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The creative act

The creative act

by Danielpouras · 42 things on Twos

Creativity is not a rare ability.
To create is to bring something into existence that wasn’t there before.
Definition of creativity
To live as an artist is a way of being in the world. A way of perceiving. A practice of paying attention.
It is not something you are it is a way to live
If you have an idea you’re excited about and you don’t bring it to life, it’s not uncommon for the idea to find its voice through another maker. This isn’t because the other artist stole your idea, but because the idea’s time has come.
If your idea is important for you, you need to tell it before someone else does
The best artists tend to be the ones with the most sensitive antennae to draw in the energy resonating at a particular moment. Many great artists first develop sensitive antennae not to create art but to protect themselves. They have to protect themselves because everything hurts more. They feel everything more deeply.
Personal notes: I am a good artist because I feel everything deeply
Artists who are able to continually create great works throughout their lives often manage to preserve these childlike qualities. Practicing a way of being that allows you to see the world through uncorrupted, innocent eyes can free you to act in concert with the universe’s timetable.
It may be helpful to think of Source as a cloud. Clouds never truly disappear. They change form. They turn into rain and become part of the ocean, and then evaporate and return to being clouds. The same is true of art.
The ability to look deeply is the root of creativity. To see past the ordinary and mundane and get to what might otherwise be invisible.
As artists, we seek to restore our childlike perception: a more innocent state of wonder and appreciation not tethered to utility or survival.
The act of creation is an attempt to enter a mysterious realm. A longing to transcend. What we create allows us to share glimpses of an inner landscape, one that is beyond our understanding. Art is our portal to the unseen world.
When looking for a solution to a creative problem, pay close attention to what’s happening around you. Look for clues pointing to new methods or ways to further develop current ideas.
A helpful exercise might be opening a book to a random page and reading the first line your eyes find. See how what’s written there somehow applies to your situation.
Living life as an artist is a practice. You are either engaging in the practice or you’re not. It makes no sense to say you’re not good at it. It’s like saying, “I’m not good at being a monk.” You are either living as a monk or you’re not. We tend to think of the artist’s work as the output. The real work of the artist is a way of being in the world.
The objective is not to learn to mimic greatness, but to calibrate our internal meter for greatness. So we can better make the thousands of choices that might ultimately lead to our own great work.
It helps to realize that it’s better to follow the universe than those around you.
If you’re not up to it, no one else can do it. Only you can. You’re the only one with your voice.
Instead of sounding like others, value your own voice. Develop it. Cherish it.
The artists who define each generation are generally the ones who live outside of these boundaries. Not the artists who embody the beliefs and conventions of their time, but the ones who transcend them. Art is confrontation.
The impossible only becomes accessible when experience has not taught us limits.
The point Wooden was making was that creating effective habits, down to the smallest detail, is what makes the difference between winning and losing games.
Failure is the information you need to get where you’re going.
The works we do are at most chapters. There will always be a new chapter, and another after that.
Georges Perec wrote an entire book without using the most common letter of the French alphabet: e.
Do things that defines the rules and social normes
Success has nothing to do with variables outside yourself.
If we can tune in to the idea of making things and sharing them without being attached to the outcome, the work is more likely to arrive in its truest form.
As Theodore Roosevelt pointed out, comparison is the thief of joy.
Perfection is finally obtained not when there is no longer anything to add, but when there’s no longer anything to take away. —Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Wind, Sand and Stars
If you are open and stay tuned to what’s happening, the answers will be revealed.
When we sit down to work, remember that the outcome is out of our control.
You can only create you can not decide if someone likes it
When something doesn’t go according to plan, we have a choice to either resist it or incorporate it.
Bob Dylan could write a song in minutes while Leonard Cohen sometimes took years. And we may love the songs equally.
As Arn Anderson once noted: “I’m both a professor and student, because if you’re no longer a student, you don’t have the right to call yourself a professor.”
Sharing art is the price of making it. Exposing your vulnerability is the fee.
Anything that allows the audience to access how you see the world is accurate, even if the information is wrong.
The reason we’re alive is to express ourselves in the world. And creating art may be the most effective and beautiful method of doing so. Art goes beyond language, beyond lives. It’s a universal way to send messages between each other and through time.
The universe never explains why.