the mood? What was the message?
Post-workshop :: Dinner!
Creativity drains the brain, so thank goodness for an AMAZING taco stand right across the street. I don’t remember the last time I ate so well for under $3.
And that’s a wrap for day 1! I’m totally pleased so far, and am already thinking of so many ways these types of techniques could be implemented into business/technology related conferences and workshops. Sure, this stuff is creative and artistic, but it’s not woo-woo magic. Bringing together both the left & right brain has the potential to bring out some incredible insights that wouldn’t come so easily when only focusing on the logical, practical side of things. After having experienced the limitations firsthand of a non-holistic approach, I’m excited to see what this process will reveal, and how it can be duplicated in other settings.
Stay tuned for updates all week!
emergent by design 
Thankyou dear Venessa for being so generous and sharing your amazing day. How much fun is this!! Especially loved “surprises” – beautiful … seems to transcend paradox, actually.
thanks suzie!
What if emotion is emergent by design?
Insights in sight. http://x.co/Kndg blog post about skyping with @VenessaMiemis on the morning of day 2. Let’s see more of your creative training.
day 2 halfway done. a bit overwhelmed. more to come…
You are learning what may be one of the most valuable and so far, unacknowledged skills of the 21st century. As we move to more project-based forms of employment, many, many more of us will need entrepreneurial skills. Thank you so much for passing along both your experience and the format. I am excited to see what emerges from here.
Best regards,
RJ Johnson
thanks rj. i tried to check out your site but i get a 403 forbidden error.
Love your handwriting. Handwrite us a blog post sometime!
you should see my journals. i used to write posts first in them. now mostly in google docs. it’s definitely different when you have to use your hands and physical materials to create something vs. doing it online. gratifying because you have something tangible, but also somehow more exhausting.
Venessa –
Beautiful on several levels and inspiring. Reminds me of some of our Theory U social action projects we’ve done in Brazil and India.
Looking forward to hearing more!
(And congratulations on this wise and delicious investment in yourself.)
i’d love to hear more about those projects sometime
gotta love creative ways to dig into questions. love the idea of painting the backdrops first. it’s how eric carl worked. he’d paint his paper, creating textures, then use that to cut out and piece his books together. kind of a layering and an opening to creativity.
thanks so much for sharing the prompts and the process. makes me want to get busy.
and yay to get away to such a wonderful spot and play (even if it does tire you out)!
yeah, we’re given free reign to do whatever, but were started off doing backgrounds to “warm up.” it’s funny that it almost caused me a panic attack. i was like “omg, what color do i do? how should i blend it? what’s the person next to me doing?” ha. there is definitely a letting go process!
so funny. i’ve been wanting to do some creative visioning myself and thought hey, can’t make it to mexico but maybe i can parallel play at home. so i yanked out my art supplies and started in. first thing that came up was the i’m not liking these colors. why did i start with orange? nothing mixes with orange, really, it just turns kind of brown.
but i kept with it noticing what emerges. it’s definitely about letting go AND paying attention.
thanks so much for sharing your process and some of the structure. i’m having fun with it.
oops, forgot to sign in as venue X aka amanda. (shanda studd is an art site me and a virtual friend have been doing since may)
that is so awesome that you’re working in parallel!!!
it’s way cool that you think so. makes the virtual so much more real and exciting.
if you wanna take a peak (http://venue-x.com/)
Hi Venessa,
Thanks for sharing your experiences. Sounds absolutely cool and someday would love to do something like this. I am envious of you – in a good way :-).
I agree with you totally that this method and the questions posed are very much applicable to today’s businesses. In fact, answering some of these I think lead to happier employees and increased productivity not to mention being good for both the firm and its customers.
Enjoy your retreat and looking forward to your creative ‘logs’ .
Regards,
Ned
thanks ned. if an organization was really set on change, i think a process like this could have some big impacts. even if they weren’t all that set on change, it’s almost cathartic by default. i believe so much in having a foundation of emotional wisdom for good decision making, in addition to having business acumen. i know no one ever wants to admit vulnerability because it comes across as ‘weakness’ in our society, and we don’t want to be judged, but….. we all have it. we’re all human. and i feel that when we can take that leap and collectively just put it on the table, we can move on and solve problems from a place of wisdom and intelligence.
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Hi Vannessa,
Thanks for sharing, I am reminded of similar workshops I have been learning and teaching as well.
On the day when you tweeted about the retreat I checked Hacienda Mosaico, an just by looking their site I know you’ll have a blast.
What I am mostly looking for is your work in the months after the retreat, when all the valves of creativity get opened and aligned.
Enjoy the moment.
P.S. On the subject of questions:
http://coachera.wordpress.com/2010/11/20/why-asking-questions-is-a-must-for-a-modern-leadership/
i LOVE those 8Qs !
Brilliant thank you. Bet you would love Jean Houston’s social artistry workshops too
http://www.jeanhouston.org/socialartistry-whatitis-new.cfm
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Good luck Venessa, we´ve been thinking a lot about how to unleash the power of creativity and turn it into value, growth and (why not) business. There is a great group working on this in São Paulo. It is a network of artists and entrepreneurs. Your images looked just like one of our workshops. Good luck! We are somehow connected.
we are definitely connected 😉