It’s About Doing and Experience
All art comes from love – love of doing something.
Jerry Saltz, How to be an Artist
This is the hard part. I want to be instantly amazing at something or I take it as a sign that I’m not good at it and I should give up. Art, especially what I want to be good at, doesn’t work that way.
I love writing. I love standup. I love making silly things. But I also love making plans and not actually doing them. I love naps and watching Disney+. I love talking to my friends and going to comedy shows. I love not doing anything as much as I love doing something.
Maybe, just maybe, I can just do something because I love it and not (just) because I want to be good at it. Nothing wrong with playing to my strengths, I guess. I want to do good work, but there are lots of things I’m good at that I know I could go the rest of my life without ever doing again.
Sometimes writing is like dragging dead weight through waist-high sludge. I wouldn’t give it up for anything.
Even if we’re in agony while working, it’s still some kind of love that drives us on against the current.
Jerry Saltz, How to be an Artist