“Art is a personal act of courage, something one human does that creates change in another.” — Seth Godin
We’re all artists, but we’ve forgotten that deep sense of creation.
Think back to your earliest years. If you were given paper, glue, paint or whatever medium was the order of the day, and asked to create, you did.
You didn’t think about it.
You created — pure and simple.
Thankfully, your undeveloped Lizard Brain didn’t intervene.
If you’re lucky, and you continue the art trajectory, you hold on to that delicious feeling of aliveness in and through your art. I’m not saying that all artists or even all people who operate in a creative space aren’t alive to anything more than production, but, certainly, the few artists I know or have experience of are still connected to their childish ways.
Imagine then if we could find that level of connection with our work. The world would look a very different place. Actually, I find it almost impossible to conceive of a world where people came to work and were engaged that deeply. My experience of work — 35 years and counting — suggests to me that everyone is disengaged and see ‘work’ as no more than a means of production. There are exceptions but they are few and very far between. And the situation is getting worse with (in my humble opinion) the prevalence of bullshit and batshit jobs.
There’s still time, I hope, to arrest the decline particularly or more especially because I’d like to think we can bring back the joy of creation when we marry the preservation of the planet with what we do. Yes, that represents a huge leap of faith but the more I talk to people about their work and saving the world, the more I’m convinced that art is the holy grail.
Photo by JR Korpa on Unsplash