Not everyone is going to like your art.
The writers write because they have no choice — the need to express what is inside them.
My daughter once told me that her friend didn’t like the picture that my daughter drew at school. At first I wanted to say that her friend didn’t really mean that and that she probably did like it, but just said that she didn’t like for some unexplained reason. But then I realized that I would be doing my daughter a huge disservice. Her friend really did not like her picture. That was the reality of life and there was no need to sugarcoat that reality or to change it through some far-fetched interpretation of what the friend really had meant. Not everyone is going to like what you draw, write, or wear.
The truth is, when you start doing anything creative and expose yourself to the world, it gets scary. It gets personal. Your creation will be discussed, criticized, sneered at, misunderstood, or just simply ignored.
People say — “ignore what others think of you. Follow your dreams, don’t listen to anyone.” But is that really good advice? We all have the need to feel connected to our friends, our families, even strangers. This is what ultimately makes us happy. This is what allows us to “choose life”.
These are interesting words: acceptance, approval, connection. We have a need to feel connected, so we think we need approval to be accepted and connection will follow. But by seeking approval, we often stifle the need to express ourselves, to be ourselves. The great realization is that you can feel connected to the world without having the world’s approval. The reverse is also true: you can connect to someone without approving what they do.
The paradox of life is that we have the need to be accepted by other people and we have the need to create, which often will lead us to be misunderstood or critisized. What do we do? Do we stop creating in order to keep acceptance? Or do we keep creating and risk alienation? We have no choice but to accept this. If you get out there, you will be critisized. There will be haters. Your feelings will be hurt, and it’s OK. This is life. You have no choice but to keep going — for you don’t create to get fans, you create because you have no choice.
