Make Mistakes
Make interesting, amazing, glorious, fantastic mistakes.
Break rules.
Leave the world more interesting for your being here.
Make good art.
— Neil Gaiman, Art Matters, “Make Good Art”
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, March 19, 2020
Category: Life
10 Posts
Stories
In my current less-young age, I’ve learned that almost more than anything, stories hold us together. Stories teach us what is important about life, why we are here and how it is best to behave, and that inside us we have access to treasure, in memories and observations, in imagination.
— Anne Lamott, Almost Everything, p. 179
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, February 20, 2019
A Happy Life
No one has a greater impact on our joy than we do. While all the factors affecting joy are not within our reach, it’s helpful to act as if they are. Until we start reaching for joy in all circumstances, we’ll have no idea how happy we can be. Much more of our happiness rests with us than we tend to believe. Taking full responsibility for our emotional state is itself a powerful step toward joy.
With all of life’s various moods and seasons, a happy day may not always be attainable. But a happy life is. By acting as if happiness is always within our grasp, we put ourselves in the best position to live happily.
— Mike Mason, Champagne for the Soul, p. 156
Make Good Art
Life is sometimes hard.
Things go wrong, in life and in love and in business and in friendship and in health and in all the other ways that life can go wrong.
And when things get tough, this is what you should do…
Make good art.
— Neil Gaiman, Art Matters, “Make Good Art”
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, November 11, 2019
Make Art
And remember that whatever discipline you are in, whether you are a musician or a photographer, a fine artist or a cartoonist, a writer, a dancer, a designer, whatever you do, you have one thing that’s unique.
You have the ability to make art.
— Neil Gaiman, Art Matters, “Make Good Art”
Photo: Burg Lahneck, Germany, August 22, 2004
Am I Acting Like I Believe?
So perhaps a better question than “Do I believe in miracles?” is “Am I acting like I do?” Am I including the people who are typically excluded? Am I feeding the hungry and caring for the sick? Am I holding the hands of the homeless and offering help to addicts? Am I working to break down religious and political barriers that marginalize ethnic, religious, and sexual minorities and people with disabilities? Am I behaving as though life is more than a meaningless, chaotic mess, that there is some order in the storm?
— Rachel Held Evans, Inspired, p. 186
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, August 3, 2019
Doing the Impossible
If you don’t know it’s impossible it’s easier to do.
And because nobody’s done it before, they haven’t made up rules to stop anyone doing that again, yet.
— Neil Gaiman, Art Matters, “Make Good Art”
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, July 31, 2019
A Strong Aspiration
If you have a deep aspiration, a goal for your life, then your loving of others is part of this aspiration and not a distraction from it. If you and your partner both want to do things to relieve the suffering in this world, then your love for each other is connected to your love for others, and it expands exponentially to cover the whole world.
— Thich Nhat Hanh, How to Love, p. 74
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, July 31, 2019