“SET YOUR OWN STANDARDS, AND I PERSONALLY THINK YOU SHOULD SET THEM VERY HIGH.”

Let’s start with a compression-tension example for life… pulling and pushing forces.

Inspiration is something that you feel on the inside, while motivation is something from the outside that compels you to take action. Inspiration is a driving force, while motivation which is a pulling force. Interest is something that makes you curious. … But in order to accomplish a goal you need motivation.

What motivates you as a person much less as a rigger? Maybe, you are inspired by people that push the limits of what is humanly possible.  Researching why people do what they do is super hard, but you’ll probably find that they started pushing in one direction, then kept pushing and pushing further until they reached the limit of what’s possible.

The best riggers pursue their art from a deeply passionate place in life.  Vision never “just happens”. Dreams have roots somewhere, but the questions are really “what is the well you draw from? And how thirsty are you?”

• Are you practical?  It is just something that is part of what you do and if that “something” stopped… your rigging would stop as well.
• Are you an adventurer?  Again, rigging is part of what you do, but now the stakes are higher because you understand what you know could heighten opportunities and get you and or others, out of heaps of trouble.
• Is it job related where lives are on the line? This could be the fire service, search and rescue, military, or some other service related field.

When you’re passionate about something, you know it deeply, and you can translate that depth of knowledge into powerful thoughts and ideas and eventually systems that could change the face of what you do. When thinking about rigging and system setting, ask yourself:

• What interests you?
• What is unique about your point of view?
• To what extent are you willing to take risks?
• What are the possible consequences and are you willing to accept them?

Taking a creative risk can result in failure, and although it doesn’t feel great, that failure will often spark a new idea or approach for you to try again.  The more you start to embrace mistakes and failures as a means to move forward, the faster you’re going to get to where you’re trying to go.

Whether your goal is small or large, it can be helpful if you can work with others as a team to achieve that goal. Often we feel we have to do everything ourselves. But the larger the task, the smarter it becomes to surround yourself with people who share your vision. Not only do many hands make light work: many brains, working together, can come up with ideas that a person working alone never could…. Of course there are limitations to this as well 🙂

Exercises to Find Your Voice:

Below are a couple of exercises to help you find your creative voice. Select the one(s) that seems most useful to help you capture your passion.

1. Make a list of riggers that inspire you, and create a digital album of images that resonate with you. Can you identify common elements among the different images? Do certain themes, subjects, or styles show up across their different bodies of work? Being able to articulate the reasons why someone else’s work inspires you is imperative to understanding why you are moved by it. Now take a look at your own work, and see if you can list the common elements or themes that are your passions.
2. Spend some time doing some “cross-training” for your brain by exploring other types of activities that require system rigging. Research and start looking through books, website and Instagram that show the history of rigging, as well as many different genres of rigging. What are the things that make it a successful system? Is it the goal or project? The composition? The gear? Or is it something less tangible, like the system designers unique point of view? Write a list of qualities for three different riggers or system designers that make their work unique.

Explore different types of systems, thinking critically about what you see, read, or hear.

1. Go to workshops and look at the systems (as artwork), with the goal of figuring out what it is that makes that system important enough for someone to put it on display before others.
2. Go to a concert, especially if it’s a new type of music that you don’t normally listen to. How does this music interact with the systems above? How does it make the people around you feel? Study how speakers, flyers, monitors and even the musician get “moved around”.
3. Read a few short stories, or a biography of someone you admire. What kinds of stories resonate with you? Stories about perseverance or survival? 

Experiment with a genre of gear or equipment that you’ve never tried before. For example, if you’re accustomed to rigging with a certain style of equipment or the same equipment, try something different . Or if you normally rig with a lot, then start rigging with less. Remember that you don’t have to publish or show anybody this work; it can just be part of your own artistic development. Trying different types of system designs will help you become better at the thing you’d love to rig for.

Make a list of things that you are interested in, no matter how small or esoteric. These can be hobbies that you have, like hunting, engineering, climbing or photography. Then spend some time doing research on what types of rigging could be used are already being made on these subjects. 

Create a digital album of these inspirational images for reference.  Build a “bucket list”.

I started with this and I will end with this…

Inspiration is something that you feel on the inside, while motivation is something from the outside that compels you to take action. Inspiration is a driving force, while motivation which is a pulling force. Interest is something that makes you curious. … But in order to accomplish a goal you need motivation.

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Peace on your Days…

Lance