For centuries, historians believed the great Renaissance master was just another Starving Artist, struggling to make ends meet. Michelangelo himself embraced this image, living frugally and often complaining about money. He once wrote in a poem that his art had left him “poor, old and working as a servant of others.”
But it turns out he wasn’t telling the truth.
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I’ve often wondered what would it be like to be a nomad and travel the world. I did this for a brief time in my early 20s and then stopped, and recently I’ve been falling back in love with travel. I’ve bumped into some really interesting people who have traveled the world. I’ve learned that travel is not so much about the places you go or the people you meet, but instead, it’s about the person you become.
“Just be yourself” is probably the worst advice we could ever receive or give. Few of us actually know who we really are. And yet, if we can acquire this art of self-awareness, everything changes.
Recently while speaking onstage, I heard myself say something I didn’t plan on saying. I didn’t rehearse it. I didn’t have it in my notes. It just came out. The line was: “Sometimes, the good has to end before the better can begin.”
The best marketing you can do for your work is not to build an empire, but to find a few friends who care. We all want to reach the masses and see our work get into the mainstream. We want to have an “impact.” But the only way to reach the many is to first reach the few.
This is all marketing is: Finding a handful of misfits who appreciate your work before anyone else does, then giving those people the tools to help spread the message. The way we get a Harry Potter, Apple Computer, or Amanda Palmer is not by trying to reach everyone all at once. Quite the opposite in fact.
Whether you want to write books, make art, or share your music with the world, having an email list of fans is a must. Email is the most effective way to communicate with your people.
It’s one thing to understand the importance of email marketing and quite another to actually build an email list that allows you to reach a large audience.
Some fads have come and gone and come back again. And some have stayed gone. But do you know what has always remained? Email.
You need an email list. It’s just that simple. If you want to write a book that sells thousands of copies or more, you need people paying attention to your work. If you want your message to spread, you need people’s permission to communicate with them. And if you want your words to change something, then you need an audience.
Is it possible to live a life on your own terms? Can you do what you want even when it defies the expectations of others? Is the way you’re living right now a story that others would want to tell? And how do you do all this with bills to pay and responsibilities to manage?
One question I keep hearing is: What’s your favorite writing tool? It’s always good to ask what’s working for someone, but this question represents a popular misconception about creative work.
Bestselling author and creativity expert Jeff Goins dismantles the myth that being creative is a hindrance to success by revealing how an artistic temperament is, in fact, a competitive advantage in the marketplace.
For centuries, the myth of the starving artist has dominated our culture, seeping into the minds of creative people and stifling their pursuits. But the truth is that the world’s most successful artists did not starve. In fact, they capitalized on the power of their creative strength. In Real Artists Don’t Starve, Jeff Goins debunks the myth of the starving artist by unveiling the ideas that created it and replacing them with fourteen rules for artists to thrive.
