#10 Creativity is Key

Hello Everyone,

Thank you for reading my newsletter. I’m grateful for all of you that take time out of your day to take a peek into my mind. This past week a lot has been going on and I’ve been feeling really great about the progress that I have been making creatively. I have been diving into my web design and photography courses and also beginning my journey with the SEAP (self employment assistance program). I know I am doing a lot at one time but it all is worthwhile and doesn’t feel like work because I enjoy doing it. The last few weeks instead of writing whatever comes to mind for my newsletter I have been jotting topics and thoughts down in my notepad of things that I find interesting and would like to expand on more throughout the newsletter. Each week gives me an opportunity to experiment with certain parts of my newsletter or the process of using mail chimp which I was not that familiar with. I also have been getting great response on LinkedIn as I post the newsletters there weekly. When I created this newsletter it was with the intent of building my email list while providing some insight on topics that I find interesting and opening a forum to discuss those topics. It has been a test of my consistency and creativity to say the least. One thing that I am excited to learn is the basic strategies of marketing that relates to distributing my newsletter in the coming months. I follow George Kao on YouTube and a theme that he always mentions is “Joyful Productivity” which is in a way what I am trying to accomplish by sharing these newsletters with you every week. When I chose to name this week’s newsletter “Creativity is Key” the meaning expressed to me the idea of success that I have for myself and they main driving force behind that success.

I’d like to share a little bit about the experience I’ve been having in my photography class so far at NCCC (Niagara County Community College). All of the header photos you have seen are images for my course, which are taken relatively around the time that the newsletter is being written so they go hand in hand. I’ve been learning a lot and experimenting with manual settings so that has been helping me grow as a photographer. Another tool that has been useful is the creation of a visual journal to document our process from shooting to printing. The visual journal is a way to get ideas down on paper and also capture moments and backstory behind the images. I also had fun going out in Lockport this week and taking photos for what is supposed to become 4X6 promo cards that we are making in class. If you would like to see some of these images you can follow me on my photography Instagram.

What are your thoughts on the Metaverse? I started watching a few videos on YouTube about it just to get a general understanding and once I heard this next fact I stopped the video. In the video it said the Metaverse is projected to be worth 1-3 trillion dollars in the next 10-15 years. My immediate thought was that I somehow needed to be a part of this but the deeper question I had is why? Why is this new technology on pace to surpass everything we’ve known before? From my perspective I feel like these development companies are trying to find a way to blend technology with real life and merge our brain functions with computers. When we go on these websites most of them have a little green dot that tells us if one of our connections is online. I take this as meaning they have your attention. These companies have already found a way to captivate and hold our attention and now are trying to create a “virtual consciousness” based on that theory. They are studying are thought patterns and storing this data to be used later at their discretion for unspecified purposes which scares me being that these are public/private companies. I don’t trust these people to be looking out for my best interests. What are your thoughts on the Metaverse and crypto currency? Are you more trusting than I am or do you feel like I do? Let me know.

Patrick,