Tim Ferriss often says "You are the average of the five people you most associate with." That's pretty true I think. I have spent a lot of my life surrounding myself with people who created drama, and found myself always caught up in drama, whether it was theirs or my own. Eventually I decided I didn't want to be living a life of drama and I distanced myself from the people that perpetuated the drama cycle. Guess what? The drama died away. I haven't yet surrounded myself with the people that I would more closely like to be identified with, as I haven't met them yet. But what I do do instead is make sure that I'm regularly exposing myself to the kind of influence I would like. This means the books I read, the podcasts I listen to, the videos I watch. And this is OK... But it doesn't encourage me. They don't call me up to exchange ideas, or go out for coffee. They really can't, because they're not actually people, they're merely concepts being expressed through a medium. I can see that associating with the right people would make a big difference, and I can see the value of my friends statement.
But where do I find a community? How do I consciously build up a circle of friends and associates who embody what I would like to be? Well, for starters, I should probably be where they are. Then, I should probably get over the social awkwardness that is only in my own brain and actually talk to them. But what if I don't know if they're the right people? Well... I certainly won't know if I never try to talk to them. Sure, maybe I could find some people on line, get to know them through blog posts, social media, interviews. But when I see these people in real life I suddenly find they really don't compare to the fantasy I've built in my head. So really, my only choice is to talk to them. Nobody said reinventing myself was going to be easy...
Okay. So now I know that I need to talk to them. I also established that I need to be where they are at. But where are they? If I continue in the routines that I've set for myself, I'm never going to find that place. It's time for me to step out of my comfort zone and change my routines. So, I started by looking into the different conferences. I've heard that the best part of a conference is actually the networking and socializing that happens between the panel speakers. It's a lot harder to find conferences than I thought it would be. I kind of had to dig a little. It would have been easier if I hadn't been trying to localize things. I tried to keep my search specific to Canada. This rather excludes conferences such as HOW Design, SIGGRAPH, or the AIGA Design Conference. But I have found there are a suitable number of conferences which happen to be pretty much in my back yard in Toronto. I was only able to find conferences related to Graphic Design, and unfortunately nothing really in regards to CG. I'll have to keep digging for that one at another time. The short list I compiled follows:
FITC - Future, Innovation, Technology, Creativity: This conference already took place in April, but there will be another in 2018. For more info, go to: http://fitc.ca/event/to18/
DesignThinkers Conference: Hosted by RGD (Registered Graphic Designers), this event takes place November 7 & 8 at the Sony Centre for the Performing Arts in Toronto.For more info, go to: http://designthinkers.com/toronto (There's also one in Vancouver on a different date.)
GTA Photography Conference: This one is rather short notice. It takes place on July 19th, and is only a one day event. It should go without saying that this conference is specific to Photography. For more info, go to: http://gtaimaging.com/conference2017/
Design & Content Conference: Another one with short notice, this 3 day conference takes place July 17-19... And it's in Vancouver, so not quite on my doorstep, but I figured it was worth including anyway. For more info, go to: https://designcontentconf.com
It seems to me that there is probably a resource that I'm missing somewhere in regards to finding a community without going to conferences, so I guess I'm leaving that open for advice from the audience!
--Charlie Griffin
Stick with me, and we'll get wise together.
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Country Roads
Web of Light
Melting Forest
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