But sometimes you need to seek out change. You are in a slump, feeling uninspired, unhappy, or stuck. It is during these times that the changes we make – subtle or large – often have the biggest impact on our lives. So we asked 10 creatives, from creative directors to photographers, what change they made in their life and what impact it has had on their work.
10 comments:
One main thing that most of these accounts have in common is the idea that the creators were not fully in control of what they were doing, and when they fully realized this, they decided to make a change to take their work and their art into their own hands. This is interesting to me, because the work we do as artists is so personal and ingrained in who we are as people, it seems almost obvious that it should be us as individuals who are bringing the drive and the passion behind what we are doing, but this is not often the case. In order to make money with what we do, it is easy to justify working for a larger organization that will dictate things like style and projects, but this can be so stifling to individual artists. It is important to have a stake in what you are doing or it will hardly ever feel worth while. If you do not care about what you are creating, then why are you creating it?
My favorite thing about this article is the layout. I think presenting something in the form of a list especially when talking about personal experiences is a great way to stay organized and to say everything that needs to be said. I think this article is an important one to read at any age. It an article about career shifts, which is commonly thought of as a very unpredictable and scary time. Everyone thinks they know what they want to do with the rest of their lives but the truth is we never stop learning and growing, so how can we know what we will want when we change as time moves along. I think the article says a strong message which is go with your gut. I feel like trusting your gut and believing in yourself is a skill that not everyone knows how to do or is comfortable doing quite yet.
A very insightful article. The series of stories really says a lot. One common theme from them seemed to be that People tend to realize change once they take a step back in some way. It could be literally taking a break and enjoying life or it could be an article that made them think about something and realize their situation. Sometimes it is really easy to get caught up in bad situations simply because it becomes habit and creates a bad cycle where thoughts aren’t as logical but may remain very creative even still. This article really speaks to me in saying that life in generally should be lived for yourself and that taking the time to find what you want, to do what you want, or to create what you want to do is what you should do. This has been an important keepsake in my life as from an early age I knew it was important to enjoy life rather than to find it and in these people’s cases it let them realize they needed to create a change to achieve just that.
I think that this article is so relevant to my personal feelings about career. I grew up in a household where I was told to pursue my dream and passion. I felt that theatre was my passion in high school because I did it for love and not by requirement. CMU is the first time where theatre has been assigned a grade. This article was a nice reminder that I’m allowed to embrace change if I need to. I’ve always been passionate about theatre, but I’ve also always wanted to work in sustainability, film, and television. I really liked Miyako Nakamura’s story. She is a creative director and head designer at MM.LaFleur. Her story of finding a place for herself within the fashion industry that has two contrasting perspectives is extremely reassuring. She found her place within the industry by focusing on what was important to her and to her customer. Every industry has to gear their products for a customer. Like theatre has always been geared toward rich, old, white, men. However, I value the young generation and I believe that theatre can accommodate anyone, if you let your customer influence your product.
I believe in the importance of doing what you love, as I’m sure everyone in this program does or we wouldn’t be a committing to four years of art school. And I also believe that it is important to check in with yourself throughout your life to make sure that you are still happy. Reading about creators making big changes in their careers and finding success is inspirational. It’s very difficult to let go of what you are used to, even if it’s in search of something better because it is human nature to fear failure. In my life, my actually attending Carnegie Mellon is the result of a decision to back track and change my life plan, and it has worked out exponentially better than I’d planned, and I am much happier here than I ever could have been on my prior path. Learning to measure risk and reward is an important skill when it comes to a career in the arts, I’m sure it applied to other fields as well, and having these concrete examples of people taking a chance and it leading to a positive outcome is encouraging.
I am a value-driven person, and I tend to feel a bit isolated in a community of goal-oriented or success-driven people. In this article, about half of the creators made value-driven decisions that led them to satisfying and fulfilling careers, and I find that reassuring. When hiring staff for shows, I tend to go with my gut and hire people who share similar values, rather than always hiring the most skilled people. If everyone is on the same page about what is important, and if most people get a similar kind of fulfillment from putting up a good show as a team, the process will go much more smoothly. I don’t have major career goals to tick off; it’s more important that I do work that feels important and valuable to a community. It makes it hard to chart a trajectory, but it’s easy to make decisions about what is not right. The creators in this article reinforce my decision to follow my instincts when it comes to career choices.
I thought this article was very interesting; there were common threads throughout all of these stories. For the most part, these designers had to reconsider their careers when they realized that the career they had signed up for was not exactly what they had imagined. I always think it is very impressive when people can recognize the issues with their life and then take the necessary steps to remedy it and switch careers so that they can be doing what they want. I think, in the world of design and art, doing what you love is the most important thing. People do not get into art and design for the money; they get into it because it is their passion and the most important thing in the world for them. It can be very hard to recognize that whatever you are doing is not quite right for you and then to change it but I am very impressed that these people had the drive to not just give up and settle for something less than what they wanted.
I really enjoyed reading this article- the 10 creators had nuanced and well-thought out ideas of why they needed a change in their career. The article is definitely relevant to us- we’re all people with enough of a passion for theatre to have gone to school for it to “follow our dreams”. I think it’s important for us to see examples of people realizing that what they are doing isn’t what they hoped they’d be doing and successfully taking steps to change that. These ideas are even relevant now before we’ve even left school- this is the first time for most of us that our work in the theatre is for a grade rather than as a volunteer, and it’s understandable for people to come to the realization that maybe they don’t want to do this for the rest of their life. When I chose CMU as my college, my parents told me that if I end up unhappy with what I’m doing, I shouldn’t be afraid to tell them and figure out together how to make a change. I think that advice can be applied to the professional world as well- we chose jobs that allow us to follow our passion, and what’s the point of having done that if we aren’t actually fulfilled by them?
One thing that really stands out about this article is the common thread that ties all these stories together- all of the creators had a realization somewhere in their career of how their work and its responsibilities drove these creators away from their art, their ability to draw on from their inspiration for only the purpose of pleasure and drive. And this happened only because the creators understood that the thin line that existed between business and creativity was often crossed and only the business aspect was given priority.
This article speaks so much of how artists have to combat this scenario of staying true to their art and not forgetting why they started pursuing it in the first place. It happens so often that when you have been employed by a firm, the idea of art that the company follows ends up becoming yours because there is a sense of duty to the firm that exists at that point in the mind of the artist. The artist really needs to find the middle ground in this scenario so that he is delivering his work but doing so by ensuring that the art stays true and fresh to himself so that it is not exhausted either.
Recently i’ve been in a rut so when I read the title of this article I knew I wanted to read it. As said in the article “You are in a slump, feeling uninspired, unhappy, or stuck. It is during these times that the changes we make...often have the biggest impact on our lives”. I, like many others are afraid of change, letting go of control. But letting go, closing one door sometimes means then opening another. This article was a great reminder that people change, environments and situations change, and I will have to change and adapt with the times, and that's okay. Instead of focusing on what will or is lost, I can focus on now what I'm gaining and what I have now. Something I need to change right now is this bad habit (if habit is a good way to describe it) of trying to do things all on my own with no help, which stems from this self imposed stigma on being weak or less than. I need to remind myself that real strength is asking for help when you need it.
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