Category: Creator Confidential
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Instinct
Instinct is an incredible tool for entrepreneurs and artists. If you’re in the early stages of doing something that’s heading in the direction you intended, you’ll feel the momentum. Maybe you tell your friends about it, and they approach you with an opportunity to do business together. Or you’re tapping into a new source of…
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“Will it work?”
There’s really no certainty that anything you actually want to do is going to work. The only way to really find out—to get a real answer that matters—is to do it. Whatever you’re trying out, treat it like a pilot project. You’re just investigating to see if it’ll work. I like to move fast on…
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What’s your signature?
I recently came across Virgil Abloh’s lecture at Harvard once again. In particular, I liked his examination of his own personal design language; he says, “Your brain will tell you when something’s finished. And then post-rationalize. Make up something afterwards, or whatever.” That’s pretty much how he developed his design language: Readymade – new idea…
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72 seasons
An ancient Japanese calendar marked time in 72 seasons, ushering in a new season approximately every 5 days. That probably sounds strange to me and you, because we’re so used to thinking of seasons in 3 month increments. (Actually in Toronto it’s more like two seasons and 6 month increments…you get the idea.) Time is…
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Each work is a gamble
From the point of view of one who creates, everything is a gamble, a leap into the unknown. Kusama, Yayoi. Infinity Net: The Autobiography of Yayoi Kusama (p. 37). Tate Enterprises Ltd. Kindle Edition. See printing lottery tickets, the social media lottery.
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Side projects open doors
When I was a student, I had no idea how I was going to get a job. In order to get a job, I needed to have experience; in order to get experience, I needed to have a job. Any internship worth getting also seemed to require working experience. Or so I thought. One of…
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Work isn’t meant to be escaped
Entrepreneur Curtis Jackson, also known as recording artist 50 Cent, writes in Hustle Harder, Hustle Smarter: One of the most important realizations I came to early in my business career is that I’m running through an endless tunnel. What I mean by that is I came to understand that there’s no “happily ever after.” No…
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Katsushika Hokusai, drawing on the floor
Yesterday, I visited the Sumida Hokusai Museum. One thing that stood out to me was his rather modest studio; there was a replica in the museum. Hokusai drew on the ground! Creativity is not about the tools, it’s not about breaking through constraints; it’s about working with what you’ve got. I didn’t take a photo…
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Breaking the curse of perspective
It’s so easy to spot other people’s blind spots, and it’s incredibly difficult to spot your own. Sometimes, that’s because we’re effectively blind to it; our perspective of the world doesn’t allow us to see what’s really happening. Other times, it’s because we don’t want to see it; our perspective of the world protects us…
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Sold out
When you know that you’re not able to get something, you want to know why. Even when you had absolutely no interest in the first place. Scarcity is extremely effective. (It’s the fundamental principle of hype culture.) If the seller ran out of a product, that must mean a lot of people bought it, which…