Carl Nordgren

Last week’s show was built around creative sayings or quotes that I then riffed off of. One of my favorites is a quote from Picasso. “Bad artists borrow, great artists steal.”

I did something a little differently with last week’s show. I had a starting point and then let the thoughts I had in the moment drive the next bit of content.

One of the great things about showing up, intentionally, as a creative person is that people treat me as a creative person. Others’ expectations have influence on my choices, helping me be who and how I want to be.

My guest for last week’s show was John Swansey. I was struck by the physical nature of his creative journey, starting when John, as a boy, told his father he was bored so his dad directed him to head downstairs to the basement filled with tools and materials.

As Denise Rowson said during last week’s show, I’ve been trying to get her as a guest to talk about the vitally important work the Durham CDF Freedom School is doing: helping children fall in love with reading.

Our guest last week, Bill Fletcher, is the founder of NC Reads, a non-profit with a tremendously important mission: Helping children achieve reading proficiency by the 3rd grade.

Last week’s show was about your brain on music, specifically how listening to music impacts our creative growth and performance.

In last week’s show my guest, Fred Saleeby, shared some stories about his career selling products and services. I would often tell my Duke students that they are missing important experiences building their business and professional skills if they have never been in sales.

In this show I revisit a topic I discussed a couple of years ago. Liminality refers to the transition, the in-between moments and spaces where one state ends and another has not yet begun—it’s the threshold of transformation.

It was wonderful talking with Charlie Grantham on Sunday’s show. A man of many interests, his current focus is on the Future of Work. He made so many important and useful observations and let me highlight a couple for you here.