How To Enjoy The Process

“Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and get to work. If you wait around for the clouds to part and a bolt of [lightning] to strike you in the brain, you are not going to make an awful lot of work. All the best ideas come out of the process; they come out of the work itself.” 

— Chuck Close, artist

Set aside time for experiments . Straightforward calculus suggests that doing what you’re already good at has the best payoff. But you won’t encounter nearly as many opportunities if you never learn anything new. Setting aside time for hobbies you’re bad at, books you know nothing about or skills you’ve never practiced may seem wasteful, but it’s

... See more

The modern man thinks that everything ought to be done for the sake of something else, and never for its own sake.

Can you learn to enjoy the process as the end in itself, not the means?

In the beginning, the dissonance between the scale of your aspirations and the reality of your days will riddle you with anxiety. You will be tempted to strip the unknown of its surprises and travel to the future: What if my customers churn? What if a competitor introduces a... See more

My entire philosophy of how I organize myself as a working painter can be summed up by something George Carlin said: “Just keep movin’ straight ahead. Every now and then you find yourself in a different place.”

You hear a lot in art school about how painters must continue to “grow” and “evolve”—but I think those are such bullshit words. There is... See more

I am aware that I shouldn’t judge how people try to escape the 9-to-5 grind. I am aware that a job’s purpose is money, not emotional enrichment. I know!

What I am instead arguing for is something more expansive. The thing you should work hard at is everything . Finding ways to imbue each moment with meaning and purpose and effort is the only path... See more