On excellence
What I did not account for was how my expectations would scale alongside my experience. As I got better at writing weekly pieces, I began to demand more of myself. I did not want to write as good a piece as I had written the week or month before but a considerably better one. In the quest to do that, I expanded the scope of my work. I found new
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“I’m sure there’s mottos I could say that would be aspirational mottos, but the real one is ‘If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well.’ From being in sports to going to school to being in product, in my opinion, if you’re going to do something, do it to the best of your ability, because that’s what you do with your day. You spend so much time
... See more“Discipline is not a lack of freedom, it is a harmonious relationship with time.”
— Rick Rubin, The Creative Act
The very best don’t have to turn it on. It’s always on. They have to turn it off. via Farnam St
'I have enormous respect for my art as an art and my craft as a craft, for skill, for experience, for hard thought, for painstaking work. I hold those things in reverence. I respect commas far more than I do congressmen.
[…]
Revision clears unnecessary obstacles away so the reader can receive the story. That is why the comma is important. And why the
... See more“Once I went to a new dentist and he said, “That crown is beautiful. Which dentist did it?“ Most people wouldn’t think dentistry is art. But there’s opportunity for je ne sais quoi in every field.”
— Wesk Kao, Turning a yellow spot into the sun
Ad legend Bill Bernbach letter on creativity, written in 1947:
Dear ________:
Our agency is getting big. That’s something to be happy about. But it’s something to worry about, too, and I don’t mind telling you I’m damned worried. I’m worried that we’re going to fall into the trap of bigness, that we’re going to worship techniques instead of
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