Embrace Your Nature

Hi everybody, welcome back to the Artist Tao Podcast. We're here of course with Sean Starr and Jenny. And we're here on our next principle, embrace your nature. You are creative by nature. Although it is a generous idea, not everyone else is driven creatively.

Yeah.

What do you think about that?

Yeah, I think you have to know thyself. Yeah, this one's one of those that's like really just about kind of exploring who you are because I do think that everybody does have like that creative, I won't even say ability because that's something that has to be developed and nurtured, but it's creative nature. I think it's I mean, that gets into like metaphysical, spiritual stuff to a certain extent, but that's the stuff that like is the nature of who we are. And I believe that, but as the second part mentions, like it's a generous idea to say like, everybody's an artist, everybody's creative. And it's like, I... I think it's a pretty big spectrum and I don't agree that just like, well, everybody is an artist. Everyone can be an artist. It's like, well, if it's developed and if that drive is there, then sure but to just blanketly say that everyone is creative, that's like saying everyone's an athlete. Some people are born with that drive to be an athlete and then they can develop their body to do certain amazing things, but that doesn't mean that everybody's an athlete. You're like not everybody can play pro basketball. Yeah.

But they can still be athletic in a way, but they're just playing pro basketball. Right. And, and, you know, again, it's a spectrum. I mean, anybody can, you know, it, some five foot tall guy is super passionate about basketball. He can certainly pursue that and maybe even become really good at it. There was a basketball player. Yeah, I know. That was like, I want to, I mean, I don't, I would say five, seven or five eight, but he could dunk the ball or something. I forget who he played for, but yeah. And I feel like everybody does have artistic originality. I think it, like you're saying it's a spectrum that's comes on many forms. Yeah. But it's also like, if you don't unlock what's up here and do something with that, then it's kind of like a seed that hasn't germinated. It's like you have that seed, but What is your drive to germinate that seed into a growing flourishing plant that produces fruit?

That's a good analogy. That takes work and that takes commitment and that takes desire. And everyone's ability, not ability, but desire to work and commit and have that desire is clearly very different. What do you think, because you're embracing your nature, it's like, I feel... most people lose their imagination for whatever reason, right? Their life experience or something compounds, or they put it to the side, or they... Yeah, Picasso had some famous quote related to that about like something about children and artists or every artist, every child is an artist or something like that. And I think that's definitely true. It's like you, you can, a lot of that can be kind of snuffed out just by our education system and everything else that's...

Just kind of telling everyone to stay in their lane and be in the little box.

Yeah. So you probably have like an, a pathway that's always like, think out of the box, think out of the box. What you like, I guess the practice to keep getting out of the box is to keep getting out of the box in order to strengthen that root in your brain. Yeah, but it, I don't, it's not like I'm sitting around like I need to do something out of the box. I mean, it's just compiled years of, um, like I don't want a day job.

I don't want a nine to five job. So like, what can I do to keep that from happening? And so far so good, but that's not as glamorous sounding as like, hmm, how can I do this outside the box? And a lot of that, it's like exercising a muscle. It's kind of like an athlete. It's like, I think that you do it long enough and it just becomes, how you approach things, you're doing it in an unorthodox way. Sometimes out of necessity or even sometimes desperation because something's just not working. So you're trying new things to make it work because you're really trying to get a result that matches what's in your thoughts or your vision of what you're trying to do. Sometimes that turns into something really cool and really unique and people respond to and that then brings you more projects and all that. So what do you think are some tips for getting to know yourself? What would be like a route?

Well, we're in a period of time and we have been for decades, but we're in a period of time where your thought space is trying to be occupied by people selling you things, by people trying to convert you to an ideology, et cetera. And it goes on and on and you've got to clear that out. And... And there's a variety of ways that people do that with different practices and different spiritual practices, different things, but you got to get away from all the noise of... all of the things that are trying to convince you to do what they want you to do. Yeah, I would imagine and start creating. Yeah. And we're, unfortunately we're, we're living in a society that doesn't really value or want those things to happen. Uh, like certain cultures and societies in the past have that have revered you know, artistry and craftsmanship and those kinds of things. We're in this really distorted, crazy society now that doesn't have a reverence for, you know, the beautification of things. And, you know, you can even see it in our architecture, you know, like there's some really ugly buildings going up all over the place. You're just like, wow, like, You couldn't have done something with that. Like that's our visual landscape. There's a box. Yeah. There's like nothing you could have done with that. I, you know, I'm sure some of it, some of it is like trying to save money by making things simplistic. But at the same time, it's like, come on, I'm sure you could have done something that didn't cost a lot of extra money. That would have been more appealing than that. Um, cause you were talking about classical music one time, but I just, I was trying to remember.

That's a great example. The most recent thing though about where they're playing now classical music and for what reason, but that's a topic for another conversation. But yeah, like how you were saying that nobody really appreciates classical music. No, it's the most bizarre thing to me is, you know, I like to collect records on vinyl and like the most available and cheapest priced and least sought out records are classical music recordings. And I've never been a huge classical music fan, but I do dabble in it occasionally. And so, you know, I'll buy a record at a record store and they want like a dollar for it. And there's mountains of these classical records and you sit down and you put the thing on and you're, you're just blown away at the level of commitment of the musicians the composer, the conductor of the orchestra. And you're just listening to something that represents so many thousands of hours of like dedication to execute and no one cares. Like no one values it. No one cares. It's completely crazy, but that's how crazy we've gotten is there's things that are that refined to that level artistically that are just mind blowing. Like, you know, you can just sit down and listen to some of these, you know, operas or classical recordings and you're just in awe because nothing is made to that level anymore. And no one, and it has no value in our society. You know, I also love classic rock and yes, you know Led Zeppelin four, you know, whatever, like these albums are iconic and amazing. Um, but you know, those records are selling for sometimes 50, 60 bucks for an original pressing. And, you know, there's, there's other recordings that are equally as impressive and great with classical music that like no one's touching. It's amazing.

Didn't they have orchestras for even cartoons? Is it Bugs Bunny? Yeah, probably so. I think all of those studios had like all that classical musicianship as their backdrop and everything. Yeah, it's just an amazing thing to me that our culture, you know, reveres stuff that... isn't very well done. And, you know, like the whole pop music machinery that just turns out, you know, the next pop singer and the next pop song and all of that, and those sell by the millions. And you've got musicians that have dedicated literally their entire life to like becoming the best oboe player or whatever, so that they can sit in an orchestra and perform these pieces of music and aside from tiny little numbers like no one cares.

I don't know how that applies to what we were just reading, but. Well, we were talking about embracing our nature and Yeah, the music, we could probably talk about that a lot more actually.

So yeah, embrace your nature. You are creative by nature. Although it is a generous idea, not everyone else is driven creatively.

Yeah, that one kind of went off the rails, but I think we made some points. I would say.

See you next time.

Keep Your Integrity

Welcome back everybody to the Artist Tao podcast. We're here with our next principle. Keep your integrity. Never alter your work based on criticism. Never alter your work based on commercial gain.

Yep. Keep your integrity. That's a really hard thing to do, obviously in all aspects of life, but extremely important, I think, in terms of an artist. Yeah, you got to live with your decisions. Yeah, it's living with your decisions and it's also the...

If you don't, if you're not keeping integrity with your work, then your work is a mishmash. It doesn't really mean anything. I guess that would kind of be a mirror for maybe you're not keeping integrity with yourself. I think so. I think.

Just like the words that you use, if those words are truthful and honest and you have integrity in the things that you say, those words will have value to other people. And when you are expressing yourself creatively, it's the same thing. Yeah, I think we talked about the other day, never alter your work based on commercial gain. I think we were talking about galleries. Like if...

You know, when you're an artist and say a gallery comes and you were discussing about some galleries may be great. Some galleries may be not so great to always look, look for that. So don't base on them, what a gallery says or what other criticism is. Don't lose your integrity. Just base for a commercial gain. Yeah. And there's, there's all these cases I really enjoy. And we've been watching different music documentaries and I've always enjoyed those. I love the storyline of like how musical artists go from playing in their garage to becoming well known and what choices they make and being able to see where they messed up, where they didn't, where they held their ground, kept their integrity, where they didn't. And I think that the criticism thing's really important that if you're altering your work because somebody with a loud opinion thinks that you should, you're never gonna create anything of value to anyone because you're not tapping into that genuine voice that you have within you that's making you want to express yourself in the first place. Because now some other voice is involved in that as a critic.

never alter your work based on commercial gain. That's probably the biggest temptation, I think, that artists deal with is, um,

Knowing that if they make a tweak or a change to their work, that it will fit into some category that's popular right now. Oh yeah. We were talking about that this morning actually, about you're working on a project currently and how you want to develop it in your style. Because something completely different from painting or sculpture or gold, you know, the gilding. So you're developing your own style in this new projects, so yeah. Yeah, for sure. And if you start allowing the influence of, well, if I go this direction, instead of what I really think this would be best suited for, I can, you know, this can make a lot more money. I mean, there's plenty of people that have done that and have made more money, but like what...

What's your motive for doing it in the first place? I feel like that would be, that would get to be like a square fitting a circle into a square pair. How, what's that saying? I never get it right either, but I know what you're saying. You know, it would get frustrating. I think that's what you're constantly doing. It's frustrating, but it's also, it's a heavy, heavy temptation because you have to have money to live and you have to have money to move your work forward and buy supplies and, and, and everybody has the underlying desire to succeed with their artwork and to build an audience and to get people engaged with what they're doing. And that I think that's been hijacked and made even more extreme by social media. I mean, there's people who like their whole thing is just engagement on social media and they don't care what it is. Like that's their currency and that's, um, where their integrity is being jeopardized is they're just throwing out their whatever's gonna get the most engagement. Have you always kept yours?

I think in general I can say that I have and in certain cases I probably have blurred the lines and course corrected after realized that I kind of like blurred the lines but it's... Those are individual projects that I would say that I may have done that on over as compared to like my overall path. I don't feel like I'm my overall path that I've made that compromise, but I think on individual projects, I may be, not often, but I think I maybe have allowed that to influence me a little bit. And then I look back and I'm like, man, I wish I would have just did what I thought was the best way to do it instead of trying to do it in a way that might be more popular. Do you mean like for individual clients or something that you were just making? Like a, well, in my case, there's almost always a client involved. You know, I mean, I've done, you know, a bit of art for art sake type projects, but you know, years ago I set out to, you know, not have to get a day job, you know? And having grown up in this type of work, I saw the mechanism of how you can do that and was just, kind of just dreaded the idea of having to get a normal job.

So what you were just saying about that you maybe have noticed that a couple of times, would that be something that if a client comes to you and says, hey, I'm looking for this logo or whatever, what you're saying is that, maybe you had an idea of what you thought would be really good and then instead you kind of went more mainstream or... Well, it's more, I've said this for years, a big part of the job of working with clients in any kind of commercial artwork sense is having the bravery to tell the client no, because something's not in their best interest.

And that's a really, really hard place to get to and, and get yourself to do. Uh, but I've had a lot of clients tell me that they really, really appreciate that I've done that in certain instances because they're, you know, they saw something on Pinterest or whatever, and they're like, I really want this. And you're like, yeah, but that's for one, you're just copying something someone else has done. And that's really not the right fit for what you need.

It's not gonna serve the purpose of, even if it's something that's strictly decorative, it's just, it's not the right fit. And so sometimes you have to tell the client no. What do you think the percentages now of people contacting you and saying, I want you to do this and I want you to just go for it and people that maybe like have like, I have this and I want this done. Well, up until, I would say maybe six months to a year ago, it was probably 80 to 90 % would come in to and say, I want you to just do your thing. And that took years and years and years to get to. And now it's just, and this is something that you and I talked about recently and talk about a lot actually is, Everything's changed so dramatically and... I don't know that there's any baseline or standard to compare anything to anymore. I still have the majority of my clients are wanting me to just do what I do and they're like, Hey, I watched your work for a while. I'd really like you to just do your thing for me. But it's one of the reasons that I have gravitated towards the engraving is because that's, um You're really not taking orders for that. You're just, this is what I do. This is my style. If you'd like to engage with this, this is it. And this is what it costs. And that's the end of it. So what would you say, so over the last, I guess now it's already been four years since 2020. And what do you, how, what keeps you adaptable? You know, I feel like I've seen you, you do so many things.

And we've kind of like had a lot of opportunity to pivot because the, I don't know what the landscape is. So I hate to use the word volatile, but it is, you can't really predict it rightly. You have had in the past been able to sort of predict and strategize. So what would you say to somebody who is sort of stepping into this world of being an artist as their lifestyle to be adaptable to do what like have different things they do.

Yeah, I think the broader and more diverse of what you're offering, the more likelihood that you're going to survive through the ups and downs and we're clearly in some kind of a weird down world spiral right now with, you know, economic things and things like that. And things are, things are unpredictable. I wouldn't say volatiles, but they're unpredictable. And because of that, I would say, what has worked in the past and this has been agreed with other people that have either been sign painters or do this kind of work that I've done, everybody agrees. You've got to have a pretty big basket of offerings to get through the tough times. And I think that's the way it has to be looked at. Many years ago, decades ago, There were shops that would specialize in XYZ and now most painters, they're doing a really wide variety. So, you know, like the shop that I grew up in and my dad's shop, you know, that was all, everything was based on vehicles. It was, you know, hot rod stuff. It was, you know, you name it. It was, if it had wheels, we were painting something on it.

Um, and especially now, I don't think you can do that. I don't think you specialize in this is the thing that I do. I only work on these things because, you know, to keep enough work humming in, you might have to also learn doing some gold leaf on glass. You might have to do some engraving and like, that's the thing that I'm branching into just out of sheer interest. I started that whole, you know, journey, uh, over three years ago, but I think you have to diversify and offer a lot of different things so that when things do get challenging economically, you've got enough different offerings out there to keep yourself moving.

Which isn't the same thing, you know, along the lines of integrity, that's still keeping your integrity because as long as every single thing that you're doing, you're doing it from a place of like the highest level of craftsmanship and artistry and those kinds of things, then, you know, you're still keeping your integrity. You're just having to do it in a way that keeps the money coming in as opposed to altering.

Like the work itself to get the money to come in and that's where the temptation is. Yeah. So keep your integrity. Never alter your work based on criticism. Never alter your work based on commercial gain.

Thanks everybody. Thank you. See you next time.