Moving in our direction

As an artist the most potent weapon you have in your arsenal right now is this:

Your willingness to embrace uncertainty

It's a characteristic those of us who create or support art have displayed so often that we forget how rare it is.

Every time the pen hits paper, the music starts or the curtain rises it is a gamble.

Something incredibly good could happen.

Or it could be a disaster and a waste of everyone's time and money.

That's uncertainty.

But again, since you deal with this all the time you barely notice it.

Here's the twist:

The so called "stable" world, the world of doctors, lawyers, banker is falling apart.

All the assumptions that people have built their lives on are being shattered.

That's uncertainty.

But since they haven't been dealing with that state of being as long as you have, you can imagine that they are a bit panicked.

This is actually good news for you.

Because in an unstable world, those who are able to deal with ambiguity and uncertainty best become the ones mostly likely to succeed.

Your skills as an artist, your nature as an artist is more valuable now then ever.

If you want to learn more about this line of thinking, then it's pretty mandatory that you read Daniel Pink's A Whole New Mind

 

Comments

[Lindsay Price]

In this wobbly tightrope society, we might as well do what we love, because doing what we hate just to make money won't work anymore. We might as well be uncertain with what we love doing.

I recently did some research for a play on post doc scientists. And learned how there's a glut of them with no jobs for them to fill. And that you can work for no money for years in the post doc world and not get a job.

Do high school admins know this when they are pushing their students into 'stable' math & science? It was quite eye opening...

[Nancy]

Loved this post! I hope you don't mind but I linked to it from my own blog: www.nancyjkenny.wordpress.com

[Sterling]

I really appreciate and respect the sentiment of this post. I think it should also be noted that "the willingness to embrace uncertainty" is not a trait of the artist exclusively.

There are plenty of artists who are unable and unwilling to embrace uncertainty and plenty of doctors, and lawyers, and bankers who are.

A willingness to embrace uncertainty is a trait which can and does cut across all disciplines and professions. And, you are certainly right, those who are able to embrace and work with uncertainty are most likely to succeed. I would go farther and say, "at any time, not just times of uncertainty."

Of course, success, very often, is exactly what causes people to resist uncertainty in the end.