The Idea Virus
During this pandemic we are all experiencing, this 50,000 pound contagion weighing us all down, anchoring us to our homes and manifesting itself in ways unimaginable even weeks ago, some unexpected opportunities have risen. One of these is virtual book clubs. My gorgeous friend Liese Gardner was the first to embrace this, and this week’s read is Big Magic by the inimitable Elizabeth Gilbert.
These words she wrote, of course, struck me right away. “I believe that our planet is inhabited not only by animals and plants and bacteria and viruses, but also by ideas. Ideas are a disembodied, energetic life-form. They are completely separate from us, but capable of interacting with us – albeit strangely. Ideas have no material body, but they do have consciousness, and they most certainly have will. Ideas are driven by a single impulse: to be made manifest. And the only way an idea can be made manifest in our world is through collaboration with a human partner. It is only through a human’s efforts that an idea can be escorted out of the ether and into the realm of the actual.“
In the world of events my readers inhabit we understand, live and breathe this. For those whose events have been cancelled, it is the wrenching of these ideas out from under us that caused the most immediate grief. We invest ourselves in our ideas, have manifested the first germ of inspiration and collaborated with designers, destinations. decor and environment creators, venues, chefs, production teams, performers, transporters (to name a few) and clients to bring them to fruition… with no fruition. Some we will be able to revitalize, some are stalled forever, some perhaps will be resurrected in a future iteration, but never exactly the same again.
None of us know what a new normal will look like, but to date nobody I have spoken / commiserated with imagines it will have the same glitter and shine it did before. What will a clinically immaculate, human-focused event look like in the next weeks and months? Will it begin with a sanitation stop, a walk through a temperature tunnel and emerge into a space where all conversations take place with a suitable social distancing? Will we exchange handshakes and hugs for elbow taps and fist bumps? None of us know, but what I do know is if anyone can re-emerge and create face-to-face events that are safe, that deliver on the promise of dialogue and where environments are beautiful and inspiring, it is the #eventprofs around the globe who will do this. I continue to be inspired by each of you and am optimistic we will return bruised but strengthened and look forward to all your ideas being what spreads.
