Marc T. Suess is a Creative Director, Brand Consultant, Abstract Painter, Musician, and host of the Sweetspot Podcast. We had a wonderful conversation about finding your sweetspot, and what it means to be an artist.

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Finding Your Sweetspot with Creative Director, Brand Consultant & Abstract Painter Marc T. Suess

TRANSCRIPT:

Hello and welcome to Multipassionate Artists. Episode 85. This year is going by so fast. How are you doing on your goals that you set out for 2022?

[00:00:47.490] – Diane Foy

I’m doing okay, a little behind. There’s always so much to do, but I like that. I’m just always making progress. And so heading into September, it’s a good time to really think about what do you want to achieve by the end of this year that will set you up for the goals you have for next year. Just something to think about. If you need help, I’m still accepting applications to be coached by me on the show. If you want help with goal setting, your vision, figure out what you want. If you’re multipassionate and you don’t know which of your many passions to focus on or how to if you feel kind of overwhelmed that you don’t seem to be making progress on any of them because you have so many passions, we can talk about that. If you have questions about personal branding or content creation or how to figure out who is your ideal fan, customer, client, whatever you call them, if you’re an artist, probably a fan. And we can get into all that on the podcast. So if you’re interested, head to dianefoy. Comvolunteer and stay tuned because I got some coming up for you where you can listen in on a coaching session on the show.

[00:02:21.810] – Diane Foy

So today, my guest is Mark Suess. He is the host of the Sweet Spot podcast and he has a studio called that as well. And he’s a creative director, brand consultant, also an abstract painter and former musician. So, you know, we love that here. Multipassionate Artists. He is a multi potentialite along with us. And we had a wonderful conversation just about finding your sweet spot, finding your niche, finding your why, your purpose, and then we talked a little bit about his art and how he manages it all. And yeah, I think you’re going to really enjoy the conversation. So for links and a transcript, you can visit dianfoy.com 85. And that’s it. Until next time, enjoy this conversation.

[00:03:31.650] – Diane Foy

Hello, welcome to the show. I’m so excited to talk to you because you’re a fellow multipassionate, multipotential light artist. So maybe first just kind of introduce yourself and tell us about your many art forms.

[00:03:48.030] – Marc T. Suess

Hello, everyone. Hello there. Thanks for having me. Pleasure to be on your show. I’m mark T. Suess to be complete. And yeah, I’m working in different creative fields. Creative, entrepreneurial, spirited, I would say. I have a design studio where I help people and brands and artists to help them find and share the sweet spot of their brand. And other than that, I was a musician for quite some time and I’m a painter, so variety of creative work.

[00:04:22.040] – Diane Foy

Yeah. And have you heard about multi potentiality before?

[00:04:31.050] – Marc T. Suess

I heard about multipontiality, as you said before, yes. I haven’t heard about multi passionate artists. That’s something I heard first from you. And I have some thoughts on that because I really thought about this for quite some time. When you asked me about the interview and I read your podcast description, I heard all of this and I get the idea, but I think I have to politely disagree when it comes to different passionate, like the plural of passion. Because I think to me there is if you’re an artist, there’s one passion and you can find different creative outlets, different disciplines you work in, but I don’t think you necessarily have different passions. I think you have this one big passion as an artist in the sense that if you have a real passion, I think it demands a lot of your time and energy, the thoughts and a lot of work, maybe even, to quote Charles Bukowski, find what you love and let it kill you. So I really think there goes a lot of dedication and time into creating your art and immersing yourself in a creative process. So I don’t think you can do it on the side if you found that passion and you really go into I mean, you can have creative hobby, but I don’t think you’re immersed up enough to really make it into your art form.

[00:06:03.610] – Diane Foy

Yeah, there’s so many words to describe it. There’s like, the multipotentialite, there’s multipassionate, there’s Renaissance soul, and they do kind of they mean the same thing, but there’s a little differences between them. But the multi potentiality is when we do get interested in something new, we dive in 100% and we’ll learn everything we could possibly can about it and we get obsessive about it. And then sometimes there comes to a time where we get kind of bored of it because it’s not challenging anymore. So I think that’s where the multi potentiality comes in and then multipassionate for some reason, I was just always drawn to that word. I think it was Marie portfolio, even though I don’t really follow her stuff, but I think she’s the one that kind of coined it. And I think it’s just because you have so many passions and they don’t necessarily have to relate so many passions that I guess I compare it to guitar players. If there’s a musician and guitar player and some of these musicians, that’s all they’ve ever wanted to do from the childhood. They’re obsessive with guitar and they don’t get distracted by many other interests or other art forms.

[00:07:28.890] – Diane Foy

They’re just like music. Guitar my life. They’re dedicated. They’re not multipotentialites, multipassionate people. They’re specialists. Like guitar is my life. But then there are multipotential lights where they love guitar, they love music, but then they also love production, and then they also love maybe they want to be an actor as well, and maybe they want to be a painter as well. Maybe they’re a graphic designer. Maybe they want to do everything. That’s kind of where I come from. And also there’s different ways of building a career with that. Some people try to do everything at once, and other people maybe. I think for me, I specialized. I kind of went from one thing to another. I was a photographer, I was a makeup artist, I was a publicist, I’m a coach. And now I feel like I can bring everything into one career as a coach, which is great. So that’s kind of where I’m coming from it and I just always love that. Multi passionate because very passionate about our interests.

[00:08:45.610] – Marc T. Suess

Absolutely. I totally agree. I think it’s just the terminology. I think there is you can call it your why or your calling or your purpose as an artist or however you want to call it. So if people ask me, I think you can call it passion or calling. I think to me, it’s just being a storyteller in a very archetypical, tribal sense. Sit by the fire, collect curate sample, rewrite, and think of stories that I believe are worth telling because they carry a deeper meaning or carry a narrative that I’ve seen is necessary at the time. And these stories, sometimes they are paintings, sometimes I write them, sometimes I record them, and sometimes I help people to find their own story, you know?

[00:09:33.970] – Diane Foy

Yeah. And I think that’s it it comes down to your why and purpose, because I may change careers, and I may have done a lot of things, but the purpose and why behind it all has been the same.

[00:09:47.170] – Marc T. Suess

Do you share your why? You probably shared it before in your podcast, but I haven’t heard it.

[00:09:51.460] – Diane Foy

Yeah, well, my why is when I was a kid, I was way too shy to be a performer, but I was always attracted to arts and entertainment. And I love that you can escape to the world that artists create for us. No matter what’s going on in your life, we all turn to the arts to get through it. And so I was just passionate about music and films and actors and dance and all this stuff, but I was way too shy to do it. And then when it came time to pick a career, I just knew I wanted to be around performers. That’s just my passion. And so I literally just picked up a tour book, went to the back, and went, oh, photographer, okay, I’m going to be photographer. It was just my way in. It wasn’t necessarily the love of the art. So everything I’ve done is because I can help artists get out there in the world, help artists figure out their why, figure out their purpose, figure out how they want to make a contribution to the world, and then I can teach them all the marketing stuff. But I think you think like I do is that the important part is your story really getting to the core of your why and getting comfortable and confident enough to share that and different ways you could tell stories.

[00:11:29.810] – Diane Foy

So that’s kind of where I come from. Artists change lives with their talent.

[00:11:35.810] – Marc T. Suess

Yeah, okay, let’s why not? Let’s dig into this, because I 100% agree, and I even think there’s more to it. Or I think it’s a very important time right now to share true stories, meaningful stories. And also, there’s a lot of maybe responsibility if you create art. Because I think to me. Finding and sharing stories or art is super important right now. And maybe the best thing I can do with my time. Because I don’t know how it is on your end. But I feel like here we have a lack of a collective narrative. Lack of meaning that goes along with it. And maybe even a lack of belonging that a lot of people feel. And there are, of course, old constructions, traditions, things from the past that could do this. But I think art is an amazing way to create new rituals, new traditions, to share with the people and to share with your audience. So I think that stories and art provide these things, maybe a deeper meaning and a kind of a sense of belonging. And I think that’s the reason why people some 400 years ago started painting on cape walls, or why you have myths and stories that are thousands of years old because they carry something and unite people.

[00:13:00.900] – Marc T. Suess

I think art sometimes has to be comforting and sometimes confront you with something new and share a different reality, a different view on the world. And I think we are united by the most individual stories we can tell. That’s something I learned from a friend of mine who does stand up. He always said, the more specific you put a story, the more universal it gets, because then it becomes relatable and it sparks the imagination, and you can hook it to something that is in your life, and you can maybe it’s a pain relief for some inadequacy that you felt, for some great emotion that you want to share with the world, and it just connects us. And I think that’s if you’re, so to speak, the midwife for the arts, that’s a perfect and beautiful thing to do.

[00:13:50.870] – Diane Foy

Yeah. Sometimes people don’t feel like they belong, and sometimes they can express themselves through art or escape to the world that artists create for us. Because you might see something in someone else’s art that makes you feel less alone, of like, oh, this art speaks to me. This is what I’m feeling right now. It makes you feel less alone. So I get that belonging thing.

[00:14:22.320] – Marc T. Suess

Yeah. And I think it’s important to be critical about the stories that are popular and that we tell ourselves and others. So to me, personally, it hurts identifying as a storyteller in whichever medium might choose. It hurts me to see that storytelling became, in some industries, kind of a marketing buzzword that cuts out the thousands of years of tradition that goes along with it. Even the personal meaning that stories have for us as growing up as kids in school learning and even now that we’re grown up to relate to the world. And I think some of the biggest stories of our time right now are kind of oversimplified. It’s a world view where it’s simply good versus bad. It’s black and white views. Well, let’s take superhero movies. I know they’re a huge success, but to me, I don’t like them because it’s always the thing. I don’t enjoy them. I think they kind of kill the idea of cinema and movies because it’s no excuse that the audience like it. I think people want the need to be entertained, but our jobs as creatives are, in this case, filmmakers or storytellers is something I don’t know, it feels like mother art needs to feed its children nutritious and diverse dishes, so to speak.

[00:15:54.690] – Marc T. Suess

Sometimes it has to be spicy or foreign. And if you consume that, you will grow and you will develop a flavor and a taste for more. Different things will make you more curious and leave you just hungry for more. So don’t feed them just the other whopper of the week. Ignore things and try to push them somewhere new.

[00:16:15.410] – Diane Foy

The superhero movies, like, I get that it’s like people go because it’s an escape and maybe they like only action. I don’t get it either. I like my Batman and my Wonder Woman. That’s about it. But even then, I don’t watch them that often because it doesn’t get to your heart. Whereas I love musicals, I love drama, I love comedy and yeah, that actually tell you a story and make you feel things.

[00:16:46.800] – Marc T. Suess

Yeah, 100%. And I mean, if you pick one single superhero movie, that’s cool, but if you look at just the sheer mass of them repeating the same story and the same and if we go into values and deeper meanings and messages, it’s good to have a diverse cultural range and art input, I believe.

[00:17:10.410] – Diane Foy

So what were you like as a child? What was your first kind of art form?

[00:17:17.490] – Marc T. Suess

I remember I grew up in a pretty liberal creative household. My dad was a photographer. My mom was a stay at home mom, but she always had her little creative endeavors by having a furniture design company going a little bit into fashion, but most of all, great model. But I remember that there was a lot of freedom and encouragement to try out new things, to be playful and creative about anything. And I remember my first form of expression. I had this little creative argument with my dad when I think I was just four years old or something, because he bought me this watercolor case with, I don’t know, 48 colors or something. But at that phase, I was just interested in shapes, so I always went straight for the pitch black watercolor, and I was just drawing shapes and exploring that and the heavy contrast and all of that. And he sometimes said beside me, and he was like, hey, how about some red sundown? Orange, red, yellow, a rainbow maybe? I was like, boom, going straight back into the black color and just exploring that. So, yeah, I think the first expression for me was thinking, yeah.

[00:18:35.070] – Diane Foy

And as you grew up, at what point did you when they make you pick a career, what was your first kind of idea? And how did you get to the point where you’re like, this is my career, I’m going to be an artist, or I’m going to be what was your first thing outside of maybe high school?

[00:18:57.450] – Marc T. Suess

Well, there was a little spark of an idea when I was just seven, because what I call creative entrepreneurship is to me personally, this crazy idea that you can think of something, turn it into something real, maybe music, painting, spoken word thing, whatever, and people are willing to invest in money or their time or their attention, and that was something unimaginable for whatever reason. It’s not like I had a lot of attention as a kid or something, but this was just it blew my mind. And I was seven, and I was a huge comic fan at that time. And with all the money I saved, I drew a little comic, a seven page masterpiece, you might call it, and I went to the coffee shop and I made like, ten copies of that thing, and I stapled it together, and I went from door to door in the neighborhood, and I offered people my comic. I had no idea if I charged them. Sometimes I got a candy bar or whatever, but people were interested in it. And I mean, it was a seven year old comic, but they were just interested. And I had the feeling coming home, I had a little bit of change in my pocket and a Snickers bar, and I was just like, wow, right now, this moment, there are like, ten households reading my brain Child that I put on paper, and this was really spark a little thing in my tiny universe back then, maybe the root of what I today call creative entrepreneurship.

[00:20:20.490] – Marc T. Suess

And I later went on. And I wasn’t quite sure what to do in high school. I was on a science high school. Which was kind of tough. But I had the opportunity to graduate in music. And I did a lot of theater. So my original plan was to go into music. But pretty soon after high school. I took a year off and in germany. You have this one year of just social work that you’re obliged to do. Or were obliged to do back in the day. And during that time, we just made music, we recorded, we played life a lot. And I felt like, this is amazing, but it’s something that I want to do as a career. And so I rediscovered kind of my painting and drawing skills and I decided to go into design. And from then on, I actually started working in an agency because, again, I love to apply skills or crafts to the real world. I sometimes love to just have a free open end project and everything, but I really like if it gets some traction, if it’s just connected to something real, people giving you immediate feedback, spreading it out to all the posters in the city or whatever.

[00:21:35.450] – Marc T. Suess

So, of course, as many creatives advertising checks, a lot of my boxes, not the right ones, not everyone, but yeah, I started there and I started working in an agency. I had just a couple of drawings under my arm, went in there and were like, hey, do you need an illustrator? And they actually gave me a job. So I worked there for one and a half years before I started studying design.

[00:21:58.110] – Diane Foy

Cool.

[00:21:58.700] – Marc T. Suess

Yeah.

[00:21:59.970] – Diane Foy

It’s interesting that you wanted to make it public because there’s a lot of artists that they’re very comfortable hiding in their creative world. And when it comes to actually putting it out there, there’s such a resistance there.

[00:22:18.870] – Marc T. Suess

Yeah. I don’t know where this comes from, but sitting on things, not releasing them, driving me crazy. I mean, you need to take your time and you make it perfect to present to the world. But really, I’m very impatient when it comes to that because I really love the moment when it hits the ground, when you really get people’s feedback, their thoughts provoke emotion or any kind of reaction. It’s just such a multi layered way to reach out and connect with other people that’s just beyond whatever relationship you have with them. So this was, from the very beginning, something that really was driving me.

[00:22:58.830] – Diane Foy

Yeah. And so what are the many things that you do and how do you manage it all? Because you do a lot.

[00:23:08.090] – Marc T. Suess

Yeah, I can tell you what I do, how I do. I’m figuring it out.

[00:23:13.620] – Diane Foy

Yes.

[00:23:19.090] – Marc T. Suess

I had a little journey over the last couple of years, maybe I do a quick rundown and then I can tell you where I am today. So I started advertising, made my way there until I became a creative director who had the team. I had to create a control of whatever creative work gets out there. But that felt limited and restricted because it wasn’t my own company. So I became a freelance creative director, moved here to Hamburg at the same time. And after my master’s degree, I co founded the company with a fellow student and we had a company for developing digital products for other companies. So I was the creative part, he was the tech part. Great PR story. We got a lot of attention for that. And then we had an idea for our own startup. So I thought, well, why not try this out? Always be curious as a creative and not shy away from taking responsibility or entrepreneurial responsibility, so to speak. So we shifted our whole company into a startup, BC driven start up to the whole game. And I went down that road for one and a half years and was an interesting grade ride.

[00:24:34.180] – Marc T. Suess

But I really wanted to do this. And of course it was also part for my ego because it’s great being the CEO, being covered in the press, having this great story. Oh, so there’s this tech guy and this creative guy and they’re working on a chatbot that can create new texts and blog articles for you. And the AI is creatively trained and learning and all of this. But after one and a half years, I found myself in the role of a CEO and I was working creatively. Marketing was up and running, the brand was built, the marketing strategy was also up and running. And I was just managing, I was pitching. It was great attention, but at the end of the day, your day job was not driven by creative work. Not by creating new things, but by managing existing things and strategizing and fighting over financing with your investors. And I just felt like on your head says, yes, cool job, founders, CEO, all of that. But somewhere inside, call it in your heart or in your soul or whatever, something was like, you know what, man? I don’t think you’re put here to do this.

[00:25:43.570] – Marc T. Suess

Anyone can do this. Basically not found it, but manage it. You can study economics and manage a young company. So I reconsidered and I left the company peacefully. Everything is good. But I made an exit in mid 2019 and I took half a year off to really think what I want to do. And this is where the idea for my now sweet spot studio came to me, which is really more space for creative work. Of course, I work a lot with entrepreneurs and brand owners, helping them, as I said, find and share their sweet spot. But I also work with artists and I produce media formats like podcasts. I do events, and I really want to not put too many labels on it. I call it Studio because it’s a place where things really get done, get creative, get put out there in the world. It’s not an agency, it’s not advertising based, it’s not based on strategy, which is also part of it. But it was important to call the studio because I want real things to get out of the door. This is part of my day job now that, as I said, it’s a twoparted job finding sweet spot.

[00:26:56.980] – Marc T. Suess

We can call admission passion, purpose. It’s strategy based, finding this thing. I offer workshops and I offer coaching, remoter in person. And then I help people to really tell that story and put it out there in the world with designs, with media products and content strategies and yeah, that’s where I help others as a service provider or a yeah.

[00:27:22.100] – Diane Foy

And your studio, it’s not like just limited to one thing either, right? So your studio could be graphic design, it could be website, it could be videos, it could be photography, that kind of thing.

[00:27:36.330] – Marc T. Suess

Yeah, I think that’s kind of business talk. But I think the time for agencies is limited, or at least what agencies can offer if they don’t reinvent themselves is very limited. Because if you have such an overhead and you have a lot of teams, and then you offer what you offer, and you can’t be really serving individual needs of brands. And I think today, with all the opportunities you have and all the different outlets in the media landscape, if you really want to help the brand, you have to be pretty agile and flexible. And I see myself as a creative experience partner. I always say I’m the muse and the business partner. So if you need some inspiration, if you need some new ideas, you can call me as well as say, okay, we need to up those, let’s say, content, strategy, numbers. And then I work with a collective of other creators, filmmakers, photographers. There’s a lot of stuff I can do myself, graphic design, branding, and web design. But when it comes to really producing, let’s say a great short film or something, I have my network of trusted creative fellows and I work together with them.

[00:28:44.950] – Diane Foy

Wow, that’s cool.

[00:28:46.480] – Marc T. Suess

Yeah.

[00:28:46.950] – Diane Foy

And then how do you fit in your painting? How much of your life is dedicated to painting? And do you have shows and galleries, that kind of thing?

[00:29:01.390] – Marc T. Suess

So well, painting becomes more and more a bigger part of my life. I must say. I rediscovered it during the culprit years in a sense that I allowed myself to with more time and also more energy to really try out the thing that I always had in mind. It’s like a lot of us, especially creative people, have some of their brain children and they carry it around for years. You may be know that one day I want to do this and I want to do this. And I sat here during lockdown and I was like, you know what, I think now is the time I really want to try it out. And I do abstract paintings, mostly large scale paintings. And for the first time, I really was building canvases myself in the size and just exactly the way I imagined them being a little tougher, a little thicker, just the way I always imagined it, but never took the time to actually do it. And it was really like, wow, you just popped something open there. Since then, I can’t stop thinking about it. And drawing and painting and working on it and yeah, I do exhibitions, I do shows.

[00:30:11.750] – Marc T. Suess

I have a little art collective together with an amazing Hamburg painter she’s called Lotterhouse. She’s sculpturing and painting. And we formed this collective called Meson Deuce, and we do a race together. In the olden days, the idea of hosting a salon, like in Paris in the something, just bringing people together, debating arts, debating ideas, having an open, safe space for truthful and creative exchange. And this is often connected to presenting a new painting or doing a performance or performing a little fire ritual, but people that normally don’t get in touch with it. It’s a pretty handpicked selection of guests we invite, but they are all open to experience something like this. So this is also part of this artistic journey to really put it out there. And, again, I need the traction I need to put things out there. Yeah. And right now I’m painting. I’m working on a new series, and I hope to display it in autumn, maybe windshield.

[00:31:21.810] – Diane Foy

Yeah. I like what you said about we often have a lot of creative ideas and things that we want to do, but it might just not be the time. I don’t know if you’ve read Barbara Sherr’s book Refuse to choose.

[00:31:39.330] – Marc T. Suess

I have not yet.

[00:31:40.570] – Diane Foy

She’s kind of the pioneer of the multi potentiality thing. Okay. And she calls the Scanners, but she has an amazing idea where it’s a book that you write into, draw into every day, because sometimes we don’t necessarily have to take what our idea to completion to be satisfied. So it’s this book where you just if I had a design for a jewelry piece, I could draw it out, I could write all my ideas, and I might not actually take that to go and make it, or I might ten years from now, who knows? But it’s this book where you collect all your ideas of things that you may or may not return to. And I haven’t done it yet, but I’m like, I really want to start that book and collect all these ideas. That way it gets it out of your brain, and maybe now is not the time to pursue it further, or maybe you don’t even want to, but it gets that idea out on this book, and one day I’ll bring it back out. I have a lot of ideas and creative of stuff that it’s not my focus right now, but one day.

[00:33:05.140] – Marc T. Suess

Exactly. And I think you have to give yourself permission to postpone things or to delay things or to be playful and try things out. Because what I experience, especially having worked in this startup economy, which is absolutely driven by either plans to exit the company to sell it, it’s always very focused, and you say no to. 99.9% of the things because you define things in the business plan. And on the other hand, there is this huge self optimization idea revolving in this whole business field in terms of sleep optimization, food, eating habits, sports, everything, every potential thing. And I tried some of it and if you do it long enough, it’s like, guys, what’s the point? I mean, I’m not a robot. It’s not about being the perfect working machine or anything else. By giving yourself permission to be playful and try things out and just be in the moment and make new experiences, I think this is at least to me and to other creative people I know, more valuable than being the perfectly tuned robot for your business. And this is one of the many that I’m working on with my art to try and break this idea of oh, you have to be perfect and you have to be so controlled.

[00:34:38.850] – Marc T. Suess

So a lot of my work as a painter revolves around escapism, loss of control, a little bit of chaos, acceleration, intoxication just in a sense not of substance abuse, but in the sense of giving yourself permission to try things out, lose the sense of control and explore your maybe more primal, raw or pure form of being. As in many art forms, there are things that you can’t transport with words in writing. And I think my paintings are always connected to music thinking like maybe writing its own, composing it in a similar way. Always, of course, listening to music while I paint. And I think there’s a kind of connective tissue and how it resonates within yourself if you can really immerse yourself. And that’s why I paint in such big scales that you have the feeling that you can really fall into it like being on a live concert. It’s just all around you. You can just immerse yourself completely. And that’s one of the thoughts that really drive me when I paint.

[00:35:47.090] – Diane Foy

That’s cool. And so a lot of us do a million things. How do you manage it? Do you have seasons of the year where you dedicate yourself fully to art and then another time is more branding or do you split your weeks? How do you do it all?

[00:36:09.710] – Marc T. Suess

Well, little disclaimer. I know there are very many ways to handle it, but the way I work is really smooth hangers in a sense that when I find the energy to create something, let’s say I start for a client and a content strategy thing, I do the research, I write things down and immediately on the site, you get new ideas, you get input for a very different creative task. And when I started allowing myself to really work simultaneously have like two notebooks in front of you or three, and really writing it down as it happens. You can’t combine this with a nine to five working day, but if you’re passionate about it and love it, then it’s fine. Then if it’s 11:00 A.m. And you have an idea for a painting, then you can take 2 hours and make a scatch for it or mix the perfect shade of purple or whatever, and then you get back to it for a client. And I know a lot of people need a more structured way, but I’m lucky enough to have enough energy to do it simultaneously and mix things up. And if I feel drawn to painting in the morning, then I can still do, let’s say, a branding or a workshop or can teach a lesson on the university.

[00:37:36.060] – Marc T. Suess

I teach that and yeah, to me it was really more easy to combine things and not keep them separate. Because whenever I try to keep things separate, putting up these boundaries and forcing yourself into a time schedule takes away a lot of my energy. I really tried this when I ran the business, and of course, I had to schedule myself to be there for the whole team and for people that want something from you. And now that I lifted all these barriers, it’s way more easy, it’s free flowing, but to me, it’s easier to navigate from the ceiling instead of writing everything down.

[00:38:17.950] – Diane Foy

Yeah, that’s how I work too. Okay. From ten to twelve, you’re going to be doing this. What if I don’t feel like doing that that time? It’s like I like the freedom to kind of go with what I feel like doing that day.

[00:38:36.550] – Marc T. Suess

I need to clear this up. I’m a huge fan of everyone who’s involved in an entrepreneurial endeavor. I really appreciate all founders, the whole start of the company, it’s just not for me. Because if you start, let’s say you start time boxing, that’s the thing that happens. Some people have 15 minutes time slots for the day. And we tried this in a team, and if you work with programmers from Brazil to Hungary to wherever you need to do it. But at the same time, I really felt because I was involved and I was dedicated and I really tried it out, but I felt like you can’t move your creative muscle and you really feel it deteriorating. It was like when I got back to being a freelance creative structure, I had to really do creative workouts to get back on track and to retrain your creative muscle of being spontaneous, trusting your gut feeling, improvising, just going with the flow. So I think we have all of this in us. It’s just a question on where you put your time and energy and focus on and what part of yourself you trust the most. And this is what you should go with.

[00:39:55.150] – Diane Foy

Yeah. Wonderful. So what is your why do you do what you do?

[00:40:04.910] – Marc T. Suess

Parts of it are already told. My why in the shortest version is that I believe that stories that we tell have the power to really make a huge impact and even change the world, because if you look at society, politics, culture, it’s driven by the stories we tell ourselves. And I think you can really make an impact by helping people find an optimistic, powerful, positive narrative, and they can really have an impact in real life. It’s not about fiction. It’s not about artsy, niche things. It’s really important the stories that we tell ourselves in order to convey values, form traditions, keep them alive or form new ones, and even to allow yourself to explore more. And at the end of the day, be happy. Your whole life is basically a story you tell yourself. So if you find a good narrative that serves everyone, that’s what I want to work at.

[00:41:10.850] – Diane Foy

Cool. And where can people find you?

[00:41:12.700] – Marc T. Suess

Online, people can find the easiest way to get a view over all the things I do is on Marcsous.com. You probably put it in the show notes, and then you find links to various podcasts, my design studio, and also to my artworks.

[00:41:29.630] – Diane Foy

Cool. Well, thank you so much. It’s been so wonderful chatting with you.

[00:41:35.160] – Marc T. Suess

Thank you.