THE SYNCREATE PODCAST: EMPOWERING CREATIVITY
​​HOSTED BY MELINDA ROTHOUSE, PHD
​
WELCOME TO SYNCREATE, WHERE WE EXPLORE THE INTERSECTIONS BETWEEN CREATIVITY,
PSYCHOLOGY, AND SPIRITUALITY. OUR GOAL IS TO DEMYSTIFY THE CREATIVE PROCESS,
AND EXPAND THE BOUNDARIES OF WHAT IT MEANS TO BE CREATIVE.

​SUBSCRIBE / FOLLOW US ON SPOTIFY, APPLE PODCASTS, YOUTUBE
OR WHEREVER YOU GET YOUR PODCASTS​
SUPPORT US ON PATREON

EPISODE 26: CREATIVE SPARK SERIES - PRODUCE! 
​WITH MELINDA ROTHOUSE & CHARLOTTE GULLICK

LISTEN TO THE AUDIO EPISODE HERE:

WATCH THE FULL VIDEO VERSION HERE:

Picture
In this episode of our Creative Spark series, Melinda and Charlotte describe the final phase of the creative process: Produce. In this phase, according to our Syncreate model, we move toward completion of our creative work. This is where we refine, iterate, polish, get feedback, and ultimately share our creative efforts with the world. It’s also where we celebrate and give back to our creative communities. This episode, like the mini-episodes that preceded it, includes insights and prompts from our book, Syncreate: A Guide to Navigating the Creative Process for Individuals, Teams, and Communities.

For our Creativity Pro-Tip, we encourage you to recognize how far you’ve traveled already on your creative journey, and to celebrate your milestones, along with your accomplishments. We also emphasize the importance of recognizing, celebrating, and empowering your creative community. 

Credits: The Syncreate podcast is created and hosted by Melinda Rothouse, and produced at Record ATX studios with in collaboration Michael Osborne and 14th Street Studios in Austin, Texas. Syncreate logo design by Dreux Carpenter.

If you enjoy this episode and want to learn more about the creative process, you might also like our conversations in Episode 7: The Syncreate Story, Episode 20: The Syncreate Model of Play, Plan & Produce, Episode 22: Creative Play, and Episode 24: Creative Planning. 

At Syncreate, we're here to support your creative endeavors, so if you have an idea for a project or a new venture, please reach out to us for 1x1 coaching or join our Syncreate 2024 Coaching Group, starting in April. You can find more information on our website, syncreate.org, where you can also find all of our podcast episodes.

​Find and connect with us on YouTube, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram & TikTok under Syncreate, and we’re now on Patreon as well. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe and leave us a review!

EPISODE-SPECIFIC HYPERLINKS:

The Syncreate Book
Charlotte Gullick’s Website
Syncreate Podcast Episode 14: Anatomy of a Song with Singer/Songwriter George McCormack
Syncreate Podcast Episode 17: Creative Collaboration - The Joy and The Pain with Syncreate Podcast Producer Mike Osborne
Book: Swim Home ot the Vanished by Brendan Shay Basham
Book: Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
Song: Fuel by Black Thought
Artist Ernie Barnes

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT: 

 
Melinda: Welcome to Syncreate, a show where we explore the intersections between creativity, psychology, and spirituality. Our goal is to demystify the creative process and expand the boundaries of what it means to be creative. I'm Melinda Rothouse, and I help individuals and organizations bring their creative dreams and visions to life.
 
Charlotte: Hi. And I'm Charlotte Gullick, and I am a writer, educator and editor, and I co-create many things with Melinda. 
 
Melinda: So today for our little mini-episode, we're going to be talking about the third element of our Syncreate model, which is Produce. So we've already covered the stage of Play, the stage of plan, and now we're on to Produce, which has to do with completing our work, bringing it to its final form, and then bringing it out into the world. If that's your goal. You know, there's plenty of cases where we do creative work purely for ourselves and our own, you know, whether it's healing, or just personal practice, or whatever it might be.
 
So We don't necessarily always have to bring our creative work into the world, but often we want to. There's something that we want to share or communicate. And so the final section of our book talks about how we bring things to fruition, how we collaborate other people, how we get feedback on our work. 
 
Charlotte: And I think that that's so important, again, to kind of break it down into those stages so that Produce is actually a larger term and underneath that is iteration, collaboration. And I would also (I'm forgetting right now) celebration. So but this iteration, what you just said, the feedback piece of it is that, again, I don't think we when we pick up a book in a bookstore, we don't understand how many people are actually involved in getting it to that final form. And so iteration, feedback, you as a songwriter and performer, how does this work for you?
 
Like you have an idea, you write a song, and I know that you sometimes start with melody and sometimes you start with the lyric. But when you bring it out to people, what's that first stage for you? Like when you iterate? 
 
Melinda: Yeah, it's great because I'm working on a couple new songs right now and part of it is sharing it with a few select people that I trust, and getting feedback on it. You know, how is it coming across? How is it being received? Is there any constructive feedback there? And I think the iteration, too, is like playing it over and over and over again and experimenting. You know, once you have the basic structure there, maybe tweaking the lyrics a little bit, or tweaking the chord progression or whatever, you know, listening back to it.
 
I was just rehearsing the other day with George, who we featured in an earlier episode [Episode 14]. We’re collaborating together and we were talking about, okay, let's, you know, we rehearsed it like a million times. And then, “Okay, let's just record it on the phone,” and then there's something about actually hearing it back. Like instead of being the creator, putting on the hat of a listener and hearing it back, you hear different things.
 
You can hear what's working or what's not working, you know, upon listening back, that you can't when you're like right in the middle of it. 
 
Charlotte: That's so cool to hear about, and that there are these different ways that you can get feedback. I don't know if you want to talk about it anymore, but like that piece, I think where you said people that you trust.
 
Melinda: Yes. 
 
Charlotte: And you talk a little bit more about that? 
 
Melinda: Yes. I mean, there's a lot of elements to that. And there's, you know, many of us are very protective of our work. And, you know, maybe there's a fear that someone will take our ideas or whatever. And, you know, the response to that, I think, is, well, only you can do your work. And somebody else may have a similar idea, but even if they had the exact same idea, the way that you put it all together and make it come across is going to be uniquely yours. 
 
Sure, there are instances of people sharing is stealing each other's ideas, but I think it's not as common as we might fear. But then there's also the element of like, who's going to give me honest, productive feedback and not just be like, “Oh, it's great because I love you and I love everything you do,” or “This is crap.”
 
You’ve got to find a middle ground fact. I was talking about this with Mike, my audio producer, and we were reflecting on our collaboration in an episode that's actually coming out tomorrow [Episode 17] and it's like, what is that balance of like, the cheerleader and the productive feedback? And for me personally, I do need both. You know, I want to hear what's working well, as well as just what could be better.
 
Charlotte: How do you, as we move into thinking about collaboration, how do you choose your, how do you see collaboration playing out in the creative process? 
 
Melinda: Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, we're always collaborating on some level, even if we're working on our own. You know, you and I, our next book is about creating in community, and it's like we're really looking into our circle of interconnection, and how, you know, no matter what we do, we depend on other people for, you know, food, sustenance, connection, all these different things. Right? 
 
But in terms of formal collaboration, I mean, there has to be a sense of trust. Right? And I think it's important for there to be a sense of synergy where, you know, it's in our name Syncreate synergy and co-creation. But where, you know, the…I always forget how this thing goes, but the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, right?
 
That that, you know, in collaborating with other people, there's ideas that come to the table that wouldn't necessarily come from just one person working alone. And there's also, like you feed off each other's energy, like maybe one day I'm kind of feeling low energy, but you're feeling up energy, and we can balance each other out. Or maybe we were both feeling low energy and so we just find a way to do whatever we can, or we're both feeling really excited and we get a whole lot done in a short amount of time. But, you know, it's nice to know that you're not in there alone. 
 
Charlotte: Absolutely.
 
Melinda: Yeah. How about for you? 
 
Charlotte: I think, well I was thinking about the way that kind of with the invisible collaborations, like I'm reading a book right now, I think it's called Swim Home to the Vanished: A Novel Book [by Brendan Shay Basham] and I'm also listening to an audio book, Braiding Sweetgrass [by Robin Wall Kimmerer], and they're both so good at naming the natural world.
 
And I was like, oh, I missed that part of me. So I feel like I can be in collaboration with the texts I’m listening to or reading as like, this is how you name things in a way that is precise. It's the kind of writing I want. And so there's that kind of collaboration with existing works. A riff of a song that gets me going, I actually, there's a song by Black Thought that I heard a line out about Ernie Barnes, and that got me going on research on this amazing painter who was a football player.
 
And so I feel like I'm in collaboration with the world. Not to be like audacious, but there's a lot of opportunities to see our connections, and to where we can find our creative impulses. 
 
Melinda: Yeah, and again, we're not working in a vacuum. Even if we're working alone. We're reading other people's work, we're listening to other people's music we’re, you know, whatever it is, we gather inspiration from the world in all these different ways, and it informs what we're doing, 
 
Charlotte: Which is so exciting that it's, that again, it's so communal. I think that the process is communal. And that's why I think celebrations and fruition: it's really great to find ways to acknowledge the communities that we are part of. 
 
Melinda: Yes, great. So, great segue to our Creative Pro-Tip for today, which is about recognizing the journey we've been on. Yeah. Like seeing how far we've traveled, because sometimes, you know, we only see what we have yet to accomplish. And so it's important, at the end of the day, at the end of a week, at the end of a year to go, “Oh, wow, I actually did a lot!” Because we may forget, or we may not realize it right? 
 
Charlotte: Well, I'm thinking about those stories of the art teachers who say to the students, you can get an A if you produce 100 pieces or you can get graded on three final projects. And it's the students who do the 100 assignments that are actually the better artists, because they put the time in. You know, looking at drawing #1 versus drawing #100, that opportunity reflect about how discipline, how joy in the creative process, and showing up for yourself, really can create the change that we want. We can hone our craft. 
 
Melinda: Absolutely. And then the other piece of it is to celebrate our milestones. You know, it's great to celebrate when we're finished with a book release or you know, an album release, or whatever. But it's also important to kind-of celebrate the little wins along the way. 
 
Charlotte: And I think people will see from our book that we really see celebration as an opportunity to think like a community. It's not just about yourself. You're thinking about all the other people, and recognizing that we can be an inspiration to other people. And that's why talking about your process is so key and being a positive, creative human being. 
 
Melinda: Yeah, and sharing what we've learned with the world and just giving back to our communities.
 
Charlotte: Yeah. 
 
Melinda: Okay, great. So at Syncreate, we're here to support your creative endeavors. So if you have an idea for a project or a new venture, please reach out to us for 1x1 coaching or join our Syncreate 2024 Coaching Group. 
 
Charlotte: Which we're really excited to be offering. This will be a small group of folks who identify a project and take it through its process, and we meet regularly to check in and be inspired.
 
Melinda: Yeah, so we'll be walking you through the model that we've been talking about in these mini-sessions of Play, Plan and Produce. So you can find more on our website, syncreate.org, where you can also find all of our podcast episodes. We’re on social media as well under Syncreate, and we are on YouTube. We are releasing our episodes both in audio and video on YouTube, so find us and connect. 
 
And we are recording today at Record ATX Studios in Austin, and with Charlotte in the Hudson Valley. So glad to have you with me on this new endeavor of our Creative Spark episodes. And the podcast is produced in collaboration with Mike Osborne at 14th Street Studios. So, thanks so much for being with us and we'll see you next time.