Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about a time in my life when I felt wasteful, uninspired and lacking in any sort of creative energy. It wasn’t so bad at the time, but looking back, I can see how I was turning my back on myself. By being afraid to do something wrong or look bad, I was denying myself any sort of creative fulfilment. I can’t say that I’m creatively fulfilled now (maybe I won’t/shouldn’t ever be?) but I’m thinking about how it looks and feels and working towards it.
I’m also not as afraid to fckk up. I mean, I don’t want to do it wrong, but if I do, I’ll acknowledge it and make it right or do it better. I’m constantly striving to find ways to do things better and be better at what I do.
So in light of that, I offer you today five people I’m finding inspiration in these days.
Enjoy and happy weekend.
1
We went to see Mark Lanegan last weekend in town and he absolutely blew us away. The show was incredible, the encore was I think five or six songs. This was definitely the favourite of the night. I will say one thing though, Mark, those blue and red lights you love so much are a pure pain to photograph in. I suppose you know that though, crafty fecker.
I came across this article during the week, an interview with Ultimate Guitar and I really liked this sentiment:
….enjoy the process of creation, the process of playing, and I always try to take any of the extremeness sh-t that comes from music out of the picture. In other words, if I never made a cent, if nobody ever listened to me, I would still play music and I would still enjoy it because the music is its own reward.
It’s also worth nothing that the guy openly admits to not being able to play the guitar with any sort of competency. It’s nice to know that such an incredible musician is so honest about a lack of skill or talent.
2
You ever heard of The Talks? It’s a great little website with short and snappy interviews with some very interesting people. Worth dipping into every now and again.
Anyway, I really liked this interview with Chuck Palahniuk. An interesting insight into his process.
my life has been about living like a lump and looking like a priest so that people will come up to me and tell me their most appalling stories. They have to make their confession to somebody, and it might as well be me.
3
I’ve been a little bit in awe of Casey Neistat ever since I came across the video of his Wildly Functional Studio.
This story is entitled Work hard + Be brave
Do more.
4
I know I just shared an article about this video last week, but the whole story is really captivating me.
Artists and entertainers are always so quick to court controversy, there’s no such thing as bad publicity and all that. But I feel like these three incredible artists are not doing it for the publicity. They’re not trying to ‘break the internet’, they’re trying to make art in popular culture and the visceral vulnerability is tough to swallow. Article here in i-D’s website.Â
5
I’ve been re-reading REWORK by Jason Friedman lately. If you’re interested in setting up in business, or even just in how people think/work, it’s well worth the read.
I found this interview with The Great Discontent from a while back. Have a read if you’re into it.
I think I’m creative in the sense that I don’t accept the way things are. Instead, I think about better ways to do things.
I feel very free, but I’m also always slightly frustrated with the fact that there are more ideas and more things I want to do, but can’t because I don’t have time or knowledge to do them yet.
Who inspires you? Who makes you think about the way you think or create or act?
Tell me in the comments, I’d love to get into a discussion on this.
Éadaoin