Quotes About Expression

too many maniacs not enough michelangelos

An abiding stereotype of creativity is that it turns people crazy. I disagree: Not expressing creativity turns people crazy. ("If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you don't bring forth what is within you, what you don't bring forth will destroy you."—Gospel of Thomas.)

As Joan Didion said, "I don't know what I think until I write about it.

art is absolutely meaningless. It is, however, also deeply meaningful.

And what if people absolutely hate what you've created? What if people attack you with savage vitriol, and insult your intelligence, and malign your motives, and drag your good name through the mud? Just smile sweetly and suggest—as politely as you possibly can—that they go make their own fucking art.

Creativity is a crushing chore and a glorious mystery. The work wants to be made, and it wants to be made through you.

Your creative work is not your baby; if anything, you are its baby.

Your art not only doesn't have to be original, in other words; it also doesn't have to be important.

Because often what keeps you from creative living is your self-absorption (your self-doubt, your self-disgust, your self-judgment, your crushing sense of self-protection).

Your fear will always be triggered by your creativity, because creativity asks you to enter into the realms of uncertain outcome, and fear hates uncertain outcome.

This is why we have to be careful of how we handle our fear—because I've noticed that when people try to kill off their fear, they often end up inadvertently murdering their creativity in the process.

You do not need anybody's permission to live a creative life.

Painting working!

The work wants to be made, and it wants to be made through you.

We need you to reveal to us what you know, what you have learned, what you have seen and felt. If you are older, chances are strong that you may already possess absolutely everything you need to possess in order to live a more creative life - except the confidence to actually do your work. But we need you to do your work. Whether you are young or old, we need your work in order to enrich and inform our own lives.

The paradox that you need to comfortably inhabit, if you wish to live a contented creative life, goes something like this: "My creative expression must be the most important thing in the world to me (if I am to live artistically), and it also must not matter at all (if I am to live sanely)." Sometimes

Rest assured, dear friend, that many noteworthy and great sciences and arts have been discovered through the understanding and subtlety of women, both in cognitive speculation, demonstrated in writing, and in the arts, manifested in manual works of labor. I will give you plenty of examples. Christine de Pizan, The Book of the City of Ladies 1405

The thing about fashion, my dears, is that you don't need to follow it, no matter what they say. No fashion trend is compulsory, remember—and if you dress too much in the style of the moment, it makes you look like a nervous person. Paris is all well and good, but we can't just follow Paris for the sake of Paris, now can we?

My creative expression must be the most important thing in the world to me (if I am to live artistically), and it also must not matter at all (if I am to live sanely).

Your fear will always be triggered by your creativity, because creativity asks you to enter into realms of uncertain outcome, and fear hates uncertain outcome.

Worse, their relationship with their work is often emotionally violent. You want to make something? You are told to open up a vein and bleed. Time to edit your work? You are instructed to kill your darlings.

Q: What is creativity? A: The relationship between a human being and the mysteries of inspiration.

Every time you express a complaint about how difficult and tiresome it is to be creative, inspiration takes another step away from you

What does any of that have to do with the quiet glory of merely making things, and then sharing those things with an open heart and no expectations?