Category: Bizness Schtuff

Here's the thing about social media.

Brewskie Butt
@BrewskieButt, my Twittering Cat

My face to face friends get a little tired of me talking about my cat Brewskie. My online friends can’t seem to get enough of him.

Brewskie, AKA the Brew to his Twitter following (Brew’s Posse), is my Twittering cat. He got onto Twitter about a year ago, unbeknownst to me, so the legend goes. You just never know what your cat is up to in your absence.

When I figured out what he was doing, I let him keep on. He has turned into quite the spokescat for me.

This post isn’t about him, however.

It is about using social media in a way that can work for you. Many of my friends are bewildered by social media, and they run and hide when you talk to them about anything beyond our last Facebook communication.

That is a shame. They are missing out on a lot of opportunities.

Social media, as my friend Liz Hover will tell you, is about many more things than Twitter and Facebook. For me, it includes the following:

There is probably more that I have left out. The point is, social media is about utilizing a number of avenues of connectivity to get yourself out there.

Getting yourself out there is not just an exercise in narcissism. For me, it has opened up a world of opportunity that I would have never discovered otherwise.

Let me give you an example.

Yesterday, I went for broke and wrote a post here, asking for assistance for my areas of weakness as a business person. As a professional artist, I have to engage in business practices to get anywhere, but to do so is counterintuitive to my creative nature. So I wrote and asked for help.

I didn’t stop there. I posted my blogpost on two LinkedIn group discussions. I posted it on my blog at Talent Revolution. I posted it on Facebook Network blogs. I tweeted about it. And I responded to feedback in all those realms.

I got some good feedback.

A fellow artist left some good suggestions in the comments on the blogpost. I recieved some supportive and helpful comments in the LinkedIn discussions. One woman who is in my geographic region has inquired about meeting and discussing some collaboration. And I have an offer to discuss my dilemma more personally with the CEO of Talent Revolution.

I have not yet fixed the dilemma that I discussed in the blogpost. But I am much farther along than I was before I went to my social media network for help. Stay tuned to see how this story develops.

It took some time and effort to develop and nurture my network. And it will continue to take time to maintain and grow. But it certainly has been time well spent.

Before my cat got on Twitter, I was just another frustrated artist, complaining that I couldn’t get anywhere. Now, my artwork is seen all over the world and I have had national and international commissions. I am still broke and frustrated. But I am maneuvering to become a well-established, and hopefully profitable artist.

Through my cat’s Twitter, which was the first step in developing the rest of my network, I gained the courage to explore so many avenues of opportunity.

Thanks Brew. Extra TUNA and scritches for you tonight, little buddy.

Life is an Adventure!

BZTAT

Paradoxes, Purposes and Ponderances: The Right-Left Brain Dilemma

Paradoxes, Purposes and Ponderances

You no doubt have heard incredible stories where people have compensated for certain incapacities with increased capacity in other areas.

A blind person with a highly acute sense of hearing. A hearing impaired person who can catch visual nuances that the rest of us miss, and can “hear” by feeling vibrations.

It seems as though the human body and spirit finds ways to excel in opposite directions when faced with areas of weakness.

I think I am like that.

I am capable of creating wonderful things. I can paint paintings and capture the spirit of animals through art that inspires awe in many people. I can write and create stories that charm people, and I can illuminate thoughts in many different ways.

But my creative strengths are offset by other areas of weakness.

As much as I excel in so-called “right-brained” activites (creative and intuitive), I really suffer in the so-called “left-brain” activities (analytical and sequential).

Looking at this chart, I am clearly in the right brain realm of dominance in my mental processes. And the further I go into my creative abilities, the less organized, structured and sequencial I become.

That is a very real problem for someone who is trying to develop a business out of being an artist. You really need to be disciplined in a number of left brained activities to be successful in business.

So how does a highly creative artist develop a means to meet a waiting audience and succeed in the business world? How do I get all that left-brain schtuff done without sacrificing the immense creative potential that is awakening in me? I really could use some answers, folks.

I am well connected in social media. I get a lot of lofty advice from gurus inspiring me to “meet my creative potential”. The interesting thing I find is that most gurus tend to appeal to the left-brain person in an effort to try to open up their creative right-brain. They don’t say much to the creative person who can’t seem to manage their money very well.

Where is the guru who can help me have the patience and the skill to sit down and do basic bookkeeping and accounting?

The conclusion that I have come to is that I need to stop worrying about getting better at the things that I am no good at. I think I need to find a good left-brain person who likes to do the schtuff that I hate to do, and partner with them. Together we could create a really dynamic business venture.

I think that I need someone whom I can trust to make a viable business out of my creativity, in a way that we both prosper and both enjoy our collaborative process.

Idealistic? Perhaps. But I have to start somewhere.

What do you think? Do you know anyone like the potential partner I described? Do you have other ideas for my dilemma? Please let me know. I am open to suggestions.