the bossbabe podcast - 272. BBS: How To Be Creative When You Aren’t A Natural Creative

Episode Date: February 7, 2023

It’s important to remember a few things about creativity.  1) We are all creative, no matter our chosen profession or industry. 2) Creativity is subjective. There’s no right answer. 3) Creativity isn’t a thing, it’s a process. Welcome to the latest episode of the bossbabe business school, where Danielle reveals how she overcame her own limiting beliefs on not being a “natural creative” and reviews her top hacks for finding inspiration. She also uncovers new tips + content frameworks from a recent mastermind with other all-star innovators to help you get unstuck.  If you’re thinking, Oh my goodness, I'm not a natural creative, it's not my genius zone – then, this is the episode for you. Highlights: Are you creatively blocked or are you actually experiencing self-doubt or fear? Discover how to tell the difference and adjust your mindset accordingly.  Danielle’s tips for sparking creativity may surprise you (hint – it’s not all about art or music!). Learn Jay Shetty’s secret to consistently creating compelling content - the 4-S framework. Links: Creativity Sucks by Phil Hansen Steal Like An Artist by Austin Kleon 8 Rules Of Love by Jay Shetty Follow: bossbabe: @bossbabe.inc Danielle Canty: @daniellecanty

A Boss Babe is unapologetically ambitious and paves the way for herself and other women to rise, keep going and fighting on. She is on a mission to be her best self in all areas. It's just believing in yourself. Confidently stepping outside her comfort zone to create her own vision of success. Hello, we are back for another behind the scenes Boss Babe Business School episode. You guys, I'm having so much fun creating this episode for you. If you listened to the one two weeks ago, I shared that I was really digesting all of the learnings that I had when I was at the Mastermind in Napa. I was with the likes of Mel Robbins, Jay Shetty, Lewis Howes, Jamie Canlima, who built It Cosmetics,

Jasmine Starr, Jenna Kutcher, like so many amazing people. And so it's been so fun to be able to actually bring you the notes that I made. Like I'm literally going through all the notes that I took. In fact, it was so funny. Jenna was like, can you send me your notes? Because I'd like sectioned them in true Virgo style, obviously, into like social content, like how to become more creativity, marketing, book deals, all these things. So I'm just really excited to be sharing this knowledge with you on the Bossy Podcast. So before we begin, I would love, first of all, if you love this podcast, please just take two seconds to write a review. They mean everything to me. They really help us. The Apple algorithm, should I say, or the

Spotify algorithm to favor us. We love it when you share. So put it in your stories, tag myself at Dania Canty. I share as many as I can and just really, really appreciative of you. And like I said, this podcast is all going to be about being creative, even if it's not your genius zone, because those of you who have followed me for a while will know I really struggled with this. I really struggled showing up on social media for a really long time. And a lot of that was because of imposter syndrome. And a lot of it was also because I didn't relate to being a natural creative. Like sure, yeah, I can be creative at times like I did various things when I was younger but as an adult I just couldn't tap into that side of myself anymore so

if you're listening to this and you're also telling yourself oh my goodness I'm not a natural creative it's not my genius zone then this is the podcast for you because we're going to be changing that and I want to be sharing things that I've learned over the years that I've applied so that I'm able to tap into that creative side of myself and also things that I learned from Napa and these people which I'm starting to apply but I just wanted to share with you why I really feel like this is important and I heard this quote that Steve Jobs used to say and he was always saying that innovative thinking and having creativity is how businesses succeed he said innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower and he's like emphasizing the importance of being creative and thinking differently

in order to become a real leader in your field so whether you want to apply this creativity to your social media posts or you want to provide it to the strategy in your field. So whether you want to apply this creativity to your social media posts or you want to provide it to the strategy in your business, which I learned really suit me, then listen through either lens and just really hear how you can become more creative and how you can truly innovate in the thing you are creating and putting out into the world. So I'm going to start with a few things I feel like I've learned from coaching and mentoring a lot of you, whether it's in the society, whether it's an influencer school, whether it's a mastermind, like I've worked with a lot of you and often it starts with, oh, I'm not creative. I just don't feel inspired. I'm blocked. A lot of

these aspects are actually not always true. The number one thing that I've noticed with most of you is you're actually suffering from self-doubt. You're doing what I used to do and you're telling yourself that you're not creative and you believe you're not creative so therefore you don't feel like creating so therefore your action is to not create and it's kind of like that thoughts create your feelings, create our actions. And the truth is creativity is a muscle that can be developed and it can be exercised. So first of all, I want you to start now and rewire that story that you're telling yourself. If you're listening to this saying, oh, I chose this podcast because I'm not creative.

It's not my genius zone. Let's change that now. And it doesn't have to be, you know, something that feels like a lie, like, oh my goodness, I'm the best creative genius ever. No, it doesn't need to be that. But it can be like, hey, I am creative and every day I'm finding ways to be inspired and create new things. Because to get into a creative pattern, you also have to give yourself freedom and relinquish the self-doubt. And that comes to the second thing that I see blocking a lot of people being more creative, and that's fear. Like fear of failure, fear of judgment, fear of not being good enough. And whether that might be,

doing your artwork or posting on social media, or speaking up in meetings where maybe people are asking for creative ideas or as a CEO making decisions on the best path forwards. You can quite often hold your creativity back because it's a fear of yours. But I want to remind you that creativity is subjective, right? There's no one person that decides, oh, that is the absolute one idea and the only way to do things. You can't rate creativity on a scale of one to 10. Some people might love Picasso. Some people might like Van Gogh or Banksy. Like it ranges and creativity is an appreciation. So if you find yourself being blocked, I want you to free yourself of judgment. Don't judge your creativeness. Don't judge that post that you put out. Don't think that likes or comments are

actually a judgment of your creativity because that is not actually true. The comments and the judgments are how well you did your, as I speak about in my trainings previously, is how well you attract attention and you hold attention and then you direct attention that's what that is isn't actually a judgment on creativity but I also appreciate that you know what sometimes it's hard to even start you don't feel inspired to write that social media post you don't feel inspired to create that next thing in your company you don't feel inspired to put a new sales funnel together or a marketing angle whatever that is so I'm going to give you some solutions that are really going to help with that okay but first of all you need to acknowledge how you're

speaking to yourself about it and acknowledging if you have any roadblocks or fears are starting to stand in your way let's take a quick pause to talk about my new favorite all-in-one platform Kajabi you know I've been singing their praises lately because they have helped our business run so much smoother and with way less complexity which I love. Not to mention our team couldn't be happier because now everything is in one place so it makes collecting data, creating pages, collecting payment, all the things so much simpler. One of our mottos at Boss Babe is simplify to amplify and Kajabi has really helped us do that this year. So of course I needed to share it here with you. It's the perfect time of year to do a bit of spring cleaning in your business, you know,

get rid of the complexity and instead really focus on getting organized and making things as smooth as possible. I definitely recommend Kajabi to all of my clients and students. So if you're listening and haven't checked out Kajabi yet, now is the perfect time to do so because they are offering Boss Babe listeners a 30-day free trial. Go to kajabi.com slash Boss Babe to claim your 30-day free trial. That's kajabi.com slash Boss Babe. So let's talk a little bit about sparking creativity in our lives. It was really cool. Actually, I was chatting to glow Tano, who was also at the mastermind. She is like the most amazing person. And she was really talking about holding space for creativity.

And she was recommending some books, which I'll make sure I put in the descriptions. But also we were talking about the importance of changing your routine and your situations because creativity and new experience have a close relationship because they feed each other. So new experiences can provide fresh perspectives. They can inspire creative thinking while creativity can lead to new experiences and adventures.

So for example, if you're exposing yourself to new cultures and new people and new environments, you actually broaden your horizons and bring new ideas to the forefront. Either they are inspired by something you saw, or it's something that was already within you, but it just needed this experience to come out of you. And engaging in creative activities like painting or writing or playing music can also help that. But as can going to new events, meeting new people. Creativity doesn't look like, oh, putting some music on and starting to paint or learning how to dance. Putting yourself in new experiences can also be a form of creativity because you're exposing

yourself to cultures perhaps you have never seen before, colors and visions, and that exposes you to new music and new opinions that you haven't thought before. So in short, both creativity and new experiences are really valuable for your personal growth and can really enhance each other in a really positive cycle because when you do experience and you do seek out new experiences and you engage in these creative activities you actually continue to expand not just in your creativity but really as a better leader and in your life because when we do these things we are open to more opinions more options and those next things that come and I also think it's such a good thing in business. If you're not already doing it, you really should do so that you see here and see other people's

perspectives. So basically I'm telling you, if you have a lot of routines that keep you on your house on your own all day, you need to get out more. You need to be doing new things. If you're not traveling, you need to seek that out. You need to go on adventures. You need to try new things. And let's say you can't escape the area that you're in then do the second thing go put on a different music go to an art class go dancing whatever that is just get out live life life is for living and creativity comes from that my next point is this system blew my mind honestly I'm going to give him full credit for this I'm applying this circle back from Navajo and it is an absolute game changer and this came from

the one and only Jay Shetty so I was chatting to Jay same thing in front of the group we were talking about creativity and he was like oh this is what I do he said I have a content system he is like whenever I'm starting to create I always start with something I either find a story that inspires me I either find a study like a research base that I'm like oh that's interesting I'm finding out there's new research released on this paper and so I'm going to create something around that or I start with a statistic of something that I think shouldn't be that way or should be that way and break it down and create content around that. Or lastly, a system. And he creates posts and

social media things around a system that he has researched or has come up with from the research and the statistics that he has done. So it's a 4S system. We're going to thank Jay Shetty for this. And so if you are struggling, if you're sat with a blank piece of paper in front of you and you're like, how am I going to get creative today? Try this. Look up a study, look up a study that maybe your audience are interested in. Look up a study that maybe you're writing a sales funnel that you could base it on. Look up a study, maybe you're a health coach and you're like, right, a study just came on out on why this or that is bad for you, right?

Look at that study and create content from there. Second of all, find a story that inspires you. If you've read something, if you're reading a book and it inspires you, write about it. And don't be sucked into the fact that we have to read one book on its own all the time. I literally have three books on the go and I like it that way because I can pull stories and add them to my life and explain things, whether it is on social media or whether it's on an email list, I can tell stories from that aspect and find the statistic. I often talk about the statistic of only 2% of women's businesses reaching the seven figure mark. We are here at Boss Babe to change that. that matters to us and i can create content around that and likewise the system in the society we have our system that helps you start a business and grow a business it's based on mindset six pillars mindset purpose audience revenue systems and growth and likewise we have another system which we have another system, which we have inside Influencer School, which is the MBA method. Magnetize, build, activate. So we can talk about these systems, but those systems would never

have come about if we didn't start somewhere. We started playing with ideas. In fact, I remember when we first created the society blueprint, that system there, we went backwards and forwards on it so many times. So just know creativity isn't a thing. It is a process and you have to give yourself time and put energy in to being creative. I hope first of all, this inspires you that if you are saying and describing yourself as not a creative, every single one of you is, it just looks a little bit different. And your goal is to tap into that for yourself and really learn, Oh, well, it just looks a little bit different. And your goal is to tap into that for yourself and really learn, Oh, well, this is how I become more creative. Like this is how I work with my brain. And this brings out my creativity and my creativity looks like that.

So give yourself space over the next week before the next episode drops and just play with this, play with the ideas of what creativity looks for you and always make sure that you have space on your calendar to do this. So last little hack, which I actually did not plan to say, but I think is really important. I always make sure that on a Friday afternoon, it is free for social media content. Like that for me is where I do all my creative work. I do all of my planning. I think about the posts that I'm going to drop in there. And also if I'm having ideas in the meantime, in the weeks leading up to that,

I'll go into my notes section on my phone and just write down little ideas. So I have two things that I do. I have a notes section that I drop into as I go if I'm feeling inspired and I have a folder for it. And the second one is I always batch my content on Friday afternoons because that makes it easier for me. I can make sure I'm in folder for it. And the second one is I always batch my content on Friday afternoons because that makes it easier for me. I can make sure I'm in a creative zone. My team's normally

a little bit quieter on a Friday afternoon, so I'm not getting pulled into various other aspects, and I get time. And sometimes that creativity might hit me straight away. Sometimes I have to go for walks. Sometimes I have to read a book. Sometimes I have to do various things to really spark that joy inside myself to bring that out. So I hope you've loved this podcast. If you haven't already, please leave me a review. I really appreciate it. And I cannot wait to see you next week. We have some epic, epic podcast episodes coming up. Jay Shetty's is actually dropping on the 14th of February. I interviewed him about his book, The Eight Rules of Love. It is amazing. I'm reading it for the second time right now.

Even if you are not in a relationship, but you want to be, or if you have a relationship that you want to make better, it's good for all of it. Honestly, do yourself a favor and read it. One of the best books I've ever read on love. So anyway, on that note, I will see you all very soon.

Share that you've listened to this podcast and I will repost as many as I can. Bye. Thank you so much for listening. And if you enjoyed this episode on the Boss Babe podcast, then I'd absolutely love it if you leave us a review. As a thank you, we'll send you our side hustle success kit. Your simple, no BS guide to keeping track of everything that you need to do to start and grow your business. To access this freebie, all you need to do to start and grow your business. To access this freebie, all you need to do is leave us a review, then share a screenshot of

your review with contact at bossbabe.com and we'll send this must-have kit straight to your inbox. Outro Music