Stole this from another blogger’s post

His name is Ralphie, and he is a “business artivist.” Here are his philosophies:

 

formerly known as “The Evolving Principles of Boojummy”

Create win-win scenarios where everyone gets what they need and feels good and no one feels taken advantage of.

Recognize that we can’t just sit on our a$$es and do nothing if we want to have any right to complain about the respective states of our existence

Embrace the ego because if you’re not getting what you need, you’re not going to be able to give others what they need. Accept that altruism and egotism are not incompatible concepts.

It’s OKAY to make money doing something you love. And it sure as hell ought to be okay making money making the world a better place. And it’s okay for those who work harder and contribute more to society to make more, not less, money than others.

Change happens ONE PERSON AT A TIME. It starts with the self and spreads outwards like rippling water. But as the one becomes the few and the few become the many, the waves increasingly intersect and create “nodes” of connection and understanding.

No one person is the be all and end all within the interdependent business artivist system. Some people, however, akin to Malcolm Gladwell’s conception of the connector and the maven, have a greater grasp on big picture issues and that grasp should be respected, but never go unchallenged. The goal of the teacher is to have the student surpass him or her.

Power abhors a vacuum. If humanistically oriented “spirit first” leaders (aka “poets of the possible”) don’t aspire to wield influence, then materially-oriented “money first” leaders will because their rules-based institutional structures are based upon a well-considered rational understanding of human nature that has proven itself successful time and again through recorded history. As such, the “rules of the game” are stacked in their favor because they have past precedent to argue their case. Many people with spiritually-inclined constitutions are co-opted into the “system” simply because there are no other viable alternatives.

We can do just fine by ourselves, but we can do better together than apart. In the increasingly networked world of Intrenet 2.0, collaboration and sharing are to be considered a competitive advantage.

Flexibility and adaptibility are key. Changing opinions and approaches resulting from growth, learning and changing circumstances “on the ground” are never to be considered evidence of a disingenuous initial position. Precisely because of this amorphous nature of the artivist network, the cultivation of permission-based networks centered upon trust, transparency, honesty and openness are key ingredients to business, as well as personal, success.

Business is personal. Don’t let anyone tell you differently. The idea that it is not is just a “believeable fiction” we tell ourselves to ease those nagging guilts we feel when we screw others over. As social entrepreneurial and good corporate citizen models suggest, psychic benefit in lieu of monetary gain can provide for increased efficiency and yield superior profits, both psychic and monetary, going forward.

Receive an ounce of kindness? Try to pass on two and it will even out in the end. If you don’t know what I mean, try being the guy who collects the money at the end of a group dinner…

It’s okay to press the back button. Mistakes get made. We only ask good faith and for network participants and/or allies to take immediate ownership and accountability for past error. Mistakes made in good faith are not “evil.” Failure to re-assess past positions upon presentation of new information, or failure to allow for the presentation of new evidence (aka “communication shutdown”), however, will not be passively accepted, but persistently challenged, until a better story that better fits facts can be presented.

Let’s be human beings… There is no room in business artivism for either petty jealousy or preening egoism. Those who succeed are to be considered guides and facilitators for those who helped promote them to success. Gifts of knowledge and/or venture risk capital are to be considered a duty. In return, the giver may reasonably expect a return on investment in the form of monetary or social equity. Returns on investment in the form of physical or emotional equity, however, are to be assiduously avoided whereever possible (you can’t shut off feeling after all…) lest they exploit well known inequalities embedded within the the very structure of unequal power distributions.

Those who create work should benefit from the widespread dissemination of that work. We consider intellectual and creative copyright, especially in the digital age, a moral mandate.

Business artivism is OPT-OUT at any time. If you’re not getting what you need, go someplace where you have a better chance to get it. But you can’t just take it all with you and neglect those who helped you along the way. Well… you can, but don’t expect us to sit still for it. We’ll fight for our own not to get the short end of the stick and even keep the door open for you to come back if and when the time is right.

Bruce Mau’s Incomplete Manifesto for Growth

I think I have seen a sliver of light with this one. I actually posted this to another blog to share with peers, but I see no harm in posting it here too…

AN INCOMPLETE MANIFESTO FOR GROWTH

Written in 1998, the Incomplete Manifesto is an articulation of statements exemplifying Bruce Mau’s beliefs, strategies and motivations. Collectively, they are how we approach every project.

1. Allow events to change you.You have to be willing to grow. Growth is different from something that happens to you. You produce it. You live it. The prerequisites for growth: the openness to experience events and the willingness to be changed by them.
2. Forget about good.Good is a known quantity. Good is what we all agree on. Growth is not necessarily good. Growth is an exploration of unlit recesses that may or may not yield to our research. As long as you stick to good you’ll never have real growth.
3. Process is more important than outcome.When the outcome drives the process we will only ever go to where we’ve already been. If process drives outcome we may not know where we’re going, but we will know we want to be there.
4. Love your experiments (as you would an ugly child).Joy is the engine of growth. Exploit the liberty in casting your work as beautiful experiments, iterations, attempts, trials, and errors. Take the long view and allow yourself the fun of failure every day.
5. Go deep.The deeper you go the more likely you will discover something of value.
6. Capture accidents.The wrong answer is the right answer in search of a different question. Collect wrong answers as part of the process. Ask different questions.
7. Study.A studio is a place of study. Use the necessity of production as an excuse to study. Everyone will benefit.
8. Drift.Allow yourself to wander aimlessly. Explore adjacencies. Lack judgment. Postpone criticism.
9. Begin anywhere.John Cage tells us that not knowing where to begin is a common form of paralysis. His advice: begin anywhere.
10. Everyone is a leader.Growth happens. Whenever it does, allow it to emerge. Learn to follow when it makes sense. Let anyone lead.
11. Harvest ideas.Edit applications. Ideas need a dynamic, fluid, generous environment to sustain life. Applications, on the other hand, benefit from critical rigor. Produce a high ratio of ideas to applications.
12. Keep moving.The market and its operations have a tendency to reinforce success. Resist it. Allow failure and migration to be part of your practice.
13. Slow down.Desynchronize from standard time frames and surprising opportunities may present themselves.
14. Don’t be cool.Cool is conservative fear dressed in black. Free yourself from limits of this sort.
15. Ask stupid questions.Growth is fueled by desire and innocence. Assess the answer, not the question. Imagine learning throughout your life at the rate of an infant.
16. Collaborate.The space between people working together is filled with conflict, friction, strife, exhilaration, delight, and vast creative potential.
17. ____________________.Intentionally left blank. Allow space for the ideas you haven’t had yet, and for the ideas of others.
18. Stay up late.Strange things happen when you’ve gone too far, been up too long, worked too hard, and you’re separated from the rest of the world.
19. Work the metaphor.Every object has the capacity to stand for something other than what is apparent. Work on what it stands for.
20. Be careful to take risks.Time is genetic. Today is the child of yesterday and the parent of tomorrow. The work you produce today will create your future.
21. Repeat yourself.If you like it, do it again. If you don’t like it, do it again.
22. Make your own tools.Hybridize your tools in order to build unique things. Even simple tools that are your own can yield entirely new avenues of exploration. Remember, tools amplify our capacities, so even a small tool can make a big difference.
23. Stand on someone’s shoulders.You can travel farther carried on the accomplishments of those who came before you. And the view is so much better.
24. Avoid software.The problem with software is that everyone has it.
25. Don’t clean your desk.You might find something in the morning that you can’t see tonight.
26. Don’t enter awards competitions.Just don’t. It’s not good for you.
27. Read only left-hand pages.Marshall McLuhan did this. By decreasing the amount of information, we leave room for what he called our “noodle.”
28. Make new words.Expand the lexicon. The new conditions demand a new way of thinking. The thinking demands new forms of expression. The expression generates new conditions.
29. Think with your mind.Forget technology. Creativity is not device-dependent.
30. Organization = Liberty.Real innovation in design, or any other field, happens in context. That context is usually some form of cooperatively managed enterprise. Frank Gehry, for instance, is only able to realize Bilbao because his studio can deliver it on budget. The myth of a split between “creatives” and “suits” is what Leonard Cohen calls a ‘charming artifact of the past.’
31. Don’t borrow money.Once again, Frank Gehry’s advice. By maintaining financial control, we maintain creative control. It’s not exactly rocket science, but it’s surprising how hard it is to maintain this discipline, and how many have failed.
32. Listen carefully.Every collaborator who enters our orbit brings with him or her a world more strange and complex than any we could ever hope to imagine. By listening to the details and the subtlety of their needs, desires, or ambitions, we fold their world onto our own. Neither party will ever be the same.
33. Take field trips.The bandwidth of the world is greater than that of your TV set, or the Internet, or even a totally immersive, interactive, dynamically rendered, object-oriented, real-time, computer graphic–simulated environment.
34. Make mistakes faster.This isn’t my idea — I borrowed it. I think it belongs to Andy Grove.
35. Imitate.Don’t be shy about it. Try to get as close as you can. You’ll never get all the way, and the separation might be truly remarkable. We have only to look to Richard Hamilton and his version of Marcel Duchamp’s large glass to see how rich, discredited, and underused imitation is as a technique.
36. Scat.When you forget the words, do what Ella did: make up something else … but not words.
37. Break it, stretch it, bend it, crush it, crack it, fold it.
38. Explore the other edge.Great liberty exists when we avoid trying to run with the technological pack. We can’t find the leading edge because it’s trampled underfoot. Try using old-tech equipment made obsolete by an economic cycle but still rich with potential.
39. Coffee breaks, cab rides, green rooms.Real growth often happens outside of where we intend it to, in the interstitial spaces — what Dr. Seuss calls “the waiting place.” Hans Ulrich Obrist once organized a science and art conference with all of the infrastructure of a conference — the parties, chats, lunches, airport arrivals — but with no actual conference. Apparently it was hugely successful and spawned many ongoing collaborations.
40. Avoid fields.Jump fences. Disciplinary boundaries and regulatory regimes are attempts to control the wilding of creative life. They are often understandable efforts to order what are manifold, complex, evolutionary processes. Our job is to jump the fences and cross the fields.
41. Laugh.People visiting the studio often comment on how much we laugh. Since I’ve become aware of this, I use it as a barometer of how comfortably we are expressing ourselves.
42. Remember.Growth is only possible as a product of history. Without memory, innovation is merely novelty. History gives growth a direction. But a memory is never perfect. Every memory is a degraded or composite image of a previous moment or event. That’s what makes us aware of its quality as a past and not a present. It means that every memory is new, a partial construct different from its source, and, as such, a potential for growth itself.
43. Power to the people.Play can only happen when people feel they have control over their lives. We can’t be free agents if we’re not free.

Fellowship Song

As I was sitting on my couch today, I was sooo disturbed, frustrated, and upset about how things were going with my friends. I have been feeling miserable all summer for soo many reasons, but something hit me today and told me that such worries are meaningless, for I have God, and He will supply all of my needs, wants, and desires. Then, I just had to thank Him, and instead of writing a poem about my miseries, I decided to write a song to my friends and to God, exclaiming how great He is.  I call it The Fellowship Song.

Verse 1.

Join me in fellowship.

Let us lift our hands to Him.

He who is great. He who is awesome.

Let us praise His name.

(repeat 1x)

Chorus:

Lord we love you. We adore you.

You are good to us.

Not for what you’ve done, but for who you are.

We exalt your name.

Lord we love you. We adore you.

You are good to us.

Not for what you’ve done, but for who you are.

We will praise your name.

Verse 2:

Lord, we lift our hands to you.

For all the things you brought us through.

We have been called. We have been chosen.

To exhalt your name.

(repeat 1x)

Chorus.

 

Let us praise Him. He is good to us.

Let us glorify, glorify His name.

(repeat 8x)

We love you! (We love you!)

We adore you! (Adore you)

We praise you! (We Praise you)

Hallelujah! (Hallelujah)

 

(repeat 12x)

A Call to Teach and a Call to Persevere

Today I got my first opportunity to teach students about the subject that I love most- identity in art. Although my session with the students, sophomore students from University City High School, went exceptionally well, I really feared (at first) that it would end in a total flop. Here’s a quick summary of the story:

I have a friend who is a sophomore at my university (WashU!), and she has an internship this summer in St. Louis working with students from UCity. Last spring semester, she always asked me if I would be interested teaching a class about the things that I study to her students, and of course, I said yeah, not thinking that anything would come of it. Many times in college, you find that people say that they will support something or do something with so much enthusiasm, but because of the other hundred activities that we are involved in, we soon forget…and I really thought it was another of these fleeting moments.

But no, this girl was PERSISTENT, and she kept reminding me of this task that I’d agreed to do, so as a woman of my word, I took it more seriously and prepared my lesson. Everything went completely smoothly until last night when the girl wrote me on Facebook at 11:14pm to inform me that the students were studying GLOBAL WARMING, and their art project would be a college expressing how they feel about it. Of course, I FREAKED OUT. I had to present for them at 8:15am, and I knew nothing about global warming or the art of collaging (I’m the painter/drawing/graphic design type). So immediately, I thought, “Well, I just won’t do it,” (along with MANY other pessimistic, arrogant, and downright negative thoughts) and soon after, I was reminded by God the following passage that I hold dear, Hebrews 10: 35-39, “A Call to Persevere:”

“35 So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewareded.

36 You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.

37 For in just a very little while, ‘He who is coming will come and will not delay.

38 But my righteous one will live by faith. And if he shrinks back, I will not be pleased with him.’

39 But we are not of thos who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who believe and are saved.” (NIV)

This passage has helped me through many hard times and tribulations throughout my college experience, and I am sure that God sent it to me last night as a reminder that I do not need to worry and freak out about everything that goes wrong in my life because I must stay focused on His higher mission for me. And more than anything else, I dare not give up on anything that I due when faced with a challenge, especially one like this one.

Therefore, after reading this passage again last night, I went directly to sleep, and when I overslept (I’d scheduled to wake at 5:45, but did not rise until 7:34), I kept this passage on my mind and still did not freak up. I calmly got up, thanked and conversed with God for the new day, and proceeded to my school. And when I entered and presented, things went absolutely PERFECT. The kids did not care that I did not talk about art and global warming; they were simply intrigued about my and other artists’ works revealing how we feel about our self-identities and the worlds around us. Moreso, because I presented things smoothly and time efficiently, they decided to reflect what they’d learned from me and create similar drawings. It was a blessed occasion, and I am so glad that I did not simply “shrink back” and give up because I realized with those students that educating/mentoring youth is something that I desire to do with my life, and in my perseverance, God just allowed me to take the first step.

De