Rick Rubin

sometimes mistakes illuminate the path. Humanity breathes in mistakes..

Maybe the best idea is the one you’re going to come up with this evening.

Source makes available. The filter distills. The vessel receives. And often this happens beyond our control.

If we like what we are creating, we don’t have to know why.

Intention is all there is. The work is just a

Similarly, the total output of human creativity, in all its kaleidoscopic breadth, pieces together the fabric forming our culture. The underlying intention of our work is the aspect allowing it to fit neatly into this fabric. Rarely if ever do we know the grand intention, yet if we surrender to the creative impulse, our singular piece of the puzzle takes its proper shape.

Intention is all there is. The work is just a reminder.

lose. If we can tune in to the idea of making things and sharing them without being attached to the outcome, the work is more likely to arrive in its truest form.

Expressing oneself in the world and creativity are the same. It may not be possible to know who you are without somehow expressing it.

worth noting the distinction between doubting the work and doubting yourself. An example of doubting the work would be, “I don’t know if my song is as good as it can be.” Doubting yourself might sound like, “I can’t write a good song.” These statements are worlds apart, both in accuracy and in impact on the nervous system. 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. If you have an imperfect version of a work you really love, you may find that when it finally seems perfect, you don’t love it in the same way. This is a sign the imperfect version was actually the one. The work is not about perfection.

If you know what you want to do and you do it, that’s the work of a craftsman. If you begin with a question and use it to guide an adventure of discovery, that’s the work of the artist.

The purpose of the work is to awaken something in you first, and then allow something to be awakened in others. And it’s fine if they’re not the same thing. We can only hope that the magnitude of the charge we experience reverberates as powerfully for others as it does for us.

It’s helpful to turn those voices down so you can hear the chimes of the cosmic clock ring, reminding you it’s time. Your time to participate.

To live as an artist is a way of being in the world. A way of perceiving. A practice of paying attention.

You work not as an evangelist, expecting miracles, but as a scientist, testing and adjusting and testing again. Experimenting and building on the results. Faith is rewarded, perhaps even more than talent or ability. After all, how can we offer the art what it needs without blind trust? We are required to believe in something that doesn’t exist in order to allow it to come into being.

Sharing art is the price of making it. Exposing your vulnerability is the fee.