How to be a Creator #2: Do what everyone else is doing. Do what everyone else isn't doing.

FIRST: THANK YOU to prior subscribers. I understand if you unsubscribe because I haven’t sent anything in like years and now will be emailing more frequently.

(Or for like 4 days straight before another years-long hiatus…)

A ChatGPT summary of what I blabbed about on the mic.

Get ready for some mind-bending tips to be a better creator. Ditch that cooking school dream – because it's not about the degree, it's about the experience. Learn for free and harness the power of the internet to build your skills in the kitchen.

For artists, your story is what makes you unique. So, tell it! Embrace the baby steps and build a library of work that shows off your talent.

Finally, when it comes to being a creator, don't be afraid to blend conformity with innovation. Find a balance between what everyone else is doing and what sets you apart. Absorb, reject, and add what is uniquely yours.

These three powerful tips – ditch the degree, embrace your story, and blend the familiar with the fresh – will set you on the path to being an extraordinary creator.

And here are the quotes I used. From David Chang’s “33 rules of how to be a chef”:

Don't go to cooking school. Theoretically cooking schools are a great idea. They provide a curriculum, experienced instructors and job placement opportunities. Degree from the culinary Institute of America will open doors to a perfectly comfortable career track in a hotel restaurant or corporate kitchen that pays a decent salary with benefits.

a little bit more

Make no mistake. Cooking schools are businesses that are selling you on the illusion that you will emerge from their programs as a bonafide chef. They prey on your not realizing that you can learn all of this stuff for free.

And Jerry Saltz’s “33 lessons for how to be an artist”

Don't be reigned in by other people's definitions of skill or beauty or be boxed in by what is supposedly high or low don't stay in your own lane. Drawing within the lines is for babies, making things add up and be right as for accountants. Proficiency and dexterity are only as good as what you do with them. But also remember that just because it's your story, that doesn't mean you're entitled to an audience. You have to earn that. Don't try to do it with a big single project. Take baby steps and be happy with baby steps.

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