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- All first drafts are shitđź’©
To do, not be
All of us who do creative work . . . we get into it because we have good taste. But it’s like there’s a gap, that for the first couple years that you’re making stuff, what you’re making isn’t so good . . . It’s really not that great. It’s trying to be good, it has ambition to be good, but it’s not quite that good. But your taste— the thing that got you into the game—your taste is still killer, and your taste is good enough that you can tell that what you’re making is kind of a disappointment to you.
It´s okay to suck…
As our stay on earth extends by the day, we start saving up, little by little, like money in the bank, little deposits of confidence in our mind.
Their purpose?
Well, in it´s most basic sense, it makes us feel good.
See, it´s no surprise that living on earth is a constant experience of pain surrounded by short and brief periods of happiness.
Now, don´t take this the wrong way, this is not an attempt to throw you into a spiral of existential crysis and ultimate depression, but rather an oversimplification of what life truly is.
Thus, as we navigate through the pain, we make the most out of what we can to extend our stay in happiness island.
This can come in a variety of presentations; short-lived like a good meal, or in the form of immediate satisfaction such as drugs.
Such is the job of this little deposits of confidence, to make us feel good.
Because our stay on earth ain’t free, and our time has got to be worth something right? Our minds says….
So this little deposits start building what we call ego.
Ego: A person’s sense of self-importance
As the dictionary’s definition clearly shows, ego is how much we think we’re worth, how important we are, or rather think we are.
The main problem though, is that ego is the antithesis of humility.
And since our ultimate goal is success; we tend to prioritize ego over being humble.
Why?
Unfortunately, we’re not sure humility can get us there…you know, to success.
We believe, as Reverend Dr. Sam Wells puts it;
“if we’re humble, we’ll end up subjugated, trodden on, embarassed and irrelevant.”
This is the thinking that creates the Faustian bargain that turns most clean ambition into shameless addiction.
And so we proced to have a debate about confidence regarding our skills, arriving to Ira Glass’s quote as presented above.
The Talent/Taste Gap.
And so we must prepare ourselves before trying, to take as a certainty that, as Ernest Hemingway put’s it:
The first draft of anything is shit.
We musn’t seek comfort in ego.
We must face our truths and identify our points of weakness. And put the work in to bridge in that gap.
Because what comes next is going to test you in ways that you cannot begin to understand. For ego is a wicked sister of success. And you’re about to experience what that means.
To do, not be
Prioritize action above all.
And understand that time provides skill, all it requires is to try…