How To Be a Renaissance Person
Many people in the world strive to be creatives in life. Many people strive to be successful in whatever they want to create in the future. Be that music, art, film, photography, and many more. But there is a smaller (yet still large) amount of people who want to do many or all of those creative things together. These are what are called Renaissance people. If you want to be a successful person in multiple creative forms, here are a few possible tips that can assist you in your journey.
A quick definition of a Renaissance person. A renaissance person is someone who does more than just one creative field, examples of renaissance people are, the father of the term Leonardo De Vinci, Tyler, The Creator, Donald Glover, Kanye West, and many more.
Start Early. This may be a given, but starting early is one of the most important steps. If you want to do something such as make music as well as the other creative fields you have in mind, start early and get as good as you can at making one or two of these things. For example, let’s say you wish to make music and film. Get good at both of these things early on, although it is never too late to start, doing it early is the very best option.
Show you can do more. This is a tough one to explain. Let’s use an example. Let’s say you want to make music and film, not saying this is all you wish to do, but let’s say these are your two main career choices. Get good at music and get a rough understanding of film. Keep all of your music in the vault. What you really are trying to do is not get magnetized to one thing. Like when someone is talking about you, you do not want them to say “The musician ___”. When you release your music, release short films alongside it. This way people can see you are good at more than one thing.
Do not be too adamant. This is another given but many people may not think about it. Do not be too adamant about the fact you do more than one thing. It may be a turn off for potential fans of yours. If you are doing, let’s say, music and photography. Don’t post things bragging about how you do both music and photography. Simply show people you are good at both of those fields by releasing your work when you are ready to do so. Show, don’t tell.
Take your time. This may come off as hypocritical to my prior statement about starting early, but it is different. Starting early is indeed a great thing to do as you get better at your creative fields, yet you have much more time to get better. The better the product the more successful you can possibly be in your career. Never get too attached to the first draft of anything, as this can potentially ruin your creativity later on. Continue to create until even the back of your mind congratulates you on waiting to release whatever amazing creations you have decided to make to the public.
Don’t try. Do not worry, the title of this section is not (entirely) serious. This title is in relation to the most famous quote by the great writer Charles Bukowski. The quote is his most famous, and it is even on his grave, but he says it best in his poem so you want to be a writer? Here is a stanza from the poem.
if it doesn’t come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don’t do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don’t do it.
Basically what I am trying to say here is, if you are not entirely devoted to the creative fields of choice, you may not get as far as you want to. You must make the act of creativity your #1 priority. And that is how you can become a renaissance person.
Michael St. Jean is a 12th grade student at Dracut High School. His main drive is creativity. He tries to make art and music whenever he has free time out of work and school.
