Hey friends, welcome back to Create Connected.

This drop's guest is my good friend and former uni classmate, Georgann Ireland. She’s an award winning singer-songwriter, independent female artist, vocal and music producer for Nova Noir Productions. On her Instagram, she’s an entertainer extraordinaire—EE for short—music artist, and UC Berkeley graduate in economics.

Beyond that, she’s an incredibly multi-talented individual whose creative ambitions are only matched by her ability to think deeply and speak on a variety of diverse, fascinating, and forward-looking topics.

Most importantly, this conversation gives you widely applicable insights into how a multi-creative entertainer navigates production, remote collaboration, creative identity, and more.

Find Georgann Ireland on:

Whenever and wherever you're reading this, thank you for coming along for the ride. This drop has 2 pieces. This post and the podcast below:

You’re about to level up your creativity. Read on to...

  • 🚀 Challenge yourself to help your audience feel less alone
  • 🎤 Learn how Georgann Ireland fosters collaboration, perfects her craft, and aligns her multi-creative identity
  • 🧰 Build 1 winning practice to help you finish your solo project
  • 🧠  Water your seeds of creativity
  • 👁️‍🗨️  Get a quote to help you recall this drop’s big lessons

🚀 Challenge yourself to create, connected

Ask yourself these 4 questions in sequence to help your audience feel less alone by creating something that resonates with them. Set a timer for 60 seconds for each question so you don’t overthink it.

  1. Besides myself, who am I creating for? (Their traits, likes, dislikes, worldview)
  2. In a regular day, what makes them feel lonely, disconnected, or isolated?
  3. If I ran into them on the street, what things could I say to help them feel more connected to me and each other?
  4. How can I say those same things using my art form(s)?

🎤 Standout interview wisdom

For this drop's podcast, I connected with award-winning songwriter, producer and UC Berkeley economics grad Georgann Ireland and to chat collaborative vibes, the value of art, and multi-creative identity.

I had a hard time picking out the best parts of our convo. The whole 90 minutes feels like a philosophical deep-dive into art’s value and the most vibrant parts of the creative process.

Here are the biggest slices of wisdom.

Trust your gut on creative chemistry

Have you ever hit it off with someone at a party and felt like you knew them instantly? Georgann shares how that intuitive “I vibe with this person” is the root of the most successful, fruitful, and fulfilling creative collaborations.

Train with craft, make with emotion

Great creatives have practiced enough they reflexively make things that are good, allowing them to focus on putting their deepest feelings into their work, resonating with their audience.

Art’s utility versus art’s value

Recent convos about art seem to focus far too much on the surface-level utility of art. If you want to stand out, focus on how you can use your art, craft, and works to bring people together.

🧰 1 practice to help you finish your solo project

The problem: You have a creative project you’re stoked about, but it keeps getting put off and de-prioritized.

The solution: Accountability buddy-ing / partnering

How to do it:

  1. Write down a clear goal for your project (for example, done and published to 5 platforms)
  2. Pick a deadline that you think you can get it done by if you stay consistent
  3. Find a friend whose opinion you value (they don’t have to be creative)
  4. Reach out and ask them if they can help keep you accountable on something. Here’s a blueprint for that message:Hey (friend’s name)! I’m working on finishing (your project’s name) and I’d love for you to help keep me accountable so I can get it done. Would you be cool being my accountability buddy on it?
  5. Make sure they’re okay with you sending an update at least a few times a week. And ask them if they want your help on anything as a favor in return.
  6. Tell them what you’ll have done by the next time you check in (Use the phrase “next time we check in, I will have…”)
  7. Check in with them anywhere between once a week and daily to give updates on your progress (I love a daily morning voice note)
  8. If you miss your deadline, make a point to ask your accountability buddy why they think you missed it. Then either commit to a new one, or archive the project.

🧠 Water your seeds of creativity

I’ve been thinking deeply lately on how many people I meet say they “aren’t creative,” and how that’s something I’d like to help change in my spheres.

Our thoughts often become our actions, and so a prohibitive thought prohibits the action. The notion that many vibrant people are walking around thinking they’re not creative makes me feel sad at all the missed potential that’s causing.

We make a ton of the creative decisions throughout the day that we might not think of as creative. Your wardrobe, your diet, how you choose to move your body, the content you consume, the words you choose in conversation. These all contribute to—and create—your identity.

If you want to water the seeds of creativity within you, consider these questions with me in the coming days:

  1. What parts of my identity have I created unintentionally?
  2. What parts of my self do I love and feel vibrance in?
  3. What small change can I create in my daily life to let that vibrance shine through just a little bit more?

👁️‍🗨️ Heuristic idiom

I like to create idioms to help me explore, reorient, and recall lessons learned. Like a word-based mind palace. Here’s the one I’ve been using lately:

“To create is to be human and to be human is to create.”

🗞️
This post was republished from the Create Connected project.