On gratitude and audience
View this email in your browser (|ARCHIVE|) “The key is to keep company only with people who uplift you, whose presence calls forth your best.” —Epictetus
This newsletter began years ago out of sheer necessity. I was at an impasse in life.
So I put all of my faith into a long-held belief: that the written word has unique power to domesticate raw creativity and feelings.
Words forge sense out of the abstract. They make us put labels on thoughts and assumptions and codify our habits. They are the accounting of the creative process.
And yet knowledge is worthless unless you apply it. So that’s what I do.
With time, CreativeBoost has grown to become a kind of cartography of collected wisdom: a travelogue of what I’ve learned to apply to my life.
I don’t pretend to have answers. The best I can promise is that what I share here are things that have worked for me to gain a clearer sense of purpose professionally and to live into life rather than just be its passenger.
An interesting thing has happened on this journey. I’ve found that the more that I put myself into the service of the work itself and the needs of others (http://us4.campaign-archive1.com/?u=89226eb68936fc712577977b8&id=26ff6d99b4) , the more I help myself.
It’s helped open me to the power than can come from being able to change my mind (http://us4.campaign-archive1.com/?u=89226eb68936fc712577977b8&id=4cd5968426) about things.
It’s challenged me to exercise deliberate resiliency (http://us4.campaign-archive1.com/?u=89226eb68936fc712577977b8&id=0e4c0fe203) in how I work. and to declutter (http://us4.campaign-archive1.com/?u=89226eb68936fc712577977b8&id=4476734e34) my feelings about a subject I’m working on.
It’s also taught me there are two kinds of audiences for creative work.
First, there are consumers: essentially anyone who takes in what you do, but you never really know what value it serves to them.
But then there is this much smaller segment: those who connect with what you do and prove it through actions.
I’m fortunate to have both, but especially the latter.
Argentine chef Francis Mallmann—featured in this visually stunning episode (https://youtu.be/qQ8Htm4jAGc) of Chef’s Table—credits a good part of his creative output to “the people around you who are helping you.” The Argentinian Spanish, he explains, associate this with the word: maestranzas, “a very beautiful word…very romantic,” he says. (Aside: its root origin in traditional Spanish has a military connotation, but I’m all in favour of co-opting words this way.)
Gratitude isn’t just a choice. It also comes to us through the small, beautiful actions of others. And yet it’s a sentiment greatly under-expressed (https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=gratitude&case_insensitive=on&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=20&share=&direct_url=t4%3B%2Cgratitude%3B%2Cc0%3B%2Cs0%3B%3Bgratitude%3B%2Cc0%3B%3BGratitude%3B%2Cc0) in our culture today.
So I am taking this moment here to express a small slice of the considerable gratitude I have for my readership.
This includes Kel, whose retweets tend to include a kind nudge or two. Same goes for Tom, who is like a brother to me and who also happens to keep my website gloriously free of Wordpress security bugs. And Melissa, who reminds me that looking at the world differently can be a powerful asset. I’m grateful for Pierrette, who regularly takes time out of her day to explain how she applies what learns from this newsletter. For Juliana, whose work and gestures of great kindness continue to inspire me. I’m grateful for former students of mine in the School of Media and Design who continue to follow this newsletter. And for Ilesh and Danielle who teach me so much about the power of partnership and beauty of deliberate design.
There are many, many more whom I’ve not named here. Each of you are—to me—the maestranzas who make it possible for me to keep asking questions and challenge what it means to grow as a creative pro in a changing world.
In her book Becoming Wise: An Inquiry into the Mystery and Art of Living, Krista Tippet notes that “we create transformative, resilient new realities by becoming transformed, resilient people.” That’s certainly been my experience.
You are among the people around me who are helping in that constant undertaking. That’s what your readership does. I’ll continue to pay that back as long as you keep giving me the gift of your time.
Very best, Patrick
P.S. You make this community of loyal readers grow when you share CreativeBoost with someone you think it could help. Do that now.
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