For those of us who love to create, it is easy to get discouraged when we get in a slump. We look at the production line and see the belt has stopped rolling. Discouragement begins to creep in. But could it be that we are allowing quantity to be the real measure of our creative process?
This applies to so much of what we do on any given day. It could be painting, designing, writing a blog or a poem or a song, taking a photo, sharing words of hope with a friend, making a dinner, giving anything of ourselves to someone else.
This brilliant quote by poet laureate Amanda Gorman caused me to stop and think about my own discouragement. It speaks to the possible mindset behind it.
“I think if I could go back in time and give myself a message, it would be to reiterate that my value as an artist doesn’t come from how much I create. I think that mindset is yoked to capitalism. Being an artist is about how and why you touch people’s lives, even if it’s one person. Even if that’s yourself, in the process of art making.”
Amanda Gorman, Poet, NYT Arts and Leisure, 3.14.2021
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