Risk means… danger of failing looking stupid feeling stupid embarrassing yourself making yourself known being vulnerable having a panic attack stumbling falling fucking up or possibility of succeeding looking awesome/fabulous/brilliant feeling awesome/fabulous/brilliant realizing just how silly and baseless all your fears were in the 1st place feeling stronger feeling a billion times more confident stumbling … Continue reading
“To be mature you have to realize what you value most. It is extraordinary to discover that comparatively few people reach this level of maturity. They seem never to have paused to consider what has value for them. They spend great effort and sometimes make great sacrifices for values that, fundamentally, meet no real needs of … Continue reading
Most of us conduct our lives in a certain way simply because we are afraid of failure. We stay in our futile, miserable jobs because to leave would mean to take a risk and possibly invite defeat. We stay with the wrong person, in the wrong city, at the wrong job because to do anything differently … Continue reading
According to Julia Cameron, author of smash hit The Artist’s Way, there are two kinds of people: innovators and conservers. As artists, we are most often innovators: we create and invent, experiment and explore. Those who work with our work-agents, managers, publishers, gallery owners, curators, producers- are conservers. As Cameron maintains, “conservers focus not on the … Continue reading
On one of my most beloved advice shows, viewer Renee writes in complaining that her work lacks deeper meaning. After working in healthcare for several years, she worries her work as an artist won’t make the same kind of real-world impact. “I’m a little bogged down with the realization that my purely aesthetic work won’t … Continue reading
Many pragmatic, scientific people dismiss the power of positive thinking because they assume positive thinking means thinking only. “So what, I’m just supposed to believe I’m the writer of a national bestseller and then I’ll magically become the writer of a national bestseller?” skeptics scoff, “I call bullshit.” But visualizing what we most passionately yearn for … Continue reading
According to brilliant psychologist and pioneer of the positive psychology movement Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, the key to a leading a fulfilling life is striking a balance between action and contemplation: “Inner conflict is the result of competing claims on attention. Too many desires, too many incompatible goals struggle to marshal psychic energy toward their own ends. It … Continue reading
Writing is like playing a sport: if we want to get better, we have to practice everyday. If we want to write, for example, we have to write every morning when we wake up (or, depending on our schedule, every afternoon). But we don’t just simply write- we write to improve a particular skill, … Continue reading
Shakespeare originally coined the phrase “jealousy is a green-eyed monster” but it’s so widely circulated that today the expression has passed into common speech. Why has this image endured for centuries? What spared this characterization from fading into oblivion when so many others slipped into the dusty cracks of history? I suspect it’s because no other writer … Continue reading
When asked what “big magic” inspired her to write Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear, Elizabeth Gilbert replied that as a writer she most often met people who yearned to live creatively but could (or would) not. When she talked to these people, they always had sensible reasons why they couldn’t get to the … Continue reading
The Blank-Faced Confidante 