HENRY MILLER
COMMANDMENTS
1. Work on one thing at a time until finished.
2. Start no more new books, add no more new material to “Black Spring.”
3. Don’t be nervous. Work calmly, joyously, recklessly on whatever is in hand.
4. Work according to Program and not according to mood. Stop at the appointed time!
5. When you can’t create you can work.
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Robert McKee has been teaching creators of all kinds for most of his adult life. In a recent interview about storytelling, he offered a statement that literally paused me. (I’ve replaced his words “write” with “create” because his answer can be used for artists of all mediums.)
“Beyond imagination and insight, the most important component of talent is perseverance – the will to [create] and [recreate] in pursuit of perfection. Therefore, when inspiration sparks the desire to [create], the artist immediately asks: Is this idea so fascinating, so rich in possibility, that I want to spend months, perhaps years, of my life in pursuit of its fulfillment? Is this concept so exciting that I will get up each morning with the hunger to [create]? Will this inspiration compel me to sacrifice all of life’s other pleasures in my quest to perfect its telling? If the answer is no, find another idea. Talent and time are a [creator]’s only assets. Why give your life to an idea that’s not worth your life?”
Why give your life to an idea that’s not worth your life?
Love it.
Here’s to the creators.
About two years ago, I became incredibly fascinated with polyphasic sleep or “The Art of Staying Up for a Really Long Time and Your Body Being Cool With It.” I had just started The Uberman Project, which was a series of personal experiments designed to test the limits of my mental and physical abilities, or to discover that I had no limits. (I was rooting for the latter.)
The first test was bent on answering the question: How much sleep does a human really need to be effective? I wanted to find out if I could sleep less and still produce the same quality of work that I produced when sleeping 5+ hours a night. When I became vegan, my sleep requirements dropped by a couple hours anyway, and I only needed 5-6 hours per night vs. the 7-8 that I needed when I was still consuming meat 3-4 times a day. If I could drop that to 2 (hours per night of sleep) then that would equal 4 more hours of writing, video production, or music composition that I didn’t have before.
Enter The Uberman’s Sleep Schedule
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To say that Friedrich Nietzsche has influenced my thinking would be quite the understatement. Many of my ideas on self-creation have been inspired by his Philosophies, especially his concept of the Übermensch.
The Uberman is a progression of his original idea. But there’s much confusion as to what the Übermensch was all about (especially after the Nazis had their way with it). So let’s explore what Nietzsche had in mind when he first “spoke” of his Philosophy and also review the supreme differences between Nietzsche’s version of the Uberman and my own.
Here are a few of them:
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I went through my oldest journal recently. It’s big & black, with gaffer tape supporting the spine, full of well-used pages, magazine clippings and questions. It inspires the hell out of me. The journal and the questions. Which is the subject of this post: questions, or rather the asking of proper ones.
Without questions there can be no answers. So both the wise person and the seeker of wisdom must ask good questions. Great questions. Questions that make your skin flush and the hairs on your arm rise to attention.
I went through the beast (my journal) and pulled out the questions that moved me. Questions that paused me. Questions that dared something deep within me to present itself.
So in turn I do the same with you. I dare you to answer these questions. In fact I double dare you. And if we really want to make this interesting, I’ll present a physical challenge: answer them (no doubt) and then act. Do it. Live Your Answer.
I dare you.
10 Questions That Will Absolutely Change Your Life:
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