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Homework Assignment Hot Seat

Welcome back to creative life david nick turn he's a well known composer producer guitarist he's a four time emmy winner and a two time grammy nominee. He's the founder of dharma moon of five point record five points records and he's worked with everybody in the business stevie wonder christopher guest jerry garcia lana del rey marie mulder john kennedy o'connor you name them he's worked with everybody pull simon is well he used to be the co director of the l a shambala center and he's also being the director of expansion action on bala training international and director of buddhist practice and study for om yoga I'm so thrilled to welcome back two creative life david nick turn theo I'm very good how you doing? Oh, excellent. Now we all got the sort of teal green memo today going into doing it is it's a green day. It must be something from yesterday that we all got into a symbiosis overnight. It's an environmental statement here. Well, david really filled abby I'm very sorry this is t...

he last day of this course this way you're going to like it. But I know from the chapmans have so engaged in the company and the way you've been teaching really does inspire everybody in the creative live audience, so we threw out a happy back thank you very much I'm looking forward to the next course but I'll give you that so you could get away with this course we have it might have to be in relationships. What do you think? That sounds good. I might stay there going, uh, good morning. Good to see everybody again. Greetings to all our virtual participants. Um, I feel like yesterday if you we're watching. We kind of laid a lot of groundwork in regards to these basic topics and how they work together. And it was interesting to hear that people in the audience, you know, speaking about your epiphanies, your, you know, your sense of processing what we've been talking about seem like one of the ideas that came out strongly was the idea of joining heaven on earth or taking your vision and your sort of practical elements of your life on dh, synchronizing the and the meditation practice is really a way of doing that. On a personal level, you're joining a personal having your personal earth, which is your mind in your body synchronizing. So, um, my teachers often talked about synchronizing mind and body being them together in the same place at the same time, which which creates a lot of a lot of focus, power and clarity, so we're going to continue along today with this kind of discussion, and I'm hoping today we get a little bit maybe yes there's little more heaven in terms of like sort of the theoretical dimension of this and maybe today mohr tackling specific issues that we're all experiencing and kind of learning from each other again today as to how we can get down you know, the expression get down is sort of coming down to earth and it's a big actually in this classical buddhist teachings getting down is considered a very, very powerful aspect of the teachings even the buddha himself has shown touching earth you might have seen if you see sometimes the buddha statues touching the ground, which is about getting down to earth and we've been floating around long enough don't you think it's time to land and as a way of doing that, we're taking the sort of ideas that we expressed yesterday, right? And now processing them through our own and, you know, actual lives on de so we had homework assignment that was really an attempt for you all, including you all at home or wherever you are too personalized these thoughts so and see if they if they can kind of make sense for you and help you to get unstuck, which is really that's what we're really talking about, where are we stuck? And I think somebody said something about the flow of energy who said that? What did you say? Could you say it again don't push the river that flows by itself yeah yeah so um but you have to get in the river wait I want to watch the river flowing by because that would make us philosophers but everybody here is a creative artist and looking teo uh develop the practical dimension of your expression in the world in a powerful way so I think we're talking about today sort of a little more engaging our own power uh in terms of manifesting you know actually showing up for the party so um hopefully we can we can dig in a little bit I want to hear whatever it is going through a home on dh what people in the audience are going through and we're going to start with just a review of the homework will serve as a review of what we talked about yesterday and even some of the things we're going to talk about today so uh we're gonna just try with one person to kind of go through the homework assignment as a way of looking uh point by point you know how these things are getting digested by you so I think sarah did you volunteer okay what did they pick you or did you volunteer a little bit of okay so sierra's gonna come up? We'll get a chair for you over here and we have a little bit of a dialogue here about these points by going through your your homework so welcome, sirrah. How are you today? Doing extremely well. Good. Thank you. Alright, so, um jumping in, um and this serving as a review of the material that we covered yesterday so it gets fresh in your mind. Um, first what we did talk about the notion of joining heaven on earth heaven is your vision earth is your current reality, your jobs to connect the dots and bring them together. So the first it was to discuss your vision and how you plan to make it happen. Um, your vision being this sort of heaven element and how you plan to make it happen being the earth element. So do you want to just read what you wrote or or talk about it a little bit about it? Okay. All right, good. All right, so my vision, I'm really interested in technology innovation um and so what I want to do is I want to bring more diversity to technology because diversity stimulates innovation and how I want to do that, how one increase diversity and to take his first have to introduce diverse people to the tech industry and how I do that is by making it accessible um and that's why I want to build you've sinners that specializes that's a beautiful vision I mentioned yesterday it's a vision that would I think, be catalytic and would receive a lot of support so how do you plan to go about making that happen so first I'll put myself in a position to order from people who are doing it already there's a lot of organizations that have similar interests similar focuses and so what I would do without become involved in those organizations really give attention to the processes that they use and see what results in effect um and then use that and implement from my own systems in organization any specific ideas have you done the research on who those organizations might be? Yes there's one in particular that I'm really I wanna wear for his black girls code what's going black girls code code okay yeah and where are they based they're in the barrier have you made contact? Absolutely have a meeting next week. Okay? She already set up a meeting with them next week. Um are they aware that you're doing this program no, not giving them a shout out on kind of international media they don't yeah, I would recommend that you let them know that or even if you could grab a little bit of the footage of you doing this because you're bringing something to them and that's a that's a powerful way to enter you know situation where you actually you enter as a supplement but at same time your bringing an offering so that's very very exciting are they the stab well established at this point yes, they have different centers around the u s and would part of your plan maybe be toe work for them for a while and just sort of get your get your uh learning curve up that one absolutely okay that's excellent really excellent. And have you thought beyond that towards okay now let's see you do that for a year or two or what would you visualize? I think you two would be good for another thing is to it puts me in the instead of actually working with kids so actually learning how t deal with a young minds and different attention spend and things like that so it's a lot of different challenges that I think uh I can overcome by working with him so I think until years a year to be sufficient here that's totally excellent really total here so uh the second one was taking your mind to the gym just as we can train the body to develop strength, flexibility and stamina we can also train the mind to develop clarity, focus and stability. What is your current relationship to meditation practice if any and what aspirations if you need to have to develop your practice all right, so my form of meditation has been toe wake up in the morning and write down what I'm grateful for so that's something that I would do it consistently um and then a kind of fella so I would say that my aspiration is to be more consistent with my meditation in terms of what we kind of mindfulness meditation is that we've introduced here. Do you feel that that's something that could be useful? Teo so how would you implement? Well, you know, I really liked and mental floss on tactics I think implementing that would be but would you see doing this sitting practice that we've introduced here is part of your life okay? Any kind of notion of time dedication to that practice they can start with the two minute today very li building it up a little bit. Is it hard for you to sit you find challenging sometimes um to sit and just be very still I really liked the analogy that she used yesterday with the water and sometimes you just have to sit still and keep calm. Well, you know a lot for a lot of the folks out there. This is I know this is a new kind of topic in terms of being the sitting meditation practice. So my recommendation to you and to all of you out there is to try and, uh the course comes with a very clear a set of instructions you know, that's uh, simple meditation instructions for ordinary people which you get when you do sign up for the course uh you can review it that way you know uh three steps they're just taking your seat putting attention on the breath and notice when you wander off and coming back so for you especially you know, maybe you can get up to fifteen or twenty minutes four, five times a week and that'll give you grounds going forward up to you up too but that's what's that's what's part of this particular sort of notion of how to stabilize as you move for your moving forward into battle into action you know? So we need our ground right? Okay, so thank you for that. Uh, number three we talked about spending time in the sandbox do you remember playing in the sandbox was a kid you had time you didn't have to be somewhere else. You didn't have a list you were checking off agendas, timelines and obligations khun b the enemies of creativity describe your creative expression. Okay, this is for you and your relationship to it is a hobby or business specify how you want to develop it. Okay, so I designed document and photograph you've been for living apparently um and I want to be comfortable designing user interfaces and I want to master adobe light room well you're on the ball, sirrah this's what we're talking about with earth this's a very grounded kind of approach towards how she's going use go forward with this uh all these things that we've been talking about um obviously you've done some good thinking about it so the next one is sometimes we have to create with an agenda a timeline and a budget when we mix creativity in business there is a price to pay literally and figuratively what are your issues with bringing your creative and business skills together? Okay, so I think dc be mentioned something similar yesterday was creating something that she don't necessarily like it's something more so for the client and that you don't necessarily have like a connection to it. So one issue I've had has been yeah, this this logo that I know that's what you want but it's really not a good logo, you know, so that that conflict when I am designing something that I don't necessarily like you and I know that's what the client likes another one is dealing with difficult client to something I don't like tio well, um so how do you work with that? I just kind of have to suck it up that sometimes I wonder if I've been that person you understand? Like, you know, when you're on the other side of that it's very interesting if you've been on both sides of the issue you get you get a kind of very different perspective from um so part of that is that you're doing your creative work for hire right and uh you know, I did the music for two soap operas for about fifteen years you know, one life to live and as the world turns that did all their music and it was you know, there's an interesting moment there like you create something you like and they go no, this isn't right for what we need uh with varying degrees of how they might want to express that to you you know, you know, uh accommodating your sensitive artistic toes you know, um it's interesting to suck it up I think we all have to contemplate that if you have that fits in with our creativity spirituality making the buckets and so can you, but there's something very earthy and the confidence that I think everybody can relate to write t k oh, can you relate to that can't wait s so um uh, what about money? Which is where we're going to settle launch from take money it's just such a word it's gonna settle loaded word but what we said somewhere between grasping and ignoring so those two extremes some of us are grasping at money and some of us just don't want to deal with it and everything in between so somewhere between those money looms as a precise and challenging barometer of our state of mind and our relationship to our world yes or no do you think so yes, I think that I had depends on everyone's relationship with money is relative how about yours um I tried to use it is lisa's possible um use it as little as possible meaning don't spend money not if I don't have to go and I'm learning that it's more about the exchange value then money and I've just been a lot more resourceful lately okay uh how does the idea of making more money strike you that night? You like that? I do like that idea. So do you think that involves any shift of your attitude about it to sort of enable that to happen necessarily um and I say that because, um I think it it's it's it's more about like what you can do for someone and how they die if I don't I don't always accept money as my payment for certain things that I do because it's not as for philly for me but it all the prison situation okay, this is actually going to be our first topic this morning that we're gonna launch into uh it's such an interesting area as we'll see and I think we could try to get a lot of feedback from you all about it out there in cyberspace so yeah, I mean that's you know you're scanning through your your approach towards it and you can see certain things that look a little bit food for thought at a certain point um, uh, defining you're offering, there is no business. If you do not have something to offer, your first happens to clearly define what that is to be a service or product or intellectual property. You've already in some sense described your offering both fronts. So I think we would you say, I mean, you you you talked about the offering that you're currently making and your future offering, uh, pretty clearly pretty succinctly, would you want to add anything to that, or was that good? Okay, now here is the one that we're going to talk about overcoming poverty mentality, and this is a sort of interesting fulcrum for all of us. I think our business can only succeed to the level of success we will allow in our life. We experienced poverty mentality when we cannot access our own internal sense of richness and worthiness discuss you understand the concept of poverty mentality, and whether and how it applies to you. And just to be clear about this, this is sort of drawn, really, from the buddhist teachings that I studied this this idea of poverty mentality is not exactly about money. That's what interesting it's about a sense of inherent richness and abundance. And can we can we contact that dimension of our own of our own experience? And then how does that radiate out in terms of how we how the flow happens between us and other people. So any relationship to this notion is there's something in it you wantto say to us it's so that axe my understanding, so poverty mentality to me its focus and when she don't have also known as the negative on dso the poverty metalious for me and forces me to be and I brought it this word a lot is resourceful on dso for example, there's a there's a lot of tech converses in san francisco on dh also like power cells silicon valley so I know okay, I want to go to this conference but it's eight hundred dollars it's not in my budget and I always add a but at the end of it but they might need a photographer so I can offer my on my photography services and get paid to be at that conference or if there's something I really want to be in and they don't have the the they don't have the budget they were ableto to negotiate no, you know so to me, like I said it's about an exchange of value. So I really want to use our exchange, my skill set for access it's this information or to these people I'm truly impressed that's uh it's interesting that uh um conceiving of richness wealth has not just strictly in monetary terms but in terms of resources in terms of talent in terms of generosity of spirit that's really that's really very very moving to hear you talk about that uh sales and marketing which is going to be a major thrust for us today um talk about the rubber hitting the road or touching the earth once we define our offering we have to let people know about it which is the marketing peace and here's the one that we're really going to dive into it with gusto today identified potential clients and customers educate them and close the deal all capital letters discuss your relationship to marketing and sales and so far as it relates to your current business operation okay, so um facebook has actually been a very good marketing tool for me um accidentally I just just like that what do you mean accident? Because it wasn't with the intent to sell so I just start posting some designs in photography on my facebook page and people just kind of like oh, you know you're really good in um people started to reach out from to me from facebook actually got more I probably got more uh leads through facebook than actual before had a website so now my website just kind of serves as by the central location for people to get my contact information but it's not it doesn't necessarily drive right so I don't buy any as you anything and then winter work is good you know there is available on facebook I know that they are but I don't purchase that they it could be very reasonable it's an interesting possibility using that medium that you already engaged with we've been doing that some of that night um and so one thing I have awesome learn is when people really like here product in result they did a marketing for you so a lot of my time my marketing has come from a past clients in the bottom over come through for us now okay uh do you think there's anything you could be doing that's more proactive in terms of sales and marketing? Oh absolutely and that's something that I've done with photography is now reaching out to event coordinators and calls right? Well, actually email e mail of accidents they're interested in photography services. You know, there used to be a thing in sales called cold calling which was like the sort of mark of ah, how much proactive energy you could create and kind of narrative in a way uh confidence to actually get somebody on the phone who doesn't really know about you doesn't really care it wants to get off the phone it's as quickly as possible have you found that email is sometimes a little bit lukewarm? I mean people it's so easy to deflect an email all right not even look at it best shoot teo but a lot of times that's come like the only information that's available at the time okay for those people a lot of people did you know they don't necessarily have their phone numbers online but they're having in villages and so just sending out uh have you had responses well absolutely okay it's been going well uh isn't important what you put in the subject line for them to pick up on what you're threatening well, first I just kind of try to hook them and ask them if they're interested in the services and then a zafar cells and really helped close the deal our proposals really identifying a time table how much this is going to cost and clearly I didn't find my delivery bols did you have a business school? Uh well I did study business in college yes and then market is well and then I take a lot of online classes so uh I learned a lot from you know make sethi tim farriss and like that terrific. Okay um relationship with others into personal skills if we do not work and play well with others we have to work on that take a deep breath, be honest and evaluate your interpersonal skills okay, so I was really good at building relationships on guy want to become a better listener hey, you know what happens when you're listening you find out what people want and need thio e I think she'll be having our own workshop before you go on saying sierra the chaplain's absolutely loving way your bravery for doing this with you going thank you and they love loving your spirit actually they're saying that that is what shining through to them you might have a new career success on our own terms fundamentally we're talking about defining achieving success on our own terms now this is a slogan offended by you since a cow has not calved b which means each one of us is a unique individual not a cow but an individual and describe your notion of success as he currently envision it as mine is really, really simple success to me is completing a go uh you mean setting goal and then and bring it to fruition whatever that goal is but you might not reach the goal but it's the the progress success to me so you measures he says by defining your own goals on actually attaining them it doesn't matter what somebody else might want you to be or become or whatever it's zone internal uh calibration terrific. My goodness. Well, you know, from my point of view we could do this all day and I think this is the meat and potatoes so what? I'm going to suggest that people out there and uh uh virtual land until all of us and you go through this process take advantage of what we're talking about and then use the worksheet just for what you would discover about yourself you know I mean there's nothing like we talked about you writing it down did you find that just sort of having read this and write it down so they help you clarify and focus and that's something to that I've been in for many more in my life so I mean I care on the journal all the time you're writing it down? Yes. Okay. Um should we should would any of you like tio ask sierra any anything about what? She's sort of representing here for comment I love black girls code and I think, um one of the books that I have my artists read because you mentioned jay z is do you buy russell simmons and I just, you know, just reminds, you know, that's a good book and I think I think black girls code is like you there's so many resources available, man you're in the right spot. Uh any any other comments from our online audience? Yeah, I mean that's saying you know how powerful sierra's naturally, I mean, if you want to find sierra online on a website is the cool creative dot com and she's available to it at the cool, creative if you want to find that homework all you have to do said that our spp button and you can use that worksheet and fill it out and and figure it out right it's not easy to come up onto the stage in particular okay terrific. Thank you so well interesting comments in the chat room just about general today david because like we mentioned earlier is joining us from israel from siberia's he was saying that overcoming the poverty mentality is something he's really looking forward to benefiting from today and he put in his paradigm shift is money from what I gather is not value it's a representation of value on what we give or ask in exchange for is the real value he thank you I appreciate you sharing and we'll see we will because um what we want to be able to do here is to explore these ideas and really including it ideas about meditation and about creativity and everybody come to their own individual conclusion about what is true for you so um all I'm trying to present some guidelines for exploration really you know and then uh um my my buddhist teacher children trunk harm ajay used to say your guess is as good as mine we doubted it at times because he seemed a pretty good guess but um the bottom line there is that we are engaged these kind of processes including meditation practice to sort of sharpened uh, our capacity to weed through our own experience and come up with them. Truest, most penetrating, most accurate and also, to some extent stripping away false notions. That's, part of this kind of training are approaches. If you strip away kind of delusion, what remains is wisdom. The wisdom is already there it's, kind of organic and innate, but it's covered over, uh, essentially, one of you said something about coming out of the cocoon who said that earlier. That was actually a statement that came beginning from our chat room from the chat room. Yeah, so thats a. In our shambala teachings, we use that image quite quite a lot of the cocoon as being a sort of comfort zone that we have to step out of of habitual patterns. It's sort of use is a metaphor for that. So stepping out of the cocoon is has tremendous meaning. You know, that's where we've been sort of hiding out in a certain sense.