About Make Real
This publication is about making the wonderful things inside your head real outside of your head
You want to write a book, learn to paint, start a business, or record an album. Or you want to do something else that’s on that indefinite list under a single umbrella: Making something out of nothing.
The creative act is real magic. It’s not reserved for somebody with a special talent or whose intentions fit into a specific category. Every person has something meaningful to share.
The creative act is hard work. It happens bit by bit. Along the way, the process is full of holes to put a foot in and twist your ankle. This publication aims at celebrating and illuminating the creative process, including its highs and pitfalls.
There are two fundamental assumptions central to the work here:
- You deserve creative pursuits, hobbies, and dreams. They are not exclusive for some other tier of people.
- There’s no minimum level of ability that you must possess before you’re allowed to do something for your own enjoyment.
Make Real is currently open for submissions!
“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. “Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”
“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.”
“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.
“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”
“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”
“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”
— Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit
