Growth Instigators Hotline
Welcome to the Growth Instigators Hotline, where we ignite your personal and professional development. For more resources, visit growthinstigators.com. Keep instigating growth in all you do.
Growth Instigators Hotline
#497 Road to 500: Pack it up pack it in
Creative breakthroughs rarely start with a blank slate; they start with a remix. We kick off a week of milestones by revisiting message 100 and pulling forward a mantra that still hits hard: there are no mistakes, only room for embellishment. Through a story about an artist friend whose work inspires fearless iteration, we explore how reframing errors as raw material unlocks playful momentum, stronger ideas and faster learning.
From there, we zoom out to the craft of idea-finding. Topics don’t fall from the sky—they emerge when we tune our ears to the intonation of everyday life. We talk about building a habit of awareness: listening to the echoes around you, noticing patterns, and letting the world’s reverberations pass through your taste. Then we ground the practice with a simple creative triad: logos for structure, pathos for energy, and ethos for the earned right to speak because you live what you say. When those three align, your message carries weight and warmth.
You’ll hear practical prompts to rework what’s already on your desk: mash up words to test new meanings, shake up a concept to expose hidden angles, rearrange the same pieces to unlock fresh context. We treat creativity like painting—layers, pivots, and bold strokes that make the canvas sing. Along the way we have a little fun with a House of Pain nod and celebrate the Road to 500, keeping the energy light while the insights stay sharp. If you’re ready to turn missteps into momentum and ship work that feels more you, this one’s for you.
If this sparked something, follow the show, share it with a friend who needs a creative nudge, and leave a quick review. Tell us: what will you embellish today?
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Welcome to message 497 of the Growth Instigators Hotline. I'm Aaron Havens, your host and growth coach. This is the Road to 500. Each day this week, we will look at the 100th message that got us here. Today we revisit message number 100. Tomorrow will be number 200 of the Growth Instigator Hotline. So, what was the 100th message topic? Here it was. Pack it up, pack it in. It's about celebrating, making mistakes, and creating. So if you want to listen to the actual message and all its gloriousness, you can look it up wherever you get your podcast. But here today, this is the recap. So my friend Shannon Almazar is an amazing professional artist. Her paintings are sought after. We've known each other a lot of years, and along the way, she has led me and my family into fun paint painting activities throughout time. And I love how she says this. Huh. No mistakes, only room for embellishment, growth, pivots, making better, going with the flow. My friends, is this the way you go about life? If so, what does this give? It gives freedom to play, room for embellishment. Your quote unquote mistakes are not new. Your discoveries are built on thousands of discoveries that came before you. Take the words, mash them up. Take the concept and shake it up. Take the same thing and rearrange it. Play with it, put it in a new context and watch fresh new things happen. You know what this is? This is freedom. Can you feel that? I'm often asked how I come up with topics for the hotline. My answer is simple. Just be aware. Listen to what is being said. Pay attention to the intonation and the reverberation of the world around you. Try to make sense of what is in the cosmos already. Put your spin on it, your heart on it, your take on it, and boom, that's it. No AI can ever do that. Logos is word, pathos is passion. Ethos is permission to speak. So take what you know, passionately live it out, and put your twists on it to make you, your people, and the world around you better. Aha! That's a solid recap of message 100. So if you go listen to the real podcast, you'll hear me rapping a little bit of house and pain in it. It's pretty funny. This is a fun week of recaps. If you're enjoying the messages, please invite your friends to call in this week. Tomorrow, we talk about message 200. Until then, go slay the day, go embellish something today.