The Creator's Journey tracks

Patricia Sarnataro is a multi-disciplinary artist blending a distinctive sense of fashion with her talents as a costume designer, image consultant and interior designer. A native New Yorker, she’s worked on numerous stage productions on Broadway, including productions of Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, Dangerous Games and Grease, along with scores of off-Broadway and major theatrical productions around the country.

In addition to her work on a plethora of TV commercials, television shows and feature films, Patricia also works with private clients to define and design their personal style and living spaces at home and work. Apart from her commercial design work, Patricia is also a painter, creating works that are so detail-specific, they can easily be mistaken for photographs.

In today’s episode, Patricia talks about balancing the many creative disciplines she enjoys as well as the challenges and opportunities that freelancers face. She encourages creators to be compassionate and gentle with themselves and to get out of the way and allow their art to come into the world.

“Have faith in yourself. Keep on doing what you’re doing, whatever it is. Be kind to yourself. Be compassionate to yourself and your work, whatever that may be – and don’t give up. Just keep on being a seeker of what’s inside and what’s outside.” ~ Patricia Sarnataro

“If you’re going to make a mistake, make a big one because there’s no point in making a small mistake. Make it spectacular – you’ll learn something from it.” ~ Janet Kestin

Janet Kestin and Nancy Vonk may not be household names, but you’re sure to recognize their work. They’ve spent their advertising careers breaking rules, challenging the status quo, and poking and prodding others to do the same.

They started out their careers as two women who wanted to do good work and enjoy their lives with no ambitions to push through ceiling into leadership roles primarily held by men. But their first big rock in the pond as a creative team was a campaign called the Dove Litmus Test in the early ‘90s. That led to Dove’s Campaign For Real Beauty, an advertising campaign that sparked a global discussion about our culture’s definition of, and obsession with, manufactured beauty.

Working together over 20 years as a creative team, they spent 13 years sharing the chief creative officer role at Ogilvy Toronto. They decided to leave that position in 2012 to start their own company called Swim, a creative leadership lab where they help talented people gain the leadership skills they need to help their careers have greater impact.

My desire to talk with this dynamic duo rose to a white-hot level while reading their book, Darling You Can’t Do Both, their personal and professional journey to discover the challenges that women face at home and work. Their response to that discovery is played out in the award-winning, culture-changing advertising they’ve shepherded; a blog, called “Ask Jancy,” aimed at advising students on career thoughts and advertising; two books; and the personal mentoring of dozens, if not hundreds, of up-and-coming advertising professionals. In 2012, Ad Age named them among the 100 Most Influential Women in Advertising.

Maria Piscopo has one of the most diverse and over-arching views of the business of creativity of anyone I know.

She is the author of the books Photographers’ Guide to Marketing and Self-Promotion and Graphic Designers’ and Illustrators’ Guide to Marketing and Self-Promotion, as well as a contributing writer to numerous publications and magazines including Communication Arts and Shutterbug.

Maria has been a college instructor for 30 years, teaching business practices and marketing to students in graphic design, illustration, photography, animation and myriad other communication specialties. Based out of San Francisco, she’s taught workshops and seminars and spoken at numerous trade conferences around the country. The most popular topic Maria is called on to present is “Taking Charge of What You Charge,” which helps creative professionals change the way they talk to clients about money, and to keep their fears from overcoming good business sense.

In addition, Maria's also been an artist’s and photographer’s representative for 25 years, not only helping them market their services but also working closely with her clients to guide their creative journey.

In this episode, Maria talks about how fear is vital in moving creative professionals forward. “People wait for the fear to go away to act brave. It’s exactly the opposite. You act brave and confident and eventually you’ll feel that way. Feelings follow behavior.”

She counsels creative professionals to stop thinking about their businesses as having a creative side and a business side. Good business practices should be integrated into the whole life of the business – otherwise you need to be a hobbyist. “I make whole people, that’s my mission.”

“The fear is important! It gives a chemical boost – to push you beyond your own comfort level. Fear is good! I need fear to move forward … Act brave and confident and professional – and eventually, you’ll feel that way. In other words, feelings follow behavior.” ~ Maria Piscopo

Greg Berg is a man of many creative talents. He’s a photographer, videographer, web designer, print designer, musician and radio podcast host. What’s impressed me most about Greg is the intentionality with which he directs his life.

After surviving an horrific car accident in his teens, where paramedics at first thought he was dead, he’s focused on using his “bonus time” here on Earth to the best of his ability to bring out the best in other people. In the wake of being downsized from a couple of back-to-back jobs in a stumbling economy, Greg and his wife sold their St. Louis home, where he’d grown up and had deep roots, and moved to sunny San Diego in search of a fresh start. After establishing himself in a new region, in 2008, in the midst of another economic slump, he gave up his job as marketing director of one of the largest YMCA branches in the U.S. to pursue his passion for creating things of significance.

Inspired by the inaugural 2011 World Domination Summit in Portland, Oregon, Greg started his first podcast, Radio Enso, tools and inspiration for conscious living. He produced nearly 150 episodes interviewing well-known guests such as Brene Brown, Chris Brogan, Nancy Duarte, Danielle LaPorte, Jonathan Fields, Chris Guillebeau and Pamela Slim. His aim was to find out what makes creatives, seekers and non-conformists tick.

This past fall, Greg had the courage to make a change in his approach and direction. and embarked on yet another fresh start with his new podcast called Life On Purpose. With this new endeavor, he intends to drill deeper into helping people be more intentional with their daily habits and mindsets.

As a musician, Greg’s performed in front of thousands, and opened for many artists including Shawn Colvin, Ben Folds, and Dada.

“The thing that I’m most scared to hit ‘Publish’ on is probably the best thing I’ve ever written. The more afraid you are, likely the better it is. You’re building this muscle – you do it once, you get a little better at it. You do it ten times and you’re starting to build that muscle a little more. You do it 150 times, you’ve built up that muscle pretty good, it’s not so hard anymore. You’re still going to get a little nervous; there’s going to be trepidation and fear, but you’ve built that muscle up enough now to where, it’s this crazy thing, but you just say, ‘I’m just going to hit launch.’ It’s how your brain works.” ~ Greg Berg

Sutton Long is an award-winning graphic designer based in San Francisco. Sutton specializes in working with entrepreneurs, small companies and independent magazines across the country. She considers herself a “word nerd” and having studied Latin for five years, enjoys figuring out the etymology of words based on Latin vocabulary. Combining her love of Latin with her penchant for type fonts, she has, over the last several months, become quite handy in the art of hand lettering which you can find copious examples of on her blog at www.suttonlong.com.

When she’s not working at her desk, you might find her walking her rescued hound dog, Chloe, and taking photos, many of which you can find in her Etsy shop or on her Instagram feed.

In this episode, Sutton talks about the power that art and creativity have to sustain us – to buoy us up in hard times as well as good times. “We can get stuck in the idea that life is hard, but life can actually be everything at once.” Creative entrepreneurship is the wave of the future – the artist in control of what she produces and how she markets it to the world, Sutton believes. “Your art is your own to make, promote, sell. There are no gatekeepers anymore.”

Like yoga, life is a practice, Sutton believes. We have to keep trying all the time. “You’ll find what works eventually. Believe in yourself.”

“My tendency has been to say, ‘Of course, I can do that – and I can do that right now,’ but that’s not always true and it doesn’t always serve me the best – and it doesn’t always serve my clients the best. Because if I’m worn out and I’ve got too much on my plate, I’m not going to do my best work.” ~ Sutton Long

As a partner in the consulting firm eatbigfish, and the co-author of the book A Beautiful Constraint: How To Transform Your Limitations Into Advantages, Mark is highly sought after as a speaker and facilitator skilled at helping companies discover breakthrough solutions.

Some of the highlights of his colorful career include a Platinum Award for direct response marketing, taking a dot-com public, starting his own ad agency to launch Yahoo!, selling Guinness beer door to door, working as a carney at state fairs throughout the Midwest, playing the part of a Buddhist monk in a Kleenex commercial, and warming up a crowd for Ellen DeGeneres.

Mark, his wife, and their two daughters live in Marin County, California.

In this episode, Mark shows us how constraints shouldn’t get such a bad rap in the creative world, but should be embraced as opportunities to look at a challenge in a different way. Constraints can often turn out to be the stimulus for coming up with a more beautiful solution.

Mark also observes that habits serve us very well – until they don’t. It’s important to know when habits need to be challenged in some way – to break “path dependence” and question our assumptions.

“Character is deciding what it is that you want, and then waking up every day and making progress towards that goal. We don’t have habits – our habits have us.” ~ Mark Barden

Chris Moody is the founder of MyHomeFound, a website where homebuyers and homeowners can look for new homes and ideas. It’s also designed to connect home-related businesses with buyers who need their services.

Chris’ career spans 20 years as a commercial artist with a specialty in serving the new home industry by creating company brands, architectural renderings, websites, mobile apps, and other marketing tools, particularly for homebuilder associations.

In this episode, Chris tells us how he’s spent too much of his life listening to the voice in his head filled with “should-a," "could-a" and "if you had-a” comments. Part of his creative process involved learning how to talk back to that voice. He also explains how he’s working to embrace the benefits that discipline and daily routines add to his life – without sacrificing the spontaneous, unstructured vibe that he enjoys in his work and personal life.

“When you lead with grace, people just hear the truth better, soak it in better, and therefore learn from it better.” ~ Chris Moody

Colleen Wainwright is a Los Angeles-based writer, designer and consultant who obsesses over making complex ideas easy to understand.

I met Colleen four years ago in Philadelphia at the Strictly Business Conference created by ASMP, the American Society of Media Photographers. As one of the keynote speakers, she absolutely rocked the house with her presentation and made me a fan of her mind and her writing.

In this episode, Colleen shares her belief that almost everything good in her life has come about as a result of walking through some kind of fear. “Fear can be an ally – or it can be a foe,” she reminds us. A recovering perfectionist, Colleen says that hearing about the rough and rocky road others have traveled in their quest to make art helps her persevere. “The creative act is the process of giving birth. It can be ugly and painful.”

Colleen is also a firm believer that clutter is one of the chief enemies in the creative life. “I cannot say enough about the power of letting go of the crap you don’t need,” she observes.

“It’s easy to just turn to television for comfort, or to food, or to whatever it is for you – to turn away from the challenge because it’s hard. To just quit, give up. Don’t give up! If you keep looking for something, you will find the thing you’re looking for even if it doesn’t turn out to be the thing you set out to find. Don’t quit before the miracle. These are not going to always be easy times.” ~ Colleen Wainwright

Camden Watts is a passionate filmmaker based in Raleigh, N.C. She is currently wrapping up the details on her most recent project, “Brewconomy,” a documentary about North Carolina craft beer. As a self-taught filmmaker, Camden has relied so heavily on the relationships she’s built in the local film community that’s she started the TriFilm Society so that other filmmakers would have easier access to the resources and connections they need. She is also founder of Crowdfund Your Film, a digital course on crowdfunding.

In this episode, Camden compares filmmaking to improv comedy, both of which require that you trust your team and collaborate to produce the most creative, innovative work. She cautions creative people to be careful about who they share new ideas with in the early stages of development. “I’ve learned the hard way that not everyone is a visionary.”

While she admits to being notoriously bad at work/life balance, getting more sleep, exercising, and scheduling time off to be with her husband are priorities she’s working to make more a part of her life. “I can easily just work all the time because I love what I do so much."

“Don’t play it small. Take the risk, find what makes you really, really happy and don’t give up on that because we need whatever it is that you’re passionate about. We need your enthusiasm. We need your time and attention poured into that thing that sets you on fire. I think what the world needs is more people set on fire.” ~ Camden Watts

Kat Gordon is the founder of -- and the visionary behind -- the 3% Conference, a social change movement started as a passion project to spotlight the scarcity of women in creative leadership in the advertising and communication fields. Kat is also the founder and creative director at Maternal Instinct, a marketing agency focused on communicating to women as well as consulting with start-ups in Silicon Valley. In 2013, Advertising Age magazine named her as one of the Top 10 Women To Watch and one of Forty Over-40 Women Disrupting The World in 2014.

In this episode, Kat’s message is simple: it’s in everyone’s best interest for there to be more equal gender representation in the creative process. “The fact that men and women are different should be celebrated. There’s a reason we were designed differently. You need very diverse perspectives to problem solve creatively.” The era of the lone genius is over, she observes. We live in a more collaborative world.