It’s whiny to complain about having to sell our art. It comes from an entitled place, where we think we must be such geniuses that other people would be lucky to sell our work for us.

We hold ourselves to a higher productivity standard than machines. When we get tired, or emotionally exhausted, or lose focus, or when we can’t find any motivation, the tendency for ambitious people like us is to be hard on ourselves. Meanwhile, we expect the cars we drive to fail. 

Everybody has two hands (at most). Everybody has 24 hours in the day. Everybody has to sleep and eat and breathe.

“I can only make sense of my unaccountable good fortune by assuming that it means I am under special obligation to make good use of it.”

When I was 21 years old, I found myself in Washington D.C. for a day alone. I wandered around, looked at some stuff, met a friend for lunch, and scalped a ticket to a baseball game. In the middle of it all, my father told me to meet a colleague of his who ran a recruiting firm. 

Seth Godin has published a short blog every single day for more than 10,000 days in a row. Beeple has created a new digital artwork from start to finish every single day for 6551 days. You might be reading these facts and thinking to yourself, “I could never do that. I’m not that kind of person.”

In December of 2014, a friend and I drove to Hollywood to see an obscure poet-turned-rapper. Ten years later, an important realization came around.

Stress says “I might lose this.” It says, “this might not go well. They might not like me. I might fail. I’m going to look like an idiot.”

Can you call a business a success if it closes its doors? Can you say you are successful if your small business isn’t growing? If you have to shut down or sell or leave a business, can you really call that successful? 

I think you can. 

“The truth is, I’m really in pursuit of greatness. I know people don’t usually talk like that, but I want to be one of the greats.” 

We make a promise to ourselves to show up and work on our art, but when we don’t, nothing bad happens. People don’t yell at us, we don’t get fired, art doesn’t stop hanging out with us. It’s all fine. 

The longer you stay on the bus, the further it will take you. The weirder it will be when you finally ask to get off, and the longer you’ll have to travel back home. 

Reframing is free. It changes nothing—but it could change everything for you. 

“There is a beautiful statue dedicated to liberty in New York City’s harbor. There is no such monument to responsibility.“

For some reason, we tend to believe that our creative inspirations had perfect conditions while they were creating. We think they achieved exactly what they hoped for—that they brought their imagination to life just as it existed in their minds. This is not true. 

I had never (successfully) written a book before, but I was confident I could get it done because I had seen the breadcrumbs. 

I just went on a run. I didn’t not feel like a runner. I felt more like one of those wooden figures artists use to pose a body shape. My legs felt wooden. I had to work to get them to move.

Dan Harmon, who wrote a few hit TV shows, said this on a podcast once. “You’re trying to prove you are a good writer. That’s what’s blocking you.” 

Remember—your hair would get windblown. Your eyes would get dry. Your lips would get chapped. It would be pretty cold. The adrenaline rush would leave you exhausted.

Stress and sadness and annoyance aren’t necessarily things to be avoided at all costs.