The "Creative Badass" Code of Conduct.

  In response to an informative and thoroughly enjoyable video sent to me by a friend a day or two ago concerning writing and taking the whole creative process seriously, despite the headshakes and disapproval of others, and pretty much going ahead to live your dream and tell your stories to the world, I was inspired by the speaker's frankness, honest advice and just plain "likeability"(gosh, is that a word?) to write this. I hope this will be as amusing and inspiring as I had hoped.

In any case,  here it is.


The Creative Badass Code of Conduct

To paraphrase Mahatma Ghandi "Write the change you want to see in the world"

1. It is true that  there  have been many great people throughout history who have captured our full attention. These people have served as examples and role models for  generations of human beings on the planet. Their stories have been told by parents, teachers and clergy to illustrate overcoming adversity, imagination, tenacity, compassion, sense of curiosity and adventure, the need for expression, compassion, invention and resourcefulness.  We find examples of the way these great people changed the world through such behaviors and how they succeeded despite what was often said about them. Such people include, William Shakespeare, Plato, Albert Einstein, Leonardo daVinci, St. Paul the Apostle, Buddha, Henry Ford, Ludwig von Beethoven, Isaac Newton, Hildegarde de Bingen, Charlotte and Emily Bronte, Abraham Lincoln, Jesus of Nazereth, Aesop, and many others. These people shared much in their thinking, yes. They also had something else in common. They were real people. By "real" I mean they existed and changed the world as we know it. Their teachings, writings, inventions and art still live on today.

But what if I were to tell you that the same could be said of fictional characters? What if, even in their imaginary existence, they too, had something to teach us and goad us on to change our world, simply because of how they overcame adversity within the pages of their narratives?

To illustrate this, here are some quotes:

"There is one purpose to life and one only: to bear witness to and understand as much as possible of the complexity of the world- its beauty, its mysteries, its riddles."
— Anne Rice (Servant of the Bones)

"The only power that exists is inside ourselves....
"
— Anne Rice (Interview With the Vampire

"Money is a needful and precious thing,--and, when well used, a noble thing,--but I never want you to think it is the first or only prize to strive for. I'd rather see you poor men's wives, if you were happy, beloved, contented, than queens on thrones, without self-respect and peace."
-Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

"The best of us have a spice of perversity in us, especially when we are young and in love."
-Louisa May Alcott, Little Women, Ch. 23