Heart Art

Have you ever felt too scared to follow your dreams? That your ambitions are too big, or that you just aren't good enough? Singer-songwriter Clare Bowditch recognises that these are often huge roadblocks to starting up a career within the creative industries, and quite frankly, she's had enough of it!

With Big Hearted Business (BHB), which was launched in earnest earlier this year, Bowditch and her team aim to equip those looking to kick-start their career with some simple solutions to tackle such issues. Reflecting on how the project started, Bowditch explains, “I guess it was because I kept seeing roadblocks [in my career]. It's also because I saw a lot of my friends were having similar problems – these were people far more talented than me, who kept falling short in taking their experience and building a career out of it. The frustration, pain and heartbreak of that led me to think, 'Wow, these are actual musicians and nobody gets to hear their music.' Then I thought, 'Why isn't anyone helping these people?' There's a need for [this kind of thing], I can see it. The beauty is that now we're living in incredible times where, guess what? You really can build your own community to sustain your career.”

Elaborating further on the personal struggles people may face when considering the prospect of a creative career, Bowditch relays, “We get trapped in this cycle of thinking that we're not good enough. From there you start to think, 'Yes, I am good enough but nobody's taking notice,' and then it starts to become, 'I don't want to talk about myself' – it's like this big house of mirrors! But once you start to learn concepts about how marketing is kind of about telling a story really well, and start looking into how people get to where they are, it becomes less elusive. People are constantly asking questions like, 'How did Zan Rowe get to be that prominent on triple j?'” she continues, “or, 'How did Marieke Hardy get to XYZ?' With BHB you get to talk to those people, demystify the process and realise that there really is no mystery. It's just about finding a grain of belief that what you've got to contribute means something, and if you can connect with that little part of it, as I had to in some stage in my career, it's empowering. It lights you up inside. For me, when I realised I wasn't interested in chart positions, but I am interested in talking about things that matter; that was very galvanising in my career.”

BHB is not just about teaching people how to kick-start their creative careers; it's also about letting those already involved in successful business know that it's possible to include warmth and generosity in their business models. “I was seeing a lot of my friends who are corporate lawyers and so on, who had learned that heart was not to be included in their work brief. They were told to leave their hearts aside, to leave their desire to change the world to the side, so they could just make money and become what society deems successful. I thought that was really imbalanced as well.”

So far there are two main ways in which Bowditch and her team reach out to those looking for advice and solutions. The first is through a mailing list, where Bowditch reveals, “People join up and we send them an 'inspiration bomb' every week, and that's where we find people who have become successful in their chosen field and they tell us their story, how they got to be where they are and their childhood tribulations – things like that. Branching from that we try to give our audience as much practical support through those inspiration bombs as we can.”

The second medium is a small face-to-face conference, which is held in various locations throughout Australia. Bowditch finds these to be the most rewarding part of the job, because it gives her the opportunity to see her pupils' progress and pitfalls. “People come to the conference and tell us about the practical side of their journey and how they've started to build their lives differently. A lawyer actually came up to me at one of the conferences and started weeping, because he said it was the first time anyone had understood the issues he's been facing. He said it was the first time he felt as though his heart could be a part of his day job, and that was probably one of the most satisfying experiences I've had with BHB so far.”