We Are Deluded By Inspiration
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All too often, we're paralyzed by this delusion that is inspiration.
We harbor grand ambitions, our dreams to 'be' what we aspire to be. But our movement towards those goals remains stalled, as we wait.
For inspiration. For motivation. For some exogenous force to provide us with the impetus to change, act and transform.
More often than not, we keep waiting. And waiting. And waiting.
And the role that could have blended our creative and commercial desires goes unfulfilled. While the artist who could have produced a masterpiece remains closeted in her mental cubicle. Or the book that lies within each and every one of us remains unwritten.
Waiting for, depending on, inspiration to strike is not a reliable proposition.
It's an excuse.
The reality is that action, activity, movement (of any kind) is the driver for us to achieve whatever it is that we want to achieve.
Action drives progress, however minimal. It ensures learning, change, progress.
Because if we aren't doing, then, by definition, nothing is happening. If we aren't doing anything, then we aren't being exposed to the opportunities, places and people that will push us even further along in our quest.
The artist, Chuck Close, put it well:
“Inspiration is for amateurs; the rest of us just show up and get to work. If you wait around for the clouds to part and a bolt of lightning to strike you in the brain, you are not going to make an awful lot of work. All the best ideas come out of the process; they come out of the work itself. Things occur to you. If you're sitting around trying to dream up a great art idea, you can sit there a long time before anything happens. But if you just get to work, something will occur to you and something else will occur to you and something else that you reject will push you in another direction. Inspiration is absolutely unnecessary and somehow deceptive. You feel like you need this great idea before you can get down to work, and I find that's almost never the case.”
One line stands out in there:
Inspiration is absolutely unnecessary and somehow deceptive.
The key, therefore, is movement. Any movement. Any action. Any activity that moves you forward.
Let's get going.
