Empty Promises Book Trailer from Cross Point Church on Vimeo.

While reading the other day, these words rocked my world:

“Approval Addiction is essentially an act of abandonment. Instead of finding your value and worth from your Creator, you have essentially given up your heart for adoption. You have given it away to others for love and approval, making them responsible for your feelings.”

As artists, how does this happen to us?

We emotionally LIVE and DIE based on how people respond to WHAT WE DO rather than WHO WE ARE.

If people don’t like our songs…we have no value.
If a service doesn’t go well…we feel we’re destroying the organization.
When we build a campaign and it misses…we think we’ll be rejected forever.
A piece of art is created and we love it, but it’s turned down or doesn’t connect…and we instantly feel like we’ve been personally attacked.

It’s a slippery and extremely unhealthy slope we live on.

This is not how God intended us to live. Our value and approval can only be found in who He created us to be…not in the stuff we create.

And I get it – the balance is ever so delicate: in order to create great art, we have to be connected to it. Just remember that our value and worth is given to us FROM our Creator, not from the things we’re creating.

Walk in that freedom today…

If you would like more info about this topic.. CHECK OUT THIS BOOK. It WILL rock your world.

See You Sunday

Sometimes it’s too much.
Sometimes we get overwhelmed.
Sometimes, no matter how hard we try, we can’t get it right.
Sometimes it’s just not enough.
Sometimes it doesn’t work.
Sometimes we are jeered.
Sometimes we get lucky.
Sometimes it all clicks.
Sometimes the effort pays off.
Sometimes we hit home runs.
Sometimes we win.
Sometimes everything comes together.
Sometimes we are cheered.

Eventually, we all have a sometime.
Embrace it.
Learn from it.
Celebrate it or bury it – but whatever you do…

NEVER. EVER. GIVE. UP!

Because Sometime is going to come and when it does we need you and the gifts you bring to change the world.
Even if it is one persons world.

P.S.
Jenni Worte a KILLER POST over at SUNDAY.TV & Carlos killed this one.

In art or leadership, there is a silent powerful force that is rarely exercised…the power of the pause.

In art, we often find ourselves under strict deadlines that move us into creative production mode – where ideas come, get executed, then ship out. While I’m a fan of shipping, there is a big part of the process missing here: the pause. It slips in right after ideas and right before executions. Taking a pause – putting the idea down, walking away, and then revisiting – often allows us to see more and better options for our ideas. Allowing them the space to breathe gives our ideas the chance to become healthy and full.

In leadership, pausing allows us not to get caught up emotionally. So often, “decisive” leaders create wow decisions in split seconds. Creating a pause – a chance to diagnose the data, explore the options, and think through the response – can create even better decisions; ones that limit big mistakes because we’ve allowed ourselves time to digest before we decide. Most of the time, taking a minute to pause will not cost us anything but the frustration of people trying to complete their check lists.

Obviously, prayer matters massively.

We can’t allow the pause to turn into procrastination. Pause is just enough time to allow space for our decisions and ideas to get better, not for us to create excuses not to ship and move. Pausing makes us better, procrastination kills us.

Have you incorporated the pause into your creative or decision making process?

Photo Props:

The nature of art is about taking risks.

We want to create things that have never been created, do things no one has done, and try things that have not been tried. When we become audacious, it forces us to accept that taking risks leaves us exposed to what some may call “failure”.

Anyone who has “failed” understands the apprehension of taking risks the next time opportunity arrives; it can be scary. There are two things that will paralyze creativity faster than any others:

1. When we haven’t defined success.
2. When we haven’t defined failure.

Clarifying success and failure help create targets. This process also contextualizes expectations. As we start projects, bringing clarity to what success and failure look like will help us take the right risks and create our best projects and art.

Do you clearly define success and failure?

Do you clearly define success and failure? Could you share a story of your success or a time you failed?