Here a short-form daily blog post with random topics on creativity and the creative process.

Things I read: at the moment, I am reading “SHOW YOUR WORK” by Austin Kleon. The book is small and inspirational, and talks about 10 ways to share your creativity.

Under #1: you don’t have to be a genius, Austin talks about how we may be revealed as “amateurs”. However, the amateur, who pursues her work in the spirit of love (amateur means lover) often has an advantage over the professional. Now I personally still work professionally, so am in between worlds, but the majority of my work these days is personal.

Austin cites the Zen monk Shunryu Suzuki who said: “In the beginner’s mind, there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind, there are a few.”

And once you have seemingly mastered a craft, whether you are a pro or a highly accomplished “amateur”/enthusiast, we become more afriad of making mistakes.

So, we should pursue art with a beginner’s mind! We should not be afraid of making mistakes, and we should take risks.

(The image is from my first roll of TriX 400 from about a year ago – there is heavy reticulation, some sort of defect. Probably user error in development.)