Welcome to the 42nd issue of The Groove.

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HOW TO OVERCOME YOUR MOST COMMON CREATIVE FEARS

Many people keep themselves from pursuing their greatest ideas and their most creative contributions because of four types of fears: fear of the unknown, fear of being judged, fear of taking the first step and fear of losing control.

Many times, one fear triggers another one and the whole thing escalates -usually first in people’s minds- preventing new and valuable projects and ideas from seeing the light of the day.

How Georgia O’Keeffe Conquered Her Fears

Georgia O’Keeffe photographed by her then lover, Alfred Stieglitz, in 1918. Imaged re-colored by Loredana Crupi.

Here’s a scenario of how these four fears interplayed:

In 1933, the extraordinary Georgia O’Keeffe, undoubtedly the “mother of American modernism,” accepted a commission to paint a mural in the ladies’ powder room at the brand-new Radio City Music Hall in midtown Manhattan, a project sponsored by John D. Rockefeller.

But her husband Alfred Stieglitz, who was also her gallerist, became livid that she had signed a contract with Rockefeller’s agent without his consent (fear of losing control) and demanded that she pull out and rescind the contract.

O’Keeffe wanted to do the project, as she had dreamed of working on a large-scale format. She went ahead with the original plan, except for some reason when she was working on-site, her canvas didn’t stick properly to the plaster on the wall, and she used that as an excuse to walk away from the whole thing.

But the true reason she left was the pressure her husband put on her (fear of being judged) and the anxiety she felt about breaking up her marriage (fear of the unknown and fear of taking the first step).

Georgia O'Keeffe with a canvas from her “Pelvis Series -Red With Yellow,” in Albuquerque, New Mexico, 1960. Photo by Tony Vaccaro.

This episode became O’Keeffe’s first public failure, followed by a nervous breakdown and a hospitalization.

When she was released, she traveled to Lake George in New York and to Bermuda. Upon her return, she began her separation process from Stieglitz. Her time alone allowed her to reflect on how she had been losing her independence and the opportunity to work on something she really wanted to do.

And here’s the greatest part: what do you do after fear has turned both a creative project and a relationship sour?

O’Keeffe didn’t blame anyone for her mistakes and took full responsibilities for her issues, acknowledging her vulnerabilities. On a letter she wrote to a friend she expressed that, “If the past year has taught me anything it is that my plot of earth must be tended with absurd care- by myself first and - if second by someone else- it must be with absolute trust.”

After this episode, O’Keeffe moved to New Mexico, reinvented herself, her art, and her lifestyle, which was fulfilling and productive until the end of her life at the age of 98 in 1986.

Of course, this a complex scenario with lots of drama to unpack, where the personal and professional overlap, but how freeing it is to have a moment of reflection in silence and solitude and take full responsibility for your life.

There’s no victimhood, no one to point fingers at. You see that good or bad, you owe it all to yourself. That’s when fear disintegrates.

What The CEO of Chobani Did When Chaos Hit

Hamdi Ulukaya; owner, founder, chairman, and CEO of Chobani photographed by Tim Richardson in 2017.

I was listening to a podcast from the Washington Post where the host was interviewing Hamdi Ulukaya, the CEO of Chobani (the yogurt company) and they were talking about the fear of the unknown. At the beginning of the pandemic, what could he do to keep the business going and his more than 2000 employees safe?

When most people were panicking and taking drastic measures, narrowing their perspectives, and losing businesses right and left, Ulukaya reflected for himself and got an insight: “let’s not just survive this, let’s transform it. We didn’t ask for this. We didn’t wish for this… but can we make something out of this.”

And he absolutely did. Ulukaya didn’t let the fear crush him and all his solutions from the get-go were really creative.

For example: since schools were closed, he provided childcare for employees in their own homes; he also gave them lunch boxes and a dinner bag since with restaurants closed and grocery stores having supply issues, he couldn’t afford to have people hungry in his production plants. He offered a flexible work plan so people could decide if they wanted to work from home for 15 or 21 days and take turns with others who were physically present.

In hindsight these seem like solutions that now most companies have implemented, but when Chobani put these protocols in place almost no one was doing them.

The antidote to the fear of the unknown in this case was taking action. As simple as that. It wasn’t about philosophizing or taking the wait-and-see approach that many other companies followed (and sadly paid handsomely for). It was about taking concrete steps and providing creative solutions to problems in real time.

Since all fears are connected or mutate from one to the next, consider these three antidotes when facing them: take time to reflect alone and in silence on the origins and truthfulness of the fear, take full ownership and responsibility for your life, and take concrete action steps that move you forward, no matter what you are facing.

Thank you for reading this far. Looking forward to hearing from you anytime.

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