The Artist's Way

When we respond to art we are responding to its
resonance in terms of our own experience. We seldom see
anew in the sense of finding something utterly unfamiliar.
Instead, we see an old in a new light.
If the demand to be original still troubles you, remember
this: each of us is our own country, an interesting place to
visit. It is the accurate mapping out of our own creative
interests that invites the term original. We are the origin of
our art, its home-land. Viewed this way, originality is the
process of remaining true to ourselves.
The spirit of competition—as opposed to the spirit of
creation—often urges us to quickly winnow out whatever
doesn’t seem like a winning idea. This can be very
dangerous. It can interfere with our ability to carry a project
to term.
A competitive focus encourages snap judgments: thumbs
up or thumbs down. Does this project deserve to live? (No,
our ego will say if it is looking for the fail-safe, surefire
project that is a winner at a glance and for good.) Many hits
are sure things only in retrospect. Until we know better, we
call a great many creative swans ugly ducklings. This is an
indignity we offer our brainchildren as they rear their heads
in our consciousness. We judge them like beauty-pageant
contestants. In a glance we may cut them down. We forget
that not all babies arc born beautiful, and so we abort the
lives of awkward or unseemly projects that may be our
finest work, out best creative ugly ducklings. An act of art
needs time to mature. Judged early, it may bejudged