Making dreams manifest

Himmelman's prescription for making dreams manifest boils down to a simple three-point formula.

It's a common misconception that in order to make dreams come true and creative inspirations materialize, you need copious amounts of will power, connections, money and/or supernatural gifts. While those things may help to some degree, they're not the building blocks. In fact, the true ingredients are simpler to grasp and within anyone's reach:

Specific: Ideas need to be broken down into small doable parts. Viewing big goals in their entirety is simply too daunting.

Present: The second key involves doing these small parts in the here and now. Procrastinating simply means they'll never get done.

True: If you can identify your passion there is a far greater chance you will achieve your objective. For a goal to be made manifest (and sustained,) it must correspond with one's deepest values. A simplified example: If you're attempting to become a baseball star because you've been pressured by a father who never succeeded at becoming one and wants to live vicariously through your success, chances are poor that you will sustain the hard work necessary to become a baseball star.

Leadership is being in service to others

Each day when we go out into the world, life presents us with a hundred different moments to show our humanity. It makes no difference whether we're doctors, farmers or musicians. Just like gravity, just like the sun rising each morning, you can trust that when we give of ourselves, give love, we will get it back a hundred fold."

("Recently I had the opportunity to work with the Wounded Warriors Project…")"…At one point I told the soldiers to take four minutes and write a letter to their wives and teenaged kids who were sitting next to them, describing why they loved them; what made them proud of these people, what made them special. I said, that I didn't give a damn what happened last week or what might happen tomorrow; act in the moment I said, write in this singular place and time. And they wrote. Next, I told the wives and kids to write to the soldiers, write about why you love them, why they make you proud and what keeps you bonded to them still - in spite of everything. Then we went around the room and everyone read their letters aloud. Years of resentment melted away in tears of joy - and my eyes were watering too. It was impossible not to have been swept up by the emotion in that space.

That experience is indelibly etched into my memory and to have had a hand in facilitating that kind of openness, the kind that comes from such profound and truthful communication was one of the most intense and meaningful moments of my life. Something like this isn't going to happen every week, I get that, but the lesson I learned about being of service, of bringing joy and delight to others isn't some tired platitude; it's real and it's accessible to everyone in this room today. The take away is this: Each day when we go out into the world, life presents us with a hundred different moments to show our humanity. It makes no difference whether we're doctors, farmers or musicians. Just like gravity, just like the sun rising each morning, you can trust that when we give of ourselves, give love, we will get it back a hundred fold."

Exuding joy

"Lifted up by our sense of purpose, our humanity and the joy we exude by knowing we're making a difference in people's lives."

(In 1972, when I was in sixth grade, my rock band played at the Saint Paul Cerebral Palsy Foundation…) "…The thing is that when we played our music for these people they absolutely loved it. They just wanted more and more and even though I was just a kid I had this very profound sense of purpose. It was a totally new sensation for me. I'd felt joy before of course. But this was something totally different. I was feeling the exquisite - and novel, sensation of bringing joy to others.

I've made nearly two dozen records, I've toured the US at least twenty times. I've scored films and network television shows. I even played at the Lenin Palace of Sport and Culture in Kazakhstan. When I look back at all those experiences, I can make one observation for certain: When I had a sense that I was in service to others, a sense that my mission in life was to bring joy to others, I was happy myself. When that sense of mission waned and all I could think about was how tedious the work was or how difficult it was to be going through airports or traveling in a van, I became frustrated and miserable.

Our life's purpose, our calling as human beings is to be of service to our families, our friends our communities, and equally as important, to our costumers. The people that walk through our doors who are looking, perhaps without even knowing it, to be elevated in some measure - large our small, by our interaction with them. Lifted up by our sense of purpose, our humanity and the joy we exude by knowing we're making a difference in people's lives."

Redefining creativity

Himmelman's perspective is that creativity might well be thought of in the broader context of ordinary people expressing themselves in everyday circumstances-such as relating to one's child or one's spouse.

Let's look at two popular misconceptions. The first is that we typically believe the brain's main function is to take in information. In fact, its function is to deselect information so that we're not overwhelmed with input. In terms of creativity we find that this "de-selective" capacity often becomes disruptive to the iterative process by not allowing the right brain (thought to be the creative hemisphere) enough airtime. We explore specific ways to reverse this. The other critical misunderstanding involves a societal tendency towards dividing people into two narrow boxes, the "creatives" and the "non-creatives." We wrongly imagine that an actuary has little capacity for creative thought, while we assume that the nipple-ringed performance artist is the natural heir to all things innovative. It's instructive to think of creativity as something like gravity (a natural force and condition available to everyone) than something gifted to a select few. Creativity might well be thought of in the broad context of ordinary people expressing themselves in everyday circumstances-such as relating to one's child or one's spouse.

Coping with the fear of creating

Peter Himmelman's forthcoming book, Marv or the Milky Way (how to calm your and make your dreams come true) and his Big Muse seminars, articulate the idea that to generate more and better creative work we need methods to slow down our inner critic.

Why is it that so many of the great ideas we have in the shower each morning go down the drain with the soap before we even reach for the towel? Is there a common set of actions and thoughts shared by people who always seem able to put their ideas into motion? Are there truly such people and if so, are they born with certain gifts or insights the rest of us simply lack? We always hear people say that if you want it, "just do it"-as if just doing it were the most natural thing in the universe. Lose weight, start a business, find a wife, learn to draw, learn to fly a plane. Why is just doing it so damn hard?

There's fear for us all when we sit down to write a brief, paint a picture or call someone we haven't spoken to for many years. What is that negative voice in our heads? Where does it come from and what's its function? It must have an important one because everyone I've ever met has got the same voice inside.

I believe that the negative voice does not represent an enemy as some writers have suggested or some evil force meant to do us harm. Rather, it's a very real and integral part of us that cares strongly about our own survival. In that sense, it's not something to be eradicated or pushed away (as if we could push it away). It's a part of us that needs to be valued and understood. It's funny how the needs of this internal critic are so similar to our own needs. The similarity exists because "it" is "us." To humanize this internal critic, I'm going to give it a name: I'll call it Marv. Marv is what my wife and I would call our oldest son Isaac whenever we traveled and he'd start complaining, or asking ridiculous questions of the "Are we there yet?" variety. We'd ask, "Who let Marv in the car?"