Why are we so obsessed with finding the right choice?
The right idea.
The right color.
The right word.
The right melody.
In the creative process, it’s as if we want certainty before commitment.
But our work typically reveals itself when we have the courage to walk up to the door and enter it.
We can’t think our way into a painting we haven’t painted.
We can’t edit a sentence we refuse to write.
We can’t adjust a note we never play.
Sometimes the next step is hidden because the current step hasn’t happened yet.
The road on our creative journey only appears after we start walking.
While I’m writing these notes on creativity, I decide what sentence to write next…
And with every new sentence, the entire message changes.
And so every sentence creates a problem.
A tension I need to resolve.
But that problem creates another decision.
And that decision creates another problem.
Eventually, there is a complete note I’m proud to share with you.
We call our finished things a “masterpiece.”
But while it was being made, it was mostly a series of problems.
Great work is just a beautiful history of solved mistakes.
And so our best work isn’t about knowing exactly what to do, when to do it.
It’s embracing whatever happens and trusting ourself to work with it.
That’s creative confidence in its purest form.
To create one thing, you must kill a thousand possibilities.
The first sentence kills every book that could’ve started differently.
The first note kills every song that could’ve sounded like something else.
The first brushstroke destroys the perfect blank canvas forever.
Creation is not only addition.
Creation is the courage to exclude.
Every yes is surrounded by thousands of quiet no’s.
And sometimes we’re so distracted grieving everything we didn’t choose that we ignore the beauty and potential in the choices we’ve made.
So make the choice. And then make the best of it.
In art and in life, I’m starting to believe that wisdom isn’t always knowing which road leads to the best outcome.
Wisdom may be understanding that no road is ever complete.
We participate in what the road becomes.
We choose the person. Then we learn how to love.
We choose the craft. Then we give decades to it.
We choose the city. Then we build a home there.
We choose the idea. Then we keep returning until it’s brought to life.
And so identify the single action that will get the ball rolling.
Take that first step.
Because every meaningful life contains a leap.
A brush stroke. A sentence.
A proposal. A resignation.
A plane ticket. A dream.
A frightening yes. A necessary no.
An end. A beginning.
If you feel a calling echoing deep in your soul…
Answer it.
You do not need to know that every decision is the best.
You need enough courage to find out what happens if you give it your all.
And one day, you will look behind you and see something you could never have planned.
A body of work.
A friendship.
A family.
A life.
Beauty built from hundreds of unsure decisions.
Stay creative,