A reflection on writing applicable to any creative enterprise:

"… that’s what art is for—for both reader and writer to overcome their respective limitations and encounter something true. It seems miraculous, doesn’t it? That somebody can articulate something clearly and beautifully that exists inside you, something shrouded in impenetrable fog. Great art reaches through the fog, towards this secret heart—and it shows it to you, holds it before you. It’s a revelatory, incredibly moving experience when this happens. You feel understood. You feel heard. That’s why we come to art—we feel less alone. We are less alone. You see, through art, that others have felt the way you have…"

                                                            novelist Khaled Hosseini from his meditation on writing

It has to be drawn well enough, not perfectly.  

No one goes to a rock concert because the band is in tune. They have to be close enough to not be distracting, but being in tune isn't the point.  No one buys a house because every floorboard is hammered in at the six sigma level of perfection. They have to be good enough, and better than good enough is just fine, but perfect isn't something that's going to overwhelm location, beauty, peace of mind and price.

As creators, our pursuit of perfection might be misguided, particularly if it comes at the expense of the things that matter.

                                                                                                    Seth Godin

“Everything has its testing point in the eye, and the eye is an organ that eventually involves the whole personality, and as much of the world as can be got into it.”

                                                                                                        Flannery O'Connor

I'm always looking for, and finding, parallels between writing, photographing, painting, making music … etc., and recently came across this observation that is true of most creative endeavors –– it is in the act of creation that we are most fully present:

We are all unsure of ourselves. Every one of us walking the planet wonders, secretly, if we are getting it wrong. We stumble along. We love and we lose. At times, we find unexpected strength, and at other times, we succumb to our fears. We are impatient. We want to know what’s around the corner, and the writing life won’t offer us this. It forces us into the here and now. There is only this moment…

Dani Shapiro  "Still Writing: The Pleasures and Perils of a Creative Life"

Came across this interesting excerpt from the book Intuition Pumps and Other Tools For Thinking by Daniel Dennett:

The chief trick to making good mistakes is not to hide them — especially not from yourself. Instead of turning away in denial when you make a mistake, you should become a connoisseur of your own mistakes, turning them over in your mind as if they were works of art, which in a way they are. … The trick is to take advantage of the particular details of the mess you’ve made, so that your next attempt will be informed by it and not just another blind stab in the dark.

In a NY TIMES op-ed, "Homage to the Idols of Idleness", Jessica Kerwin Jenkins explores how clocks may be keeping us from experiencing the benefits of unstructured time –– here's an excerpt:

… for artists, doing nothing was a fount of freedom. [Robert Louis] Stevenson … raised a rallying cry with his 1876 screed, “An Apology for Idlers,” diagnosing extreme busyness as “a symptom of deficient vitality.” In the 20th century, Marcel Duchamp was so often found soaking in the tub at the center of his studio that he had a hanging rope installed that allowed him to open the front door without ever getting up. “Deep down I’m enormously lazy,” he said. “I like living, breathing, better than working.” (The French writer Henri-Pierre Roché said of his friend that Duchamp’s “finest work is his use of time.” Duchamp agreed.)

A recent post on Brain Pickings presents excerpts from Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life, including this wonderfully instructive snippet that one could argue is true for all creative endeavors:

In order to be a writer, you have to learn to be reverent. If not, why are you writing? Why are you here? … Think of reverence as awe, as presence in and openness to the world. Think of those times when you’ve read prose or poetry that is presented in such a way that you have a fleeting sense of being startled by beauty or insight, by a glimpse into someone’s soul. All of a sudden everything seems to fit together or at least to have some meaning for a moment. This is our goal as writers, I think; to help others have this sense of — please forgive me — wonder, of seeing things anew, things that can catch us off guard, that break in on our small, bordered worlds. When this happens, everything feels more spacious.

Another excerpt from a recent interview with National Geographic photographer Steve McCurry:

In this genre of street photography you're present in the moment. That's kind of a cliche perhaps, but your mind is occupied by the here and now. The sounds, the smells — you can really look and see things for what they are. When was the last time you went out for a walk for its own sake without an agenda?

From an interview with National Geographic photographer Steve McCurry:

Has gear choice become more of an issue?

I don't want to get too technical. I hate all of that.  "…whatever one wants to do to achieve what they want to do with photography — whether it's pinhole or a Leica or an 8×10 view camera or whatever. It's your work. It's like a poem. You put the poem on the table and you read it and no one is going to ask you if you typed it or wrote it out long hand. No one cares how long it took or how many re-drafts you did. How many pictures did you shoot? It doesn't matter. The proof is the final print."

It’s not the eyes. Anybody can see that has eyes to see. It’s what we feel and what we get out of the heart that matters. We have to convey a passion. We have to convey an understanding.

                                                                                                                Photographer John Free