Cracking Creativity Podcast with Kevin Chung

A recap of episode 91 of the Cracking Creativity podcast. If you liked it, check out the full episode with Erik Young where he talks about creativity vs. natural inspiration, stealing in art, taking chances, and learning from your mistakes.

Nick Gray is the founder of Museum Hack, a twist on the traditional museum experience. The funny thing about Nick is, he used to hate museums. That is until he went on a date that forever changed his life.

During a snowy day in NYC, a girl brought him to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and showed him artifacts, furniture, and other interesting things in the museum. This changed Nick’s perception of what a museum tour could be. That’s when he started frequenting the MET, and learned to love museums.

The first time Nick charged for a museum tour, he even tried to give money back to the people who took it. He had so much fun with the tour that he thought he shouldn’t charge people for it.

“The first tour that I actually charged money for, it was a Sunday morning tour at 11 in the morning, and I was like ‘Alright I’ll just see if I can charge money. I’ll charge them $20. See if they come.’ And everyone gave me their cash, and I gave them the tour. And I had so much fun Kevin, I had so much fun, that at the end of the tour, I think I freaked everybody out because I gave them all of their money back. And they were like ‘Why are you giving us… is this Candid Camera or something?’ and I was like “No, I had so much fun. It feels dirty for me to take your money, to do something that I love, something that I’m having so much fun with.’ So for me that was the first time I experimented, but it didn’t really go so well.”

Before Nick started Musuem Hack he was a salesman of flat screen monitors. But the success of his initial tours, and the experience he gained as a salesman, allowed him to turn his passion project into a business.

“What I think is special about what I’ve done with Museum Hack that your listeners might find fascinating, is that I took something that was a passion project, something that I just did for a hobby, for fun, and I was able to convert it and make it into a business. And my time selling these screens really taught me the importance of marketing and sales and dollar value of creating premium experiences. So for me that was really helpful.”

The thing that makes Museum Hack different from other museum tours is what Nick likes to dub the 3 G’s. While most other tours are zigging, Museum Hack is zagging.

“The three Gs. These are the three things that makes Museum Hack completely different from most museum tours. Three Gs. Number one, guides. Number two, games. and number three gossip. So it’s the tour guides that are so engaging, that are actors and educators, and science teachers, and musicians who write their own tours who are so special. That’s the guides. The games means that the tours are so fast paced. They’re ultra fast paced. They’re two to three times as fast as most museum tours. And we also do selfie challenges. We takes shots of espresso or drink some wine. And then the gossip, that’s the juicy back story. The cool stuff about the art that we like to talk about.”

Instead of trying to find people who are knowledgeable in history and museums, Nick hires guides who are good with people. Anyone can learn about art, but not everyone is good at connecting with people.

“The number one thing we look for is someone’s ability to be a good host. How is their body language? How comfortable to they make people? Do they make us laugh? That’s the most important thing. It’s not about their knowledge. It’s not about how much they know about the art history. It’s about how do they make the guests feel. Because that’s what we’re trying to do, right? We’re trying to make people comfortable and we’re trying to get them to warm up inside the space. So that’s really what we hire for first and foremost. And then we can teach them about the art. We can teach them about the museum… We hire folks that are really good with people.”

He also gives his guides the freedom to create their own tours. When you are building something yourself, you become passionate about it. So, Nick gives them the freedom to come up with their own tours and write their own scripts.

“We think that having our tour guides write their own tours is so powerful because the guests and the visitors can hear that excitement and that passion, and you can hear me talk right now, right? I’m excited. I’m pumped up. I’m jazzed to talk about my business with you, and that’s because I’m not going off a script. No one is telling me what to do. Our tour guides have to be the same way, so we let them explore the whole museum, come up with their own tours, stuff that they’re excited about and they write their own scripts.”

One would think that competing with instant gratification culture would be a detriment to Museum Hack, but it isn’t. Nick tells his guides to embrace people’s attention spans and work it into their tours.

“We’re dealing with an increasingly ADD generation. These are people that are like me that are on their phones every two or three minutes. I mean, it’s not just millenials. It’s people of all ages that have a short attention span, and we try to teach our museum friends ways to engage with that type of audience. Make it personal. Keep it fast. Don’t be afraid of smart phones. Encourage people to take selfies and pictures. Things like that.”

In a world where museums can seem stale and uninteresting, Nick has captured people’s imaginations. That sort of innovation requires curiosity, risks, and failures, and that’s exactly what he has done with Museum Hack.

“Figuring out like you did, people who have that curiosity, and people who are willing to troubleshoot and make failures, and I’m guessing the podcast hasn’t been perfect since day one, would that be a correct assumption?… That willingness to make mistakes and resourcefulness to figure things out. Those are two key things we look for.”

Read more shownotes from episode 92

Erik Young is one of my friends from high school. In this episode we broke from the normal format of the show and talked about our thoughts on creativity, inspiration, the education system, and learning from your mistakes. We also talked about some of the projects he's worked on including his children's book and work as owner of 7Mangos.

Read more shownotes from episode 91 with Erik Young

A recap of episode 90 of the Cracking Creativity podcast. If you liked it, check out the full episode with Chalky White where he talks about asking yourself what if, being persistent, and why continuing to try leads to success, among many other things.

Chalky White  grew up in an abusive household, so much so that he gave up trying in school as an act of rebellion. When he 17 he joined the police cadets where he worked with alcoholics and drug addicts. It was at this point that Chalky realized he wanted to be in service of others.

One day his friend asked Chalky if he wanted to go skiing. By saying yes to his friend’s request, Chalky unknowingly changed his life. Even though he wasn’t very good at skiing on that first trip, he was hooked.

A year after that first ski trip Chalky went to Andorra and decided to become a ski instructor. When he ran out of money, he went back to Britain to become an encyclopedia salesman just so he could go back to Andorra.

After a series of tests in Andorra, and failed attempts to become a licensed instructor, Chalky went to New Zealand to get certified. Chalky was constantly told he was never going to be good enough to be an instructor, but through persistence and his system of What If? questions, Chalky was finally able to gain his certification.

Chalky not only became a certified instructor. He also wrote his own book on skiing and became a motivational speaker through it all.

In this episode, Chalky talks about asking yourself what if, being persistent, and why continuing to try leads to success.

Here are three things you can learn from Chalky:

Many of us give up at the first sign of failure. We let our lack of success define and shape us. What if it didn’t have to be this way? What if we could continue on despite our doubts?

That’s why Chalky developed his what if factor questions. These questions help him decide whether or not he should pursue his goals, despite his doubts.

“The big dream came true because I never, never quit, and it all happened… because I got the semblance of something I now use in my speech, “How to say nay to your naysayers and have the last laugh,” which I call my What if factor. “What if I don’t continue on with this? What if I don’t follow through? What are the consequences of that?” Of course when you ask yourself that sort of question, you really don’t like the answers at all. In fact, you sort of despise and hate them, but they’re enough to stimulate you to want to be asked the opposite question. “What if I do continue on? What can be the repercussions and consequences of that?” And of course you really like your answers to that.”

The benefit of constantly asking yourself positive what if questions is that they make you want to continue on. They help to push you forward instead of falling back or giving up.

“By keeping on asking yourself those questions, the negatives and the positives of the What If? factor, it tends to make you want to go on and on and on. And that’s really the premise of my speech.”

Chalky believes these what if questions helped him publish his book. They helped him get past his biggest naysayer, himself. They have helped guide him through many things in life.

“If I hadn’t asked myself those What If? questions, I’m not sure that I would have followed through and published that book. So by making myself not listen to a naysayer… it tends to translate into… self-doubt. Doubting yourself can obviously be the biggest naysayer of all. So by following through and continually asking myself those What If? questions, I actually was successful. And that’s basically what I’ve done with very many things through my life.”

There are many things that help you sustain a long career as an artist. Talent and luck help a lot, but one thing is often overlooked. It’s something we can all control. That thing is persistence.

Most of us give up after the first sign of failure. We give up when things are looking grim. We give up when things don’t go our way. We give up when someone says no. But we can’t let those setbacks stop us dead in our tracks. We must go on despite our doubts.

Chalky doesn’t believe no means no forever. He follows up with people until he gets a yes.

“Every time somebody says no to you, that you can’t do something, or says no I don’t want to buy that, it gets you closer to the big yes. So in other words you get “No I don’t want it, no I don’t want it…” then… because you kept following through, he says yes, and that big yes, if you’re a salesperson… could end up being the biggest sale of the year for the company.”

We need to constantly push ourselves, especially when we are down. It’s easy to lose morale when things aren’t going your way, but if you really want to achieve your goals, you have to be persistent.

Sometimes we just need that extra push to keep us going. That’s why Chalky constantly asks himself what if. If you don’t like the answer to those what if questions, you have no choice but to keep going.

“It’s no good just asking yourself that question once, you’ve got to keep with those questions. You have to keep on asking, sometimes several times a day… Because those questions can really help to keep your morale up because when someone keeps saying no to you all the time, it’s very easy for your morale to go completely down the toilet, and if it’s a dream or a goal that you really really want to achieve, you’ve got to find a way of not allowing yourself to quit.”

If you want something bad enough, you will put all your effort into it. You will do everything you can to succeed.

That’s often the thing that separates people who eventually succeed and those who don’t. Some people just can’t handle the constant grind, the constant rejections, the constant failure.

Failure never stopped Chalky from achieving his dreams. He kept attempting his exams even after multiple failures. He became an instructor despite the doubters. He wrote a book even though people told him he shouldn’t. There’s something inside him that told him to keep going.

“Some people just can’t be bothered. There are those out there who go “Who really cares?” But then there are others that really want it, but sometimes the fear of failure stops them, there’s no doubt about it. When I was trying to go through those exams where I kept failing and failing and failing, I was very scared that I wasn’t going to actually get there. There’s no doubt about that. But there was just something inside me that just kept saying “You’ve go to keep going,”

When you want something bad enough, you will go on no matter what happens. Chalky uses his system of what if questions to help him stay persistent.

“In my opinion, if it’s the right dream for you or the right goal for you, you will find a way to keep going, and the What If? factor is just a way of helping that effort and determination to go on and on and on, whatever happens.”

I know it’s scary to put yourself out there. Rejections and failures get to everyone, but think of the alternative. Think of all those people who had great things to share with the world, but were too scared to overcome their fears. Do you want to let your great ideas go to the grave with you?

“I’m sure there’s all kinds of people who’ve invented great things and written great things, and are great entertainers, and on and on… but didn’t actually get their things out in front of the public just because they couldn’t be bothered, they were scared, and were too afraid maybe to try and overcome that fear. As has been said in the past, the only thing to fear very often is fear itself.”

Read more shownotes from episode 90 with Chalky White

A recap of episode 89 of the Cracking Creativity podcast. If you liked it, check out the full episode with Victor Yocco where he talks about why your message should change based on your platform, the importance of a support system, and the power of creating an effective website, among many other things.

Victor Yocco went to school and studied psychology and communication. After school he became a researcher for zoos and science centers, but after a while he decided he needed a change. So he asked a friend who worked at Intuitive, a design and research company, if they had any open jobs.

Even though he didn't have any experience in design or user research, Victor found that he was a good fit for the job. His background in psychology and research allowed him to make the transition from researching zoos to researching user experience design.

The biggest obstacle Victor faced didn't have anything to do with his new job. While everything in his professional life was going well, his battle with alcohol was not. Victor's problem with drinking was interfering with his relationship and productivity. So he sought counseling and made a vow of sobriety. Since his pledge of sobriety, Victor has accomplished many things from articles to writing a book.

In this episode, Victor talks about why your message should change based on your platform, the importance of a support system, and the power of creating an effective website, among many other things.

Here are three things you can learn from Victor:

One thing artists often fail to realize is that the way you communicate with your audience can make a huge difference. You wouldn't communicate with people the same in person as you would online. The same applies to how you present information on your website.

When you talk to someone in person, you can take your time and gain rapport. But when someone comes to your website, you only have a limited amount of time to capture their attention.

"If you take that into the digital world, we know people have such short attention spans, and you are somewhat forced through a screen to project your message immediately... what it is they should be doing and why? So looking at what makes sense for your product... What key messages should you try to get across to people in that three seconds that you have?... You have to draw somebody's attention and you have to show them immediately why they should be there."

Something we can do as artists is start filtering what we show people on our websites. Instead of trying to show all of our art to people when they land on our homepage, we should share a curated selection of the type of work we do.

To get this point across, Victor points to the example of restaurants with a lot of items on their menus. When you give people a lot of choices at once, you make it hard for them to make a decision.

"When you were speaking earlier... and you used the word filtering, I really like that word because it's an important concept in psychology especially in persuasion, which there is such a thing as information overload and even too much of a good thing. An example is when you go to a restaurant and they hand you a menu, and there are eighty five things on there and they all sound good, that it's very hard to make a decision."

One of the best things you can do with your website is use ideas you see on other sites. For example, you can provide recommendations for people. This creates a more curated and focused experience for people who are interested in your art.

"Provide people with recommendations because they're on your site because they like your work or they trust you and think that your recommendation is going to hold weight. So really filtering is something that helps people process information in a lot better way then just providing 'Oh, here's everything. Do what you will with it."

As artists, we believe we need to do everything ourselves. We don't want to rely on anybody else. We want to work as independent creators.

But this way of thinking often backfires on us. We become stressed out. We take on too many projects. We can't handle all the things coming at us.

That's why it's so important to have a support system. This is especially true if you going through struggles with drugs or alchol like Victor was.

"I say to everybody who feels like they might have an issue like drugs or alcohol... that one of the first steps that I found to be helpful was finding support. I don't know how I would have been able to do it."

You might think asking for help is a sign of weakness, but it's not. People want to help you through struggles because they care. Asking for support is a strength, not a weakness.

"Definitely when I was drinking, I thought asking for support was just an admission of being weak... and what I found was the exact opposite. Through AA, through my counselors, through my family members when I would talk to them about what I was going through. That I found support and I found people who wanted me to succeed."

Having a support system was critical to Victor's development and growth. He believes it was one of the most important things he did to change his behaviors.

"Asking for and getting support around what you want to accomplish I think is critical. And then if you are trying to change I behavior, I think you need to insert some other behavior."

There are a few simple ways you can make your website better for potential and returning customers. Your website is the best representation of your work online. So it should be as positive of an experience as possible.

One of the first ways to do this is by showing people that your website is secure and sells what people are looking for.

"People need to believe that using your product is a positive thing that will lead to the outcome they want and again you can address that through telling them 'Buying through my site is safe and secure but also showing them through different ways of displaying information that their information is secure using your site or that the products you have on your site are unique to you, and so that influences the behavioral belief that using your site is a good thing to get the products that you're selling."

Another thing you can do to convince people to buy your art is by showing that other people trust you. It's easier for people to buy when they see other people already trust you and like your work.

"Then there's also social norms that people need to understand that other people think that using your product or your website is a good thing. Can you display testimonials? Can you have people like or rate your product? So that it shows that other people have been there and used it and that it's a good thing for people too."

If you want to convince people to buy from you, the best thing you can do is show them how it will affect their lives. It's great that you love your art and want to sell it, but that doesn't mean other people will automatically want to buy it.

You have to show them how your art can make a positive impact on their lives. You have to show them how their life will change when they buy your work.

"When it comes to persuasion, one of the biggest things you can do is making sure people understand why what you're doing and why what your product is, is relevant to their life. So that's about how you display information and how you do capture people's attention immediately to say 'How does using my website make my life better? How does making sure that I purchase my art through you make my life better? What are some opportunities that you have to show people this immediately or make the experience so usable that they realize using your product saves them time, saves them effort that they wouldn't want to go a competitor to do that, or they wouldn't want to choose not to buy your product because your site, they don't understand how to use it, therefore they don't see how it's relevant to accomplishing the task they are trying to accomplish?"

Read more shownotes from episode 89

A recap of episode 88 of the Cracking Creativity podcast. If you liked it, check out the full episode with Shawn Coss where he talks about why there’s no formula for becoming a popular artist, defining success on your own terms, and why running an art business is such hard work, among many other things.

Shawn Coss grew up loving cartoons, but never dreamed it could become his full-time job. He grew up in a time and place where art wasn't considered a viable career.

His dad told him he should get a "real job" instead of pursuing his dreams. The thought was, you could only be a professional artist if you went to an art institute, or learned at Disney. Like most people who grow up in difficult financial situations, Shawn's dad didn't want Shawn to grow up with the same hardships he had to go through.

Shawn hit his first break when he met Kris Wilson of Cyanhide and Happiness through MySpace. Kris liked Shawn's work so much, that he invited him to work on the C&H team.

Cyanide and Happiness provided Shawn enough financial stability to start his own clothing company, Any Means Necessary. One of the clothing company's campaigns, Inktober, brought an influx of fans and attention.

This brings Shawn to a an exciting but difficult crossroads. Should he go all-in on his company or keep it as a side hustle.

In this episode, Shawn talks about why there's no formula for becoming a popular artist, defining success on your own terms, and why running an art business is such hard work, among many other things.

Here are three things you can learn from Shawn:

When we see other artists living out their dreams, we often wonder how they achieved success. We want to know exactly what they did so we can copy their path.

The problem is, there is no secret formula for becoming a popular artist. There's no shortcut for gaining raving fans. Sometimes all it takes is a little luck. Here's how Shawn explains his break in the art world.

"When people ask me 'How did I do it?' I always tell them 'Look, I was just super lucky.' I've been gifted this ability to draw well enough to where other people, large masses, appreciate it, but the chances of someone like Kris Wilson, someone of his caliber, having a company that popular, finding me, was just a needle in a haystack. He could have messaged anyone else he wanted... but at that moment he messaged me. And that kind of changed my life."

One thing you can do to keep your sanity is, stop chasing the idea of being a popular artist. Popularity comes when people appreciate your art. It's not something you can manufacture.

"I'll have other artists message me, and be like 'How do I become a popular artist?' Well that's your first mistake, because you're trying to be a popular artist. I never pursued the popular art, I just did artwork and unfortunately, not everyone gets to do it."

Success is such a subjective thing. My version of success is different from yours, which is why it's so hard for artists to define what success means.

We all think that once we "make it", everything will get easier. But as Shawn explains, there's no such thing as making it. There's only re-defining your goals.

"There is no making it as an artist. You make it to a point, but there's always another point. There's always a next level to get to or achieve to."

One of the problems many of us encounter as artists is the ups and downs of being a creative. One day everything is going great and everyone loves your work. The next day there's radio silence.

That's the problem with riding the wave of social media success. We have no control over who sees our posts. We are at the whims of Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest and Twitter.

"It's definitely a weird emotional ride because some days you're riding cloud nine and everything's awesome, and then maybe in a week or two, there's nothing happening. You're not getting the accolades that you're used to and I feel like social media has a lot to blame on this because I feel we are programmed in a way... to chase these likes and these shares and all these accolades on social media that really have no weight to anything."

Social media provides that jolt of endorphins we all crave. But what do these likes and hearts really mean? When it comes to our success as artists, they feel great, but they don't really mean anything. They don't help our businesses. They don't build our fan base. They are just vanity metrics.

We need to stop chasing the shallow feeling of success social media provides us. We need to redefine our goals based on tangible success instead of our social media stats.

"How do I get that, how do I chase that back? I feel like that's been a huge issue. That happiness we get, a lot of it is being fueled by social media, and a lot of these new artists are wanting that notoriety on social media, but it's such a shallow feeling."

Many of us fantasize about growing our art hobby into a business, but there's a lot that goes into making a business work. You are going to face hardships and low moments. So the best way to deal with it is to grow a thick skin.

"Grow a thick f*cking skin. I think that's a good one because there's going to be a lot of down times, a lot of hardships you're going to go through. I thought there were a lot more downs than there were ups initially and that weeds out a lot of people. And then giving yourself time to figure out 'How long will I pursue this before I say, okay, this isn't going to happen," and I think being honest with yourself is one of the hardest things to do."

At some point in our journeys we will question whether or not we should continue pursuing art as a career. The reality is, not everyone can make it as an artist. Not everyone is going to find success. Sometimes we have to be brutally honest with ourselves.

"You just have to say 'Do I really want to keep pursuing this to make it successful, or in reality, is this going to be successful? Maybe it's not going to be successful, maybe it's not going to.' And maybe I'm wrong to say that as an artist who is successful, but again, not everyone is going to be successful. That's the reality of it. Otherwise we'd all be rich. We'd all be doing it. and some people can do it, and some people can't."

Running a sustainable art business takes a lot of work. It's not for everyone. Don't think just because you are doing what you love that everything will go smoothly. Be prepared to put in the work.

"It's not a popular thing because I don't think a lot of artists like to discourage other artists, but it's a hard thing. It's a lot of work. I tell artists I work more doing this than I've ever worked any nine to five job. I'm working day in and day out... and it doesn't bother me but it's definitely not for the weak who want to draw a picture once every couple of weeks and sit on their laurels."

If you fantasize about resting on your laurels as an artist, you might want to reconsider your path. Just because you make art for a living doesn't mean you get to just create for a few hours and call it a day. There's a business involved too, and running a business takes hard work.

"People think as an artist I draw a piece of art and I just get to hang out all day. I'm working so much all the time... There's a lot of work involved... No, there's a business in there too. I think that's where you get that separation of people who get it and people who don't. They see the fantasy of it and then you get people who actually understand that's there's actually hard work involved."

Read more shownotes from episode 88

A recap of episode 87 of the Cracking Creativity podcast. If you liked it, check out the full episode with Derek Miller where he talks about why you need to keep your creative momentum, the power of a positive mindset, and not getting down on yourself, among many other things.