Somethin's Been Botherin' Me...

I've been thinkin' lately.

Dangerous, yes, but unavoidable when you listen to the content I do with my podcast subscriptions.  I also got to a point today in my work when I decided I needed to go to a fabric store before I could progress on the projects I was working on, so it was a perfect opportunity to come in and lose myself in even more thinking as I tried to catch up on the oh-too-many blogs I subscribe to.

I'm becoming a big fan of Make and Meaning, by the way.  It's terribly distracting, and provides so many interesting links and food for thought that I can just totally get lost.  I avoid the blog, frankly, because I know I will spend hours and hours recovering from my melting brain.

But one of the trails it sent me down was toward a TED Talk.  These are lectures and presentations that end up on the site TED.com--"Ideas Worth Spreading".  I can totally get sucked into these things.

But I found one that speaks to me a lot.  It's essentially about what motivates us, and can be turned especially toward the works of business and organizations.  And leadership.  In a nutshell the speaker, Simon Sinek, author of Start With Why, says that people are motivated when they know why they are doing something--whether undertaking an action or simply purchasing a product.

And that made me think of the entire DIY (Do It Yourself) movement, of which crafting and art and home improvement and essentially what I do (and what a number of us do) is so popular and growing.  We do things because we understand why.  And oftentimes, people are more motivated to buy what we make when they understand that why, too. 

Shortly after watching the video, I was struck by a comment on a blog that I subscribe to--"If You Only Had One Month Left to Blog", and it hit me like a ton of bricks: I'm seriously needing to think about the "why" behind my blog, and make it clear.  Very clear.  And by extension, the why behind Relished Artistry as a business.  Because if the motivations for doing it aren't what makes any of this different from everything else, I seriously need to consider why anyone would take the time to read any of it or purchase anything from me.

So I'm stepping back and thinking long and hard about my "whys".  And here's the video lecture that started it.

Until next time, Life Life with Relish!