Rick Rubin Quotes

Sometimes the most valuable touch a collaborator can have is no touch at all.

In Japanese pottery, there’s an artful form of repair called kintsugi. When a piece of ceramic pottery breaks, rather than trying to restore it to its original condition, the artisan accentuates the fault by using gold to fill the crack. This beautifully draws attention to where the work was broken, creating a golden vein. Instead of the flaw diminishing the work, it becomes a focal point, an area of both physical and aesthetic strength. The scar also tells the story of the piece, chronicling its past experience.

Art doesn’t get made on the clock. But it can get finished on the clock.

If you’ve truly created an innovative work, it’s likely to alienate as many people as it attracts. The best art divides the audience. If everyone likes it, you probably haven’t gone far enough.

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

There doesn’t need to be a purpose guiding what we choose to make.

Intention is all there is. The work is just a reminder. Rules A rule is any guiding principle or creative criterion.

If any distractions come along during that period, don’t ignore them or focus on them. Don’t give them any energy at all. Let them pass, like clouds parting around a mountain. Regularly engaging in this practice builds the muscle of focused intention, which you can use in everything you do. Eventually, tuning out the undermining voices and losing yourself in the work will not be an effort of will, but an earned ability.

The bee is simply being.

Beware of the assumption that the way you work is the best way simply because it’s the way you’ve done it before.

The outcome is not the outcome. The darkness is not an end point, nor is the daylight. They live in a continually unfolding, mutually dependent cycle. Neither is bad or good. They simply exist.

The word comes from the Latin — inspirare, meaning to breathe in or blow into.
For the lungs to draw in air, they must first be emptied. For the mind to draw inspiration, it wants space to welcome the new. The universe seeks balance. Through this absence, you are inviting energy in.

A rule is any guiding principle or creative criterion. It might exist within the artist, the genre, or the culture. Rules, by their nature, are limitations.

As children, we experience much less interference between receiving ideas and internalizing them. We accept new information with delight instead of making comparisons to what we already believe; we live in the moment rather than worrying about future consequences; we are spontaneous more than analytical; we are curious, not jaded. Even the most ordinary experiences in life are met with a sense of awe. Deep sadness and intense excitement can come within moments of each other. There’s no facade and no attachment to a story.

Our life’s work is far greater than any individual container. The works we do are at most chapters. There will always be a new chapter, and another after that. Though some might be better than others, that is not our concern. Our objective is to be free to close one chapter and move on to the next, and to continue that process for as long as it pleases us.