The Creative Act: A Way of Being
Rick Rubin
Top 10 Best Quotes
“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.”
“Turning something from an idea into a reality can make it seem smaller. It changes from unearthly to earthly. The imagination has no limits. The physical world does. The work exists in both.”
“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.”
“Doubting yourself can lead to a sense of hopelessness, of not being inherently fit to take on the task at hand. All or nothing thinking is a nonstarter. However, doubting the quality of your work might, at times, help to improve it. You can doubt your way to excellence.”
“All art is a work in progress. It’s helpful to see the piece we’re working on as an experiment. One in which we can’t predict the outcome. Whatever the result, we will receive useful information that will benefit the next experiment. If you start from the position that there is no right or wrong, no good or bad, and creativity is just free play with no rules, it’s easier to submerge yourself joyfully in the process of making things. We’re not playing to win, we’re playing to play. And ultimately, playing is fun. Perfectionism gets in the way of fun. A more skillful goal might be to find comfort in the process. To make and put out successive works with ease.”
“Look for what you notice but no one else sees.”
“All that matters is that you are making something you love, to the best of your ability, here and now.”
“A river of material flows through us. When we share our works and our ideas, they are replenished. If we block the flow by holding them all inside, the river cannot run and new ideas are slow to appear. In the abundant mindset, the river never runs dry. Ideas are always coming through. And an artist is free to release them with the faith that more will arrive. If we live in a mindset of scarcity, we hoard great ideas.”
“Zoom in and obsess. Zoom out and observe. We get to choose.”
“When you believe the work before you is the single piece that will forever define you, it's difficult to let go. The urge for perfection is overwhelming. It's too much. We are frozen, and sometimes ends up convincing ourselves that discarding the entire work is the only way to move forward.”
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Book Keywords:
hopelessness, reality, conception, way-to-live, abundant, idea, existence, being, quality, engagement, art, scarcity, artist, practice, excellence, doubt, unearthly, self-doubt, scarcity-mindset, improvement, abundant-mindset, artist-s-life, imagination, creativity
