Category: Creator Confidential
-
What can you point to?
In Studs Terkel’s Working, a steel mill worker named Mike Lefevre says, “Picasso can point to a painting. What can I point to? A writer can point to a book. Everybody should have something to point to.” Sometimes, the work isn’t as concrete as a building. If your contribution was suggesting a change in direction…
-
Stopping
Yesterday, I wrote a response to the question, “How do you do it all?” and this is one of Seth Godin’s techniques that I am still learning: he stops. Even when there’s every reason not to stop. A couple of years ago, Seth Godin stopped working on his podcast, Akimbo. He says, “I stopped not…
-
Doing it all
A new friend recently asked, “You’ve written a book, you write a blog every day, you work at Figma. How do you do it all?” I remember that I have also asked questions like this. Here’s my method: Priority: I try to maintain a clear sense of what is most important that day, and overall.…
-
Effective first
An effective first approach prioritizes getting your work done (feeding your family, achieving your goal, helping a friend, etc.), within the boundaries of your values and ethics. When you work from a stance of effective first, you prioritize doing the real thing. You tell people about what you’re doing. Through this doing, you get the…
-
Your craft and your business model
If you’re doing something creative, you’re going to have to make a decision at some point: Are you going to try to apply your craft into a structurally difficult business model? Or are you going to find a different—less prestigious, less crowded, easier—business model to apply your craft? In writing, the decision is to spend…
-
On franchises
When you make something on the internet, you’re best off making something that stands out. Even if you follow someone else’s template or structure, you want to put your own little twist on it—so that it cuts through the noise, but also so that people know that you made it. You do this by following…
-
What if that’s what it takes?
In the 1990s, Jay Jenkins started his first record label. He had signed artists to record, but they weren’t following through on their commitments. Things were falling apart. When his friend told him, “You might as well do it yourself,” Jay’s first thought was, “I’m not a rapper, I’m a hustler.” In his book, Adversity…
-
The pressure sweet spot
There are things you know you are capable of, and there are things you’re not sure about. You might have a decades-long habit of brushing your teeth, so you don’t feel pressure when someone asks you if you can brush your teeth. By contrast, the things you’re not sure about are less certain. For example,…
-
“Please make some noise!”
You’ll often hear a recording artist, or their hype person, say this at a show. When people make noise, it’s easier for the artist to believe that everyone there is interested in what they’re doing, and to bring 100% to the performance. This creates a self-fulfilling prophecy; the audience, in turn, is energized by the…
-
Success vs. happiness
You suffer. You know you are capable of something great, and yet it feels like nobody sees that. Maybe it’s depression, or pain of another sort. It feels like there’s a hole inside of you. You think you can fill this hole by pursuing your art and achieving success. This goal gives you hope, motivation,…