Is your art important? The answer is a hand-wavy-shoulder-shrugging “kind of.”

Maybe you really are writing the next Harry Potter. Your work could become important to millions of people all over the word. That would be pretty damn cool.

But if our plane goes down on a desert island, we’ll need to use your manuscript to feed the fire. We’d chuck your art in the flames without a second thought.

So, at the most basic level, your art is profoundly unimportant.

It’s just paper, words, paint, clay, wood, whatever.

If that’s all art is, why do so many artists take their art so seriously?

It’s because too many artists view their art as a reflection of their self-worth.

Our identity gets all snarled up in our latest attempt at creating great art. When your art is a belly flop, do you ever infer the following?

“I’m a failure, and I’ll always be a failure.”
“I’m no good at this, and I’ll never be good at this.”
“It didn’t work today, and it won’t work tomorrow.”

Sure, your thoughts sound more sophisticated, but the take home message is the same.

Herein lies the paradox: by taking art less seriously, the process of creating art becomes easier. When every stroke of the paintbrush isn’t a direct reflection of your self-worth, more painting gets done. More art gets made.

The archetype of the brooding, tortured artist needs to die. Perhaps, on a desert island somewhere, because she refused to burn her manuscript.

Allow me to take the lead:

I am a writer. I arrange words in a different order than other people choose to. No more, no less.

What do you do?

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