A wonderful flaw about human beings is that we’re incapable of making perfect copies. Our failure to copy our heroes is where we discover where our o… - Austin Kleon

Our failure to copy our heroes is where we discover where our own thing lives. That is how we evolve.

That, in a way, is very much how I feel about my life,” she said. “Whether it will ever be recognizable by anyone else I don’t know, but I feel that great new things are happening very quietly inside me. And I know these things have a way, like the maple tree, of finally bursting out in some form.” For Kent, the tree came to represent creativity itself. Like a tree, creative work has seasons. Part of the work is to know which season you’re in, and act accordingly. In winter, “the tree looks dead, but we know it is beginning a very deep process, out of which will come spring and summer.

If you’re out of ideas, wash the dishes. Take a really long walk. Stare at a spot on the wall for as long as you can. As the artist Maira Kalman says, “Avoiding work is the way to focus my mind.

In the old days, a logbook was a place for sailors to keep track of how far they’d traveled, and that’s exactly what you’re doing — keeping track of how far your ship has sailed.