What is up my guys and gals!? It’s a Thursday newsletter this week, we aim for Wednesday but hey no one is perfect.
Ok Let’s cut to the chase young hustlers,
Numero Uno: This week's wonder’ings
Sometimes we just have too many options, have you ever had an assignment or project where there are just not enough constraints so you don’t know which direction to go in?? This can happen a lot when we want to do something new, or be creative, or start a business. There are so many options and these days they all get flashed before our eyes everywhere we look, from our phones to commercials to social media to whatever else might grab your attention. There are just so many options!
Sometimes the all-you-can-eat buffet is nice but most of the time we waste a lot less time and energy when someone just tells us what to do, or when a lot of the choices are taken away… What we are talking about is not about limiting freedom but rather about promoting it through the use of constructive boundaries or restraints. Plato famously wrote that “our need will be the real creator” which evolved into the saying “necessity is the mother of invention”. This is just another way of saying that restraints are the catalyst for creativity and innovation.
One of my favorite books is The Count Of Monte Cristo, I won’t spoil the story but at one point there is an old man who is imprisoned who has written books, and learned languages, and studied history and all kinds of other stuff during his long years of imprisonment, his young cellmate marvels at what he has been able to accomplish and speculated at what the old man might have become if he had not had the restraints and poverty of incarceration, the old man responds that on the contrary essentially saying that without the restraints of the prison he would have never focused on or developed his knowledge and writing because of all the distractions in his old life.
That doesn't really do the story justice so you’ll just have to go read the book, but you get the point, sometimes it’s literally the restraints that create the opportunity or show us the direction or put the right kind of pressure on us to take action and without them, we might not do anything…
So what restraints do you have? Or what restraints can you create for yourself? What if you only had 1 hour to make your product? Or only 1 week to write your book? What if you could only use one kind of material for your project? You get the point…Sometimes we just need to bring in some restraints and that can get us going.
Did you know people actually pay other people to put these restraints in place? Yes, in fact, it's a billion-dollar industry called coaching… turns out there is some real value in identifying the right restraints to put in place.
Numero Dos: My Weekly Creativity Tip/Challenge.
I am going to kill two birds with one stone here and share what I made from last week’s challenge as well as let it serve for this week’s challenge.
I am working on a creativity journal so each day I aim to create one page of the journal. It contains a journaling prompt, a quote, and a task, so here is a preview page, give it a try!
Numero Tres: A side hustle idea you can start today.
I won’t lie I don’t have all the ideas so I will borrow some of them from some of my favorite side hustle resources. I heard about this one a while ago and wanted to give it a try, but hey you can’t do everything (remember those restraints)
But back to the idea.
Start Your Own Piano Tuning Service! Yep, did you know there apps that make tuning much easier” all you need is an app and a special tool to tighten the strings and you can be charging to the “tune” of few hundred dollars an hour for this premium service, you can hear the true story of how one side hustler made this happen right here
Numero Quatro: Person or Thing That Inspired Me This Week
I have been loving the Comedian Tim Dillon, this guy is hilarious. He made this fake movie preview about cryptocurrency and I have probably watched it a dozen times. The guy is an artist. I don’t know why it's so funny but you can be your own judge.
Numero Cinco: Song I am loving right now
The Three Tenors, “How Great Thou Art”
Great way to start the day, blast it.
That's all for now folks!
I appreciate every single one of you and I love hearing what you think! You might not care about what songs I like or comedians I am following, but what do you want to hear more of??
Did you see my latest and most popular blog post yet?? If not you can read all about how I quit teaching to make and sell tiki bars right here
Yours in the creative constraints,
Ben