Linchpin_ Are You Indispensable_ - Seth Godin [43]
imperatives force you to surrender in your quest to deliver art that matters?
Was Harper Lee born to write To Kill a Mockingbird? Is there some combination of
genetic gifts and parental nudging that created the perfect opportunity for her to generate
such a monumental piece of art?
Let's go back to the beginning of this book.
Everyone, every single person, has been a genius at least once. Everyone has winged it,
invented, and created their way out of a jam at least once.
If you can do it once, you can do it again.
Art, at least art as I define it, is the intentional act of using your humanity to create a
change in another person. How and where you do that art is a cultural choice in the
moment. No one wrote novels a thousand years ago. No one made videos thirty years
ago. No one Twittered poetry three years ago.
There's no doubt that certain sorts of art are easier to create. A warm smile to a stranger
on an airplane at the right moment is an artistic endeavor that's fairly easy for most of us
to muster. Directing an Academy Award-winning film, on the other hand, is reserved for
a select few. I'll accept the fact that great novelists are born and made. But I don't believe
that you need to be an outlier to be an artist.
I'm not so interested in pushing you to become a brilliant filmmaker. I'm very passionate
about exploring why you are so afraid about creating art that is actually within your
grasp.
Why didn't you speak up at the meeting yesterday? When you had a chance to reach out
and interact with a co-worker in a way that would have changed everything, what held
you back? That proposal for a new project that's been sitting on your hard drive for a year
. . .
Why aren't all waiters amazingly great at being waiters?
I think it's fear, and I think we're even afraid to talk about this sort of fear. Fear of art. Of
being laughed at. Of standing out and of standing for something.
Now, though, the economy is forcing us to confront this fear. The economy is ruthlessly
punishing the fearful, and increasing the benefits to the few who are brave enough to
create art and generous enough to give it away.
THE RESISTANCE
"Real Artists Ship"
When Steve Jobs said that, he was calling the bluff of a recalcitrant engineer who
couldn't let go of some code. But this three-word mantra goes deeper than that. Poet
Bruce Ario said, "Creativity is an instinct to produce."
And that's the art we care about.
Andy Hertzfeld, one of the fathers of the Mac, contributed to a diary about the launch of
the original Mac, the computer that changed everything. He wrote, "The sun had already
risen and the software team finally began to scatter and go home to collapse. We weren't
sure if we were finished or not, and it felt really strange to have nothing to do after
working so hard for so long. Instead of going home, Donn Denman and I sat on a couch
in the lobby in a daze and watched the accounting and marketing people trickling into
work around 7:30 a.m. or so. We must have been quite a sight; everybody could tell that
we had been there all night (actually, I hadn't been home or showered for three days)." In
that moment, Andy felt like an artist. He had shipped.
Artists don't think outside the box, because outside the box there's a vacuum. Outside of
the box there are no rules, there is no reality. You have nothing to interact with, nothing
to work against. If you set out to do something way outside the box (designing a time
machine, or using liquid nitrogen to freeze Niagara Falls), then you'll never be able to do
the real work of art. You can't ship if you're far outside the box.
Artists think along the edges of the box, because that's where things get done. That's
where the audience is, that's where the means of production are available, and that's
where you can make an impact.
Shipping isn't focused on producing a masterpiece (but all master-pieces get shipped).
I've produced more than a hundred books (most didn't sell very well), but if I hadn't, I'd
never