Creative Intention: Your Internal GPS Guiding

From Jim:

Creative Intentionality (CI) a major element in the construct that is your success in any area of your life and yet so few people know about it let alone understand how to best use it.

To say it directly, CI is about how you frame things. But that’s not a sufficient explanation. So to make the fact of Creative Intention really clear I’m asking you to join in an imagination exercise. You’ll be able to understand and even feel the power of CI.

Take a moment now and imagine that you are going to the Broadway district of New York City. Creative Intentionality will frame your relationship with what you experience while you’re there.

Actor

You’re actor. You can sing and dance, and you are going to the Broadway district to try to get a job in a musical. Getting the job is your Creative Intentionality. That automatically creates a frame such that there will be much there that you won’t even notice. But it’s more than that.

Let’s say out of all the hotels in New York you want one in the Broadway district. You want to feel the throb and pulse, the mystique of Broadway, because it will bolster your confidence and determination as you pursue your CI—getting cast in a Broadway musical. Your Creative Intentionality gives meaning to the Broadway area and your hotel that will connect you in a very specific way.

Party Scout

Instead imagine you’re going to scout the Broadway distract as a scout for a group of your friends because you are planning a week’s vacation in New York. What you all want is a week of entertainment and fun. Like the actor you will go to the Broadway district, but you’re going there to see what show will be playing. Your CI will bring into view aspects of Broadway the actor may not even conceive and vice versa. You’ll look at the clubs, the bars, and the street life on 42nd Street. Why? Because your CI is to be entertained. You want the city to amuse you, to make you laugh and cry, to capture your attention and take you for an emotional ride.

Your Creative Intentionality is the source of meaning between you and the Broadway area. What you will see, hear, feel, smell, be attracted to or repulsed by will be dictated by the power and specificity of your Creative Intentionality. Both you and the actor will check out the after-show bars and restaurants. He will be looking to make connections. You will be looking to experience the hub-bub, the thrill of it all. He will see the pictures on the wall of Broadway stars as inspiration and you will see them as something that will glitz up your vacation week. He will see the theater marquees as someday having his name on them. You will see them as giving you the information you’re looking for to report back to your friends.

Here’s one last scenario.

Drug Dealer

Okay now pretend you are a lieutenant for a drug lord and you are going to Broadway to study the action on the streets to determine if it’s with setting up an organization in the area. Your CI is control and profit. Broadway marquees mean that people with money come into the area nightly. The 42nd street night life means junkies who could become distributors. The clubs and restaurants could mean drop-off points. The policemen and women who walk the beat could mean payoffs and a deeper level of control. Broadway looks like a gold mine.

As the actor you see Broadway as “gold mine” fulfilling your dreams and ambitions.

As the vacation scout you see Broadway as a “gold mine” of experience for a wild weekend.

As the drug dealer you see Broadway as a “gold mine” of cash and power.

Broadway remains the same but each distinct Creative Intentionality makes it a totally different experience. Meanings are different. Perceptions are different. Visions of the future are different. Assessments of reality are different. You will behave in three very different ways. And yet it’s the same place. Broadway.

So what does this mean for you career and your life?
Your Creative Intentionality is the source of your specifically directed, non-random future, the future you conceive. If you don’t conceive it first you will never see it materialize, because you will not have the frame or the lens to see what you’re looking for. Without CI anything can mean anything which means it all has no meaning, no meaning until you give it one.

Some people compare this with having a goal. That places the goal as the source. But goals don’t stand alone at the beginning. Through Creative Intentionality you conceive the future and then goals follow from there. That’s why when goals do not have a solid CI base they tend to burst forth and then lose energy quickly and with that goes your drive.

Question: How have you conceived your future? What do you see? And how has Creative Intentionality fit into what you’re up to.