Do you provide value to others, or only yourself?

This is the kind of coming-to-Jesus question I had to face when I embarked on the dissertation and subsequent research. But it's a question I faced to a lesser degree throughout my career. When you're paid a salary, you can argue your value. But when you submit a thesis, they don't call it a defense for nothing.You are, in every sense of the word, defending your idea as something that will add to the world. You are putting your career on hold. You are putting your good credit on the line (most of us are in sickening debt because of the choice to complete a dissertation). In the end, you are proving your optimism through the most depressing, rigorous, and gut-wrenching processes you can put yourself through.Yet, there are so many dissertations that don't really make the cut for interesting cocktail conversation. And it brings about a really odd kind of humor that can be pretty insular.When your writing about something you really care about, it’s hard to imagine that others wouldn't be interested. It's sort of like when I think it's hot and like the fan on, and my partner gives me, huddled with the dog and several blankets, with a look that can only say, "turn on the damn heat." I think it really is hot, not that it’s hot only for me. It feels like a fact to me, not an opinion.So when I do something that’s really valuable to me, it’s hard for me to imagine that it’s not valuable to others. I think it really is valuable, not that it’s valuable only for me. It feels like a fact, not an opinion.This is understandable. Our feelings feel like facts. It’s hard to imagine that they’re not.This is the problem of the "lonely writer," the “starving artist,” or the "nonprofit missionary."When someone creates something that feels important, powerful, and valuable to them, it’s hard to imagine that it’s not important, powerful, and valuable to others.But money only comes from doing something valuable to others.The starving artist pours his heart into a project that’s incredibly valuable to him, but not (yet) valuable to others. That’s why no money comes.The good news is there are two ways out of this problem, and either one can be fun, in the way that a 1,000-piece puzzle can be fun. :-)

#1: Productize your learning. Focus on making your "thing" more valuable to others.

Art doesn’t end at the edge of the canvas. Keep your creativity going. Constantly ask, “How can I be more valuable to an audience?” You may come up with ideas like this:

Convert what you do to a personal service. Customize your work for hire.
Spread a fascinating version of your history, so fans can get emotionally interested in you.
Simplify. Simplify. Simplify, so that people don’t need sophisticated tastes to appreciate what you do.
Find ways to be invitation-only. Think about membership versus likes, sales, and customers.
Go where money is already flowing. Adapt what you do to match the needs of the communities most relevant to your product or servicece.

Then force yourself to try all the best ideas, even if it seems unnatural at first. Read books about business and psychology to get more ideas, since many brilliant minds are asking the same question from a different perspective. Do this repeatedly, paying attention to feedback from others, and you will become more valuable.Amanda Palmer is an American singer-songwriter who is the lead vocalist, pianist, and lyricist of the duo The Dresden Dolls. On April 20, 2012, Palmer announced on her blog that she launched a new album pre-order on Kickstarter. The Kickstarter project was ultimately supported by 24,883 backers for a grand total of $1,192,793 — at the time, the most funds ever raised for a musical project on Kickstarter. A widely reported and commented upon controversy emerged from the related tour when she asked for local musicians to volunteer to play with her for exposure, fun, beer, and hugs instead of money. She responded in the press and changed her policy to one of paying local musicians who volunteered to play with her on this tour. Read her book. Watch her TED talk.Though if you find that this makes you more miserable than excited, try the other way:

#2: Stop expecting it to be valuable to others.

Accept your "thing" as personal and precious to only you. Make your thing your side-hustle and find your money elsewhere.If you stop expecting your "thing" to be valuable to anyone but you, your conflicted mind can finally be at peace. Do it only because you love it, and it honestly doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. You might even keep it private like a diary, just to be clear who it’s really for.You’ll probably be happier with your music because of this change in mindset. Ironically, others may appreciate it more, too, though you honestly won’t care.He has no book. He has no TED talk. But, if he's finding joy in what he's doing, maybe he doesn't need express himself that way.

To tackle the wicked problems of our present and future, we need to embrace a strange, counter-intuitive irony: as organizations across all sectors continue to create and adopt technologies like artificial intelligence, employees need to stay relevant by increasing their subjective intelligence. My research on master craftsmen and how they gain mastery helps connect the dots on this new dilemma, and might be the place to seek initial solutions.

When it comes to open ended problem solving and learning to improvise with what we are given; master craftsmen have something to teach us. Having to work with a material where they cannot be sure what will happen is something they are used to. Combined with the more structured training and education offered to us today, improvisational thinking in the face of uncertainty is useful to leaders in any sector. Even in the face of countless books and articles about how important it is, most traditional business school programs and organizational training fail to address sophisticated thinking about ambiguous problems.

Craftsmanship refers to something made with the highest quality. It requires a distinct mindset and approach. Values like durability, integrity, and calling are often associated with craftsmanship. But it’s more than that. Craftsmanship—to live a life and perform work with craft—is the struggle for individual agency in a world telling us to fit in. More than finding a calling, it is about understanding how to fully utilize ourselves and our unique ability to solve problems of every kind. My goal is build a bridge between the principles of craftsmanship in the traditional sense and apply it to our own lives and work.

Vancouver Psychology Centre http://www.vancouverpsychologycentre.ca

For Lesley Holm the dream was to work creatively with children in a way that would make a difference in their lives. Today she fulfills that dream in her career as an Art Therapist.

She didn’t initially know that art, creativity and working with children would look like in terms of a career. Most people don’t know what that is; she didn’t either. Art therapy is more than analyzing pictures. It is a blend of psychotherapy and art where art is incorporated as part of the regular counseling process. Art isn’t the end goal. Art is an illustration of a client’s process and what sense they make of their image.

When Lesley was young, her parents separated. She remembers that being a chaotic, confusing and scary time. Art was a comfort to her.

Now, Lesley specializes in helping children of divorce and helping them through that process. The drawings don’t have to be great, they just have to be expressive.

“There isn’t any better reward in life than a child who knows that I’m really there for them.”

Christine Haskell’s research focuses on individuals dedicated to the craft of their professions, in pursuit of excellence, sustainability and integrity. Craftsmen and women use those principles to raise standards toward a better world. Her current work is featured in Look To Craftsmen Project. featuring the Profiles in Craft Series. You’ll find a trove of profiles of intriguing artisans and innovators spanning a wide variety of professions across the globe that illustrate her research with links to the full articles. Christine’s book The Future of Work Will Require Craftsmanship is due in late 2019. To understand more about Christine’s work, check out Our Current Problem.