Know Thyself

Take the test. Read the results. Google more results and read those. It's important to understand what makes you tick so that you can more clearly see what makes you happy. Your personality is unique. Things that make you sublimely happy, may make someone else miserable. By learning about your personality type, you learn how to better yourself.
Happiness is so key to your personal success. Read The Happiness Advantage. The theories in this book are based off of research and study, and help you understand why consciously striving for happiness is so important. It also gives advice on how to find your own personal kind of happiness. One way is by discovering your top character strengths and nurturing them in new ways. Mine are:
1. Appreciation of Beauty and Excellence
2. Curiousity (Exploration & Discovery)
3. Gratitude
4. Love of Learning
5. Creativity
Another way to find your happiness is by taking a small bit of time each day to jot down three good things that happened. Shawn Achor's advice is to be specific and list things that brought small or large laughs, feelings of accomplishment, nice things that were said, happy friendship moments, or a glimmer of hope for the future. This act conditions you to search for happiness more regularly and even unconsciously, allowing you to see the world through a rose-colored lens. Achor's book has really helped me understand myself and the world much better. Happiness does not come easily to all of us. It seems like such a simple and obvious thing, but it once evaded me. Now I would describe myself as a very happy person. Here are my happy thoughts of the day:
1. Rediscovered my Unstuck book today. It has lots of fun ideas to spark creativity.
2. I cleaned off my desk today a little bit. I feel much better when my work space is tidy.
3. The storm today was very exciting. On my drive to work, the water splashed around and made me smile. It reminded me of log flume rides at water parks.

Browsing DeviantArt

If you are an artist or designer, and have not yet made a DeviantART account, as Arnold would say, "Do it. Do it NOW!"  If not to post your own gallery of artwork under one of the many many categories (Digital Art, Traditional Art, Manga & Anime, Photography, Literature, Flash, the list goes on and on....), then at least to be able to browse and "Favorite" from the huge amount of inspirational artwork that gets added every day. 

The greatest thing about DevART, is that it's like a Google search without the garbage. You can sort from Most Popular or from Newest and it's all user generated artwork. I do Google search for inspiration, among other sources, but I find that I'm more successful at finding gem after gem if I DeviantART search. Google is just too broad sometimes. And it doesn't know that you are looking for artistic inspiration. So you end up with some junk that doesn't even make sense. I mean, what was that?

Thank Yous

Every time I start to feel a little poopy about the day, I just try to think of three things that I am thankful for. They can be abstract or not. It's a great idea from many knowledgeable folks, Rhonda Byrne and Shawn Achor for example, to help redirect your brain to focus on things that make you happy as opposed to focusing on whatever it is that is giving poop-thoughts. Try it!

Today I am thankful for: 
1. New discoveries.
2. Touching moments.
3. Sudden rainstorms.*

*Getting caught in a sudden storm sounds like a crap situation, but when it happens, I usually end up laughing hysterically. Getting drenched is hilarious 80% of the time. It's just a fact.

An Idea I Love: Faceted Paper Lamp

all things paper: Faceted Paper Lamp: Do you remember making folded paper fortune tellers when you were in grade school?

Go For Baroque 2

Today's good idea: take serious style risks. I went to ADDY Awards with a beehive style Marie Antoinette hairdo. Big hit. I even went around town after the event with my hair all huge. Hair style by Harley at Eskandalo!

Award Ceremonies: Go For Baroque

My colleagues at The Morning Call, who are also members of the Greater LV Ad Club's ADDY Committee, have worked tirelessly with me this year on a theme of 18th Century French style. The catch phrase chosen was "Go for Baroque", which I absolutely love. Some other ideas I had were "Come be Adorned," "The Feather in Your Cap," Oh My Gaud," and "Baroque as a Joke." These were the result of extensive Mind Mapping and daydreaming immediately after my first ADDY Awards last year: theme was MadMen (which was the theme of so many other ADDY awards that year.) I wanted a theme that was elegant, but not as likely to be imitated. I personally love this style of gaudy fashions and it seemed like something that could be easily done. I researched and found some amazing inspirations. I made some illustrations, and Sarah made some amazing mailer pieces and take-home pieces. Many sketchbook pages later, Sarah, Tanya and I came up with the idea of props for fun photo playtime at the event, including home-made masquerade masks, and other surprises. We also created some feather bouquet centerpieces. Photos to come.


If I learned anything from this large event planning experience, it is that one must understand the importance of the little things and the viewpoint of the attendees. When planning an event, I've noticed that committees think of the event in terms of themselves, how can we fit this into our budget, how can we make things run smoother, do we really need this or this, what's our next step; always keeping in mind the time and money that it will cost them. 


I propose that it's about the experience. What are the people going to this event going to remember? What are they going to take home with them? Will they talk about it? Will they come back next year because of the good time that they had or do they just see this as an event that they wouldn't mind skipping? If all of the fun little goofy things that people enjoy are taken away because of cost and time, it's obvious that the people planning DO NOT CARE about the people attending. 


So here's the main idea: The experience is what it is all about. Everything leads up to that one night. All that work will have been for naught if everyone thinks the ceremony is boring and lame. And no one wants to attend a stuffy event that feels like a business meeting, sorry (especially if they are PAYING for it!!!!). Bare minimum isn't gonna cut it. Not every budget needs to be cut. Some things are worth spending time and money on. If you don't care, then why are you even bothering?


So at the ADDY Awards this year, we hope you have fun. Take goofy pictures and play with our hand-crafted props. Make noise, be rowdy, and appreciate the cleverness. We tried really hard, with not much of a budget, to add some funky flair and debonair design to an event that is FOR DESIGNERS. 


We hope you win something and we hope you enjoy our idea: Go For Baroque!!!

Designed a T-shirt!! Concept by Terry Payne