How to take your work personally and keep your sanity

Yesterday I had lunch with Christine Stevens. Neither Christine nor I fit the general preconception of 'creative professional,' although Christine loves to paint. (I just collect things.) But both of us arrive it our job with boundless creativity every day. We figure out better ways to operate a business. Our specialty is marketing but our perspective is growth and sustainability. We think great businesses will be stronger when good marketing principles are executed. And we use every ounce of our ingenuity to make it happen. 

I used to work for a highly creative company, Ogilvy & Mather. But I was an account executive, not a "creative." I was told that when I 'grew up' and stopped taking my work so personally, I would become a good professional. Then I found myself crying every morning on the way into work. 

If it were not for the birth of Fast Company magazine, mentorship from David Willis, meeting Durwin Sharp and Rolf Smith, and finally learning how to connect with people like George Worthington and Christine, I would be in the insane asylum. 

I wish that business owners and top executives wouldn't cringe when they read the list below, but I know that creative professionals make their life harder. Right before we save it. 

Edge Perspectives: The Labor Day Manifesto of the Passionate Creative Worker, 2012-Sep-3, by John Hagel

Live life for the adventure. Life is as amazing as we make it. When considering different opportunities, we ask, “When I look back in five years, which of these options will make the better story,” because no one ever regrets taking the path that leads to the better story.

The Labor Day Manifesto Points:

1. Live our lives, not someone else's
2. Blaze new trails
3. Prioritize learning over efficiency
4. Share knowledge freely
5. Recognize that institutions exist to serve people
6. Quit jobs that we hate
7. Escape the trap of wasting time by being busy
8. Live life for adventure
9. Stay on the edge
10. Continually reinvent ourselves
11. Never settle