18. The Weekly - Think Ahead

On long term thinking, trusting the process and finding the same energy.

Welcome to the Happy Medium newsletter, where I share inspiration and bite-sized musings on creative business each week. Enjoy!

Inspiration

Things that have inspired me this week.

Same.Energy

A visual search engine. Search by image or text to find imagery with the same energy.

Courage and Confidence: The gift of listening by IDEO

In uncertain times, you need a compass, not a map. A practical and thoughtful guide to engaging with an uncertain world, not hiding from it.

“Our best work and our best future will be sponsored by courageous leaders with a long-term vision, and the courage to act begins with the courage to ask questions and, crucially, listen hard for the answers. Our short-term to-do list may always loom large, but doing nothing is simply not an option and if we don’t listen, we won’t unlock the optimistic future we all desire.”

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Quick thoughts

Musings on business, creativity, psychology and more.

Trends over triggers

This is my share portfolio in the last month.

yikes

This is my share portfolio over the past 5 years.

oh, not so bad

And this is my share portfolio since 2017.

actually, pretty good!

My Dad has always given me great advice and one thing he has always said is ‘Never make decisions based on one data point. Always look for the trend’.

Even the deepest and most dramatic falls in the stock market have recuperated over enough time. Now this is not in any way financial advice and I don’t pretend to know anything about stocks, but it perfectly illustrates the difference between a single data point (a bad month) and a trend (fairly consistent growth over years).

If you react to every single data point, not only is it exhausting but you’re more likely to make the wrong decision (i.e selling when you’re low).

Familiarity and Novelty

In a client-facing creative process, you want to balance familiarity and novelty. Familiar elements come from a client’s brief. Novelty comes from your expertise, skill and the creative evolution of ideas.

Familiar elements build trust and reflect understanding. Novelty is why they came to you!

Just in case you missed it…

Last week I shared my tried and true methodology for identifying, then solving, any problem in your creative business. Check it out & share it with your friends

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That’s it for this week! As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments, or DM me if you’re shy.

Otherwise, if you aren’t already, subscribe to get these in your inbox every week or catch up on previous weeks below!

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