I think many of us have a "creative" side - a need or calling to put something into the world.

I feel like over the last 25 years I have tried, in some ways I was successful but continue to make similar mistakes. There are traps. We tend to think that only geniuses like David Bowie, William Blake or Steve Jobs make the creative differences to the world...but this isn't true.

So here are some of the mistakes that I have made so you hopefully don't have to.

#1 - Not allowing myself to be bad at something.

At the start of learning any skill or creative art you will be bad at it, it could be playing a guitar, learning to paint or writing a small essay - every successful person ever was once bad at their craft. But they perservered, practiced and turned up to get past the period when they sucked.

#2 - To start off with the final "vision" in mind - outcomes not processes.

Whilst aiming at a goal can be good -sometimes being too precise doesn't work. Setting out to write a book rather than learning to write well for example.

#3 - Giving up too soon.- if you never try you can never really fail.

This is a classic, either giving up near the start of a project, or not even really trying and then justifying it to yourself "I did 20 episodes of a podcast, it isn't working - the market is too crowded"

#4 - Not getting the basics in place before moving on to the next big idea.

I once had a band that never really recorded anything or played many gigs but I had planned a double album and had gone as far as planning different style gigs - normal full band and also doing electronic, acoustic interpretations of the songs...

Talk about the dream over the practical!!