1: When couples divorce, one of the main reasons they give is, “I didn’t feel appreciated.”

If creativity were our love partner, do you think it would feel appreciated?

That’s one of the provocative questions Gay Hendricks asks in The Genius Zone: The Breakthrough Process to End Negative Thinking and Live in True Creativity.

He encourages us to examine the relationship we have with our creativity.  We can ask … continue reading

1: Professor Gay Hendricks was mad.

He sat in his car at a stoplight, replaying in his head the latest rant from the dean of his program at the University of Colorado, he writes in The Genius Zone.

His counseling department “locked horns repeatedly with the dean, who didn’t like some of the nontraditional things we did in our program.”

“I had left the meeting steamed up and found … continue reading

1: What happens when we try to control the uncontrollable?

Nothing good.

“The Genius Move,” Gay Hendricks writes in  The Genius Zone, “is when we let go of our effort to control the uncontrollable and feel the new space of creative aliveness open up inside us.”

Yesterday, we reviewed the specific five steps of what Gay calls “The Genius Move:”

Step 1: Notice we’re feeling unhappy, … continue reading

1:  For more than two decades, Jay had been “shaming himself for his drinking, always apologizing and promising to do better,” Gay Hendricks writes in The Genius Zone: The Breakthrough Process to End Negative Thinking and Live in True Creativity.

For twenty years, he’d insisted to his concerned family and friends that he wasn’t an alcoholic.  He told himself he could control his drinking.   

“All the while, though, he … continue reading

1: “There is a vast academic and popular literature on the art of decision-making,” Oliver Burkeman writes in Meditations for Mortals.

“But much of it misses the point,” Oliver observes.

How do we get it wrong? “By treating decisions as things that just sort of come along,” he writes.

“It’s as though we’re sitting behind our enormous desk in the executive suite,” Oliver explains, “sipping our coffee, and every … continue reading

1: Maury was referred to Gay Hendricks by a local psychologist who had read about Gay’s work with breathing and anxiety.

Maury explained how his anxiety was blocking his professional advancement.

“It took only ten seconds to see what the real problem was,” Gay writes in The Genius Zone. “He held his breath against his feelings. I noticed right away that when he talked about his anxiety, he … continue reading

1: Gay Hendricks had just delivered his first speech to a professional audience.

A man approached the podium and said, “I really enjoyed your talk.  It wasn’t so much what you said but the way you said it,” Gay writes in his book The Genius Zone.

Gay had always been nervous about public speaking, so the compliment lit him up.  “What did you like about the way I spoke?” … continue reading

1: Author Gay Hendricks received a text from a member of his extended family.

A family member was asking “for a loan of several thousand dollars for extra holiday expenses and to pay a tax lien,” Gay writes in his book The Genius Zone: The Breakthrough Process to End Negative Thinking and Live in True Creativity.

“Based on her dismal record of repaying past loans (zero for five over … continue reading

1: “I got sober the first time when I was around thirty,” the friend said. “After two years of sobriety I had a slip. I took a sip of white wine at a party.”

The man continued: “I could have gone to a meeting, confessed my slip, and recommitted, but instead I thought to myself, ‘Since I took one sip, I might as well just finish the glass—it would be … continue reading

1: On July 2nd, 1776, the Second Continental Congress voted to declare independence from Britain.

The following day, July 3rd, final revisions to Thomas Jefferson‘s draft of The Declaration of Independence were agreed to.

Which brings us to the 4th of July, 1776.

“In later years the excessive summer heat of Philadelphia would frequently figure in accounts of Thursday, July 4th, 1776,” David McCullough writes in his Pulitzer … continue reading