Austin Kleon Quotes

We’re always being told find your voice. When I was younger, I never really knew what this meant. I used to worry a lot about voice, wondering if I had my own. But now I realize that the only way to find your voice is to use it. It’s hardwired, built into you. Talk about the things you love. Your voice will follow.

Whenever Picasso learned how to do something, he abandoned it.” — Milton Glaser When

Don’t Go Back to School

The world is crazy. Creative work is hard. Life is short and art is long.

If you want fans, you have to be a fan first. If you want to be accepted by a community, you have to first be a good citizen of that community. If you’re only pointing to your own stuff online, you’re doing it wrong. You have to be a connector. The writer Blake Butler calls this being an open node. If you want to get, you have to give. If you want to be noticed, you have to notice. Shut up and listen once in a while. Be thoughtful. Be considerate. Don’t turn into human spam. Be an open node.

Fake it till you make it. I love this phrase. There are two ways to read it:
1. Pretend to be you're something you're not until you are - fake it until youre successful, until everybody sees you the way you want them to; or
2. Pretend to be making something until you actually make something.
I love both readings, you have to dress for the job you want, not the job you have, and you have to start doing the work you want to be doing.

Neil Young sang, “It’s better to burn out than to fade away.” I say it’s better to burn slow and see your grandkids.

This is actually a good thing, because you want attention only after you’re doing really good work.

It’s not the book you start with, it’s the book that book leads you to.

Paul McCartney has said, “I emulated Buddy Holly, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis. We all did.

It's in the act of making things and doing our work that we figure out who we are.

You should wonder at the things nobody else is wondering about. If everybody's wondering about apples, go wonder about oranges.

"You're never "keeping it real" with your lack of punctuation and proofreading, you're keeping it unintelligible."

Whether their latest thing is universally rejected, ignored, or acclaimed, they know they’ll still get up tomorrow and do their work.

Es un fracaso convertirse en el ideal que a fin de cuentas nos define y nos hace únicos.” Menos mal.