Two Moments

Todd Henry [00:00:00]:
Over the past two weeks, I did a pretty intense speaking tour across the United States, delivering nine keynote presentations in just 14 days. Nine in 14 days. It's been exhilarating, it's been challenging at times, and it's been a bit disorienting. There was even a morning when I woke up completely unsure of which city I was in. It's a true story. From Indianapolis to San Juan, Puerto Rico to Savannah, Orlando, Minneapolis, Houston, and many more, I spoke to people from a variety of industries, from healthcare, furniture design and marketing to the creative and marketing departments of an NFL football team, which was kind of cool. Through it all, I maintained my practice of documenting some meaningful moments, insights and observations in my trusty notebook that I later am going to transfer to my idea organizing tool. As a creative pro, I've always believed that these captured moments are the raw materials of inspiration.

Todd Henry [00:00:52]:
So my notebook has become kind of a treasury of fragments, quick sketches, hastily scribbled observations, and those kind of lightning bolt moments of clarity that sometimes strike at unexpected times, like in the back of an Uber. While I typically keep these observations private, using them just as fuel for my creative process, today I'm going to do something different. In this episode, I'm going to pull back the curtain and share two powerful moments from my recent travels. Each of these experiences either challenged my thinking, sparked a new insight, or revealed something profound about creativity or leadership. So my hope is that by sharing these glimpses from the road, you'll find something that resonates with your own creative journey and maybe will spark a moment of insight for you as well. This is Daily Creative, a podcast for creative pros who want to be brave, focused, and brilliant every day. My name is Todd Henry. Welcome to the so the first moment occurred right after I had just given a keynote to several hundred marketers and the the two clients who had brought me in were coming up on stage and we were going to do a Q and A session with the entire group.

Todd Henry [00:02:07]:
But also and it was about the Brave Habit. Actually the keynote was but also they were going to share some of their own insights about bravery and how they were trying to instill bravery in their life and their work. And one of my clients told a story about his daughter. He was trying to teach his daughter about the importance of bravery and about making wise decisions. And he told this story. He said there was a man who was walking down the road and as he was walking he wasn't really paying attention and he fell into a hole and he got really mad at himself and he climbed out of the hole, and he continued walking down the street. Well, the next day, he came walking down the street again, and he fell into the hole again, and he thought, oh, I've made a terrible mistake. I didn't learn from the first day.

Todd Henry [00:02:57]:
I won't make that mistake again. So he climbed out of the hole, and he continued on his way. The third day, he came down the same street again, and this time he remembered to avoid the hole. But a strong wind came, and it pushed him into the hole, and he fell into the hole again on the third day. And this time he shook his fist at the wind, and he said, I can't believe all of those external forces pushed me into the hole. Right? So he climbed out of the hole, and he continued on his way. The fourth day, he decided to go down a different street. So my client told the story to his daughter, and he said, what do you think? Expecting her to say, well, of course, the man learned from his mistakes.

Todd Henry [00:03:43]:
But instead, his daughter replied, dad, he should have filled the hole on the first day. And he thought, wow, that is. That is a profound insight. And I had just given my keynote about the brave habit. And in the brave habit, I share that there are two core elements that are present when bravery tends to occur. Doesn't mean it will occur, but. But tends to occur. The first is that we have an optimistic vision, meaning that we have something we're navigating toward.

Todd Henry [00:04:16]:
We have a north pole that we're navigating toward. And it's an optimistic vision, not a pessimistic vision of the future, a way that things could be better. The second quality that tends to be present is a sense of agency versus a sense of powerlessness, meaning that we believe not only is there an optimistic vision, but that we have the agency to help bring about that optimistic vision. So there's something we can do. We can claim agency to help bring about that vision. And my client realized that that's exactly what his daughter had said. A, she had the optimistic vision to realize that the hole can be filled, and B, she realized I can claim the agency to fill the hole. How many times in my life do I have experiences where maybe I shake my fist at external forces or I decry the way things are going, or I make a mistake, but I don't take the time to fill the hole so that nobody following me will make the same mistake.

Todd Henry [00:05:11]:
And I realized that I do that more often than I. I think I do. So I started writing down some instances in my own life where maybe there are some holes that I've fallen into that I need to fill. Maybe there are some places where I need to A pursue an optimistic vision and B I need to claim the agency to right the situation. So that's the first moment. And my encouragement to you is this. Think about places in your life where maybe you lack optimistic vision, or B maybe you lack a sense of agency. And are there holes in your life that you've fallen into that need to be filled so that other people won't make the same mistake? I don't know about you, but as an introvert, sometimes all I want to do is huddle up by myself, put my earbuds in, and just block out the world.

Todd Henry [00:06:11]:
But I've learned that by doing so, when I'm on the road, I can miss golden opportunities to encourage others. This happened to me in Houston at the very end of my speaking trip. Frankly, I was exhausted. All I wanted to do was get to the hotel and crash. That was the only thing on my mind. But I've come to learn that it's often in those moments that opportunity arrives. My Uber driver and I began to casually chat and I started asking him about his story. He said he has his master's degree, he'd worked for a number of years in his industry, and he'd started a company, but what he really wanted to do was write.

Todd Henry [00:06:47]:
When I mentioned that I've written seven books, he began asking for my advice. After all, publishing seven books in 14 years seems daunting, overwhelming. So I shared my tried and true method. Write 500 words a day starting tomorrow, and do it every single day. After two weeks, you have a chapter. In five months, you have the draft of a book in a year. After a lot of revision and editing, which is the hard part, I told him, you have a book. I added that the key is consistency over perfection.

Todd Henry [00:07:23]:
Don't edit while you write. Just get the words down. Set a specific time for writing each day. Treat it like any other important appointment in your life, and guard that time fiercely. Find a quiet place where you won't be interrupted, and remember that progress, not perfection, is the goal. And I shared Hemingway's advice that I've used for many years, which is to end with the beginning in mind, meaning to always end each writing session knowing exactly where you'll pick up the next day. That's why when I hit the 500 word mark, I sometimes stop in mid sentence. It makes it so much easier to pick back up.

Todd Henry [00:07:59]:
And once I'm going, momentum carries me. I could tell that the Advice was hitting home. When we arrived at the hotel, I gave him my card and told him to reach out if I could help. The next day he did. In fact, he said that he'd gone home and written 700 words that night, that he was excited about writing again. In that moment, despite my exhaustion from two weeks of non stop travel, I felt energized. It reminded me that sometimes our most meaningful contributions don't happen when we're in public or even when we're doing the thing that we're being paid to do. They happen in those small, seemingly insignificant moments when we choose to be present and to be generous with our experience and our knowledge.

Todd Henry [00:08:43]:
And that's the thing about our body of work. We tend to think that our body of work are these big public displays of our expertise or our craft, or the big decisions that we make, or the leadership moments that we have. And sometimes that's true. That's certainly true. But often our body of work is shaped more by how we engage in small private moments that no one sees, ways that we build into other people who maybe need what it is that we have to offer, even when we don't feel like we have much to give. So what I learned from this is I need to continue to embrace these moments because we have no idea how our little decisions in those moments could be shaping the lives of everyone around us. I hope that my Uber driver goes on to have a phenomenal writing career, and he'll look back to that moment and say, I met this random person in my Uber who encouraged me, and that was the beginning of a long and prosperous body of work. So what does that look like for you to engage in small ways today with the people around you? What does it look like to be generous even when you don't feel like you have much to give? These are just two of the many moments that I had over the course of the couple of weeks that I was on the road.

Todd Henry [00:10:08]:
The many cities, the many talks, the many people I met was so inspired by the groups that I got to speak to the work that they're doing in the world and the ways in which they're applying my thoughts to their own world and their own work. And that's really, I think, what we all want, right? We want to know that the work that we're doing is contributing in some way to the greater body of work that the world is producing. I encourage you to take note of what's going on in your environment, to take note of these little moments of meaning that you have throughout the course of your day. Don't let them wash over you. Take note of them, Write them down. Use them as sparks in your own life. And consider how could these moments make me better as a creative pro, as a neighbor, as a leader, and as a human being? Hey, thanks so much for listening. If you'd like full interviews, the entire access to all of the archives, as well as daily episodes, prompts, and much more, you can get them in the Daily Creative app at DailyCreative app.

Todd Henry [00:11:22]:
My name is Todd Henry. You can find my work, my speaking and my books@toddhenry.com until next time. May you be brave, focused and brilliant.