Creative Energy and Sustainable Peak Performance
In the Harvard Business Review article The Making of a Corporate Athlete, authors Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz make the compelling case for a better way to manage the pressures of professional life. The article (and the authors’ book The Power of Full Engagement) urges us to look beyond simply managing time. They lay out how we need to also focus on our personal energy capacities… that is, how we show up to the blocks of time in our calendars. In my client coaching work, I have found that the effects of diligently exploring energy management are akin to creating time for the busy executive. Those who effectively manage their physical, emotional, mental, and motivational energy experience more presence, joy, calmness, and productivity. And embracing this particular practice of self-care across all areas of one’s life has positive compounding effects.
The concept that we are “corporate athletes” performing in the business world is a helpful perspective that encourages us to see how we can build ourselves up to perform at sustainable peak levels - and loving it at the same time.
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“We are only leading when we are centered on making others better.”
- Frances Frei, Professor of Technology and Operations Management, Harvard Business School
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As leaders, we must strive to build up those around us to be engaged in healthy, enduring ways. This begins with learning and modelling the practices.
The purpose of this page is to expand on the foundation set out by Loehr and Schwartz by adding the dimension of creative energy. I believe adding this area of focus invites into the conversation some very practical applications that is highly needed in the business world.
Creativity is our birthright
…and it is also the source of our best work in life. But the daily hustle of trying to build prosperity for ourselves and our loved ones can lead us to lose sight of this. We take creativity for granted. We don’t cultivate it specifically and then expect it to show up to help us when we need it in our jobs. I invite you to make the effort to deliberately nurture your creative instincts. Since we already have daily life opportunities to use our creativity muscles, the best way to grow this ability lies in delving into creativity in its purest forms. By pure, I mean those activities which are just about creation, and don’t have as direct a line to some tangible nearterm financial benefit.
Pursuing the fine arts or creative endeavours that feed the soul, whether it’s photography, painting, writing poetry, film making, music, or dance is often seen as a luxury “If I only had the time.” Even well-supported practices of mental self-improvement like mindfulness training will take a back seat to the functional tasks to-do list.
Artistic pursuits are not luxuries. They are necessities for achieving our goals - both long term and short term. They also help create the conditions that make life itself worth living - now and in the future.
Creative Energy
Managing creative energy is about looking at how we currently embrace our creative selves …or not. It’s about consciously looking at areas of improvement and choosing to honour those wise choices, rather than habitually falling for the narratives that drive us to chase the wrong things.
Understanding creative energy requires introspection so we can get to know ourselves deeply. It’s the work of putting a spotlight on when we find ourselves at our most inspired and productive. It’s knowing how we (even if accidentally) tap into what psychologists call our flow states. “Flow” is when we are in the zone, fully immersed, and acting out of near perfect decision-making through instinct.
Once we understand what drives our own engine for creative energy, we can design more of those conditions into our daily routines. We can also make the conscious choice to avoid the people, actions, situations, and habits that stifle our creativity.
As I mentioned in the About Me page of this website: in my youth, I set aside my creative self for a very long time because of the belief that it would not be financially rewarding. As an older, wiser person now, I realise how important it is to give voice to our creative selves.
This means making time for a purely artistic pursuit, and doing it just for the joy of it. Once you find something that fills you up with energy, even if the output is just for you …maybe especially if the output is just for you, you will discover how this enriches your overall capacity to perform in life. As you make this part of your energy management practice, your role as a corporate athlete will benefit. When your creative self is strong, the resulting contribution leads to more sustainable peak performance.
I have found that even the more mundane aspects of life and work can be a source of joy when the creative self is present. We need the presence of this creative energy to be more of a default and less of an afterthought.
Mindfulness
Although not usually spoken of as a way to become more creative, I believe that mindfulness training is a critical part of embracing our inventive selves. When we are more aware of our thoughts, impulses, and emotions… when we know how to notice them and choose wisely around what comes up, we have less clutter in the way of our natual creativity. We suffer from less “writer’s block” - or for non-writers: “being stuck.” I and leaders I work with all report back that when a mindfulness practice is embraced, more creativity and clarity of thinking results.
With all the emerging science and research around the effectiveness of mindfulness training, the question to practicing it isn’t usually “Does it work?” but rather “How can I find the time to do it?” If time management doesn’t answer that question, then intelligently managing personal energy capacities is the next place to look for a way to integrate a new practice.
In struggling to find time to do something that would clearly be helpful, we’re dealing with a classic “chicken or the egg” situation. For that, I’ll apply the often cited analogy of the airplane safety manual instruction: Put on your own oxygen mask before helping those around you. My suggestion is to be honest about what the true priorities are and simply start creating the most empowering virtuous cycle. You don’t have to be a victim to the tired (and often false) reasoning of not having enough time.
I write about mindfulness in various other parts of this website, so I won’t belabour those points here. The super brief summary is that it is important to:
Learn how the human mind works
Learn how your mind works
Exercise the tools of mental fitness and emotional regulation
Build your personal mindfulness practice
Quick links to a few relevant pages within this website:
Books for the Creative Corporate Athlete
If you are interested in deepening your understanding of these principles, here are some books I recommend:
The Creative Act: A Way of Being, by Rick Rubin
Creative Confidence, by Tom and David Kelley
The Medici Effect, by Frans Johannson
Peak Mind: Find Your Focus, Own Your Attention, by Amishi Jha
The Rise of Superman: Decoding the Science of Ultimate Human Performance, by Stephen Kotler
Stealing Fire: How Silicon Valley, the Navy SEALs, and Maverick Scientists Are Revolutionizing the Way We Live and Work, by Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal
Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
The Power of Full Engagement, by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz
And as an example of how to exercise creative muscles, and what we can learn along the way, some of my personal work and musings are expressed at my art website -> here