The Emerging Creative Economy with Doug Patton

Tonya Dawn Recla
Fabulous. I love that. That’s like an amen and dropped the mic kind of moment right there. And that sets the stage so beautifully. You felt it, right, folks? You feel what we’re about to do here. And we’re going to talk about the emerging creative economy. Doug has a phenomenal history, I won’t go too much into it, I’m sure we’ll talk about some of the inventions, creating processes, solving problems and doing it from very creative spaces. And that’s super important in today’s age.

So I’m really excited about this conversation, because we’re seeing a clear division between those who understand the power of creativity and how to harness co-creative principles. Because they are nuanced. They are subtle. There are rules to them that we can talk about, we can explain, but you really just have to work with it. And as you continue to work with it, you gain confidence. It’s a relationship. And it is beautiful. And then you learn how to interact with others in the world very differently. And the world responds. We live in a responsive universe that relies on us to send those signals and it changes, it alters right in front of our face. When we know how to work with it. It does it anyway. We know what we can anticipate when we know how to work with it. 

So I’m gonna leave that there for now, bring Doug back on and ask: Doug, what are your superpowers and how are you using them for good?

Doug Patton
Well, first of all, I have to say my superpowers with all hubris are innate in all of us. And it’s because I was a very curious child, and I still remain one at the grand old age of 70. Here, I’m fascinated with everything around me. And that is the mental spark that everyone needs every day. It’s important to have a creative spark an epiphany, and something to make you believe each day is important.

So my superpower is the ability to create and imagine in ways that society doesn’t give us in terms of K through 12, or even college. It is something that has always been not only a fascination, but also like a virtual drive in me. From some of the first projects I started with a patent design in the 80s. Every time I would invent something, I would write it down. How did I do that? What was my process for thinking? And as that evolved, people would start wanting me to give lectures about well, how exactly do you invent? How do you think? And I realized the vast gap that is there between the processes of imagination and creativity, versus what everyone else experiences that? 

So as the years and decades went on, I kept probably 20 journals of my thought processes. And finally, with my book, Conquering the Chaos of Creativity, I decided it’s time to communicate this in a way that can help everyone, where every problem can be solved. So that in a way, you know, my superpower is everyone’s is that every problem is an opportunity, it’s a wake-up call to wake up, and revel in the fact that there is some chaos, and that we can solve it. 

And the most beautiful part of it, Tonya, is that, you know, going on this thought process of superpower., we all have that in us. There is a chapter in my book called, The Subconscious Cloud, it’s something I’ve derived, where it’s basically our mind is a supercomputer. Our subconscious hasn’t really been measured, but it goes somewhere between 10 and 100 times faster than our conscious mind. And it can be harnessed. It’s kind of like a Pavlovian dog, where if you harness it in the right way, I have a chapter what I call, Methodical Intuition, which loads your brain in the right way, just like a computer program, zeros and ones in that sort of metaphorical fashion, right. And if you understand how to do that, you can load your brain and your brain spits out the answer. And it’s like a process. It’s a muscle. It’s like playing the piano, you first start doing scales. And then after seven years, which I was forced to do from the age of 7 to 13, and classical piano, you’re playing Chopin and liking it, right. It’s really an awareness. And it’s a lifetime commitment. It builds, it builds over years and decades. And any problem can be solved. If it is done in a process that harnesses every part of you. Many people when they’re thinking of creativity, you know, don’t know where to start. But it is an interconnected whole of your analytics, your psychology, your inspiration, your spirit, your imagination, all of that is enmeshed in the process of creativity, because we are inspirational beings.