Pete Dupuis is a serial real estate entrepreneur, lifehacker, home gifter and passionate social capitalist who believes in progress, not motion.

How do you define creativity and apply it in your career?
Creativity is the engine of positive change. I define creativity as the ability to draw from experience, knowledge and instinct to see things from a perspective that others can’t or don’t want to. My role is to apply creativity to challenge people to do things they would never have considered and encourage one to actively participate in personal growth in their profession and, if inspired, creating social change for the benefit of people in need.

Where do you find your best creative inspiration?
The ocean and mountains are a place of sanctuary and clean thinking. Being in this environment refreshes my thinking and allows me to challenge myself so i can challenge others.

What’s the one creative advice or tip you wish you’d known as a young person?
Ha, it’s a tie, so i’m giving you both: (1) take chances. Don’t be intimidated by other people that criticize and are afraid to try new things as they’re just trying to keep you at their level. (2) failure is the most important driver of personal growth. Fail often and fail well. A successful failure is just the next step to creating something of personal significance. Remember, the dude who created the sticky note failed at creating a better glue.

Who would you like to hear speak at Creative Mornings?
Scott Neeson. He gave up a his life of success and excess in Hollywood at the peak of his career to move to the Steung Meanchey dump to create Cambodia children’s fund. He’s the world leader in creating social change for those most in need. What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done?
Travelled to, and studying, third world dump communities then locked myself in a room for 6 months and wrote my thesis. I turned my back on the first world to open my mind to what really matters in the real world.

What are you reading these days?
I read digitally. I surf zite like a vacuum sucks dirt and am actively picking away at 5 books on kindle: (1) This Will Make You Smarter: new scientific concepts to improve your thinking, edited by John Brockman; (2) HBR’s 10 must reads “On Managing Yourself”, a collection from the Harvard Business Review; (3) The War of Art: break through the blocks and win your inner creative battles, by Steven Pressfield; (5) How To Tell a Story And Other Essays by Mark Twain. Also just finished “Cycles of Lies – The fall of Lance Armstrong”, by Juliet Macur. It will be interesting to see how Lance reacts to his biggest failure over the medium term.