The 50th Law - 50 Cent [78]
ATTUNE YOURSELF TO THE DETAILS
As a young student-artist in late fifteenth-century Italy, Michelangelo had to confront a personal limitation. He had grand concepts of things he wanted to paint and sculpt, but not the requisite skill. He looked at the masterpieces of other artists and wanted his own work to have a similar aura and effect, but he was frustrated at the flatness and conventionality of what he created. He tried an experiment: he began to copy his favorite masterworks down to the smallest brush stroke, and he discovered that the effect he had so admired was embedded in certain details—the way these artists were able to make figures or landscapes come to life by their intense attention to the fine points. And so began a remarkable apprenticeship to his craft that would last the rest of his life and completely alter his way of thinking.
In creating his sculptures, he became obsessed with bone structure, but the books and techniques on the subject seemed woefully inadequate. He started dissecting human corpses, one after another. This gave him a profound feel for human anatomy that he could now reproduce in his work. He developed an interest in texture, how each kind of fabric would fold in its own way. He worked on perfecting his reproduction of clothes. He extended these studies of detail to animals and how they moved. When he was commissioned to do his larger pieces, he avoided that old temptation of beginning with some grand concept—instead he looked at the material he was to work with, the space, the individual figures that might comprise it, and from there he would conceive the overall shape and effect. In this intense attention to detail, Michelangelo seemed to have discovered the secret for making his figures come to life in a way that exceeded any other artist of his time.
Often when you begin a project of any kind, it is from the wrong end. You tend to think first of what you want to accomplish, imagining the glory and money it will bring you if it succeeds. You then proceed to make this concept come to life. But as you go forward you often lose patience, because the small steps to get there are not nearly as exciting as the ambitious visions in your head. You must try instead the opposite approach, which can lead to very different results. You have a project you wish to bring to life, but you begin by immersing yourself in the details of the subject or field. You look at the materials you have to work with, the tastes of your target audience, and the latest technical advances in the field. You take pleasure in going deeper and deeper into these fine points—your research is intense. From this knowledge, you shape the project itself, grounding it in reality rather than in airy concepts in your head. Operating this way helps you slow your mind down and develop patience for detailed work, an essential skill for mastering any craft.
REDISCOVER YOUR NATURAL PERSISTENCE
This is the dilemma we all face: to accomplish anything worthwhile in life generally takes some time—often in blocks of years. But we are creatures who find it very hard to manage such long periods. We are immersed in the day-to-day; our emotions fluctuate with each encounter. We have immediate desires we are constantly working to satisfy. In that long period of time that we need to reach a goal, we are assailed by a thousand distractions and temptations that seem more interesting. We lose sight of our objectives and end up following some detour. This is the source of so many of the failures in our lives.
To force yourself past any obstacle or temptation, you must be persistent. As children we all had this quality because