Found a great book ‎"Ignore Everybody: And 39 Other Keys to Creativity" by Hugh MacLeod

Found a great book: ‎"Ignore Everybody: And 39 Other Keys to Creativity" by Hugh MacLeod Gapingvoid.com Great book! Insightful and hilarious about making passion a job! My favorite key is 27 (out of 40) "The best way to get appro­val is not to need it." 1. Ignore everybody. The more ori­gi­nal your idea is, the less good advice other peo­ple will be able to give you. When I first star­ted with the cartoon-on-back-of-bizcard for­mat, peo­ple thought I was nuts. Why wasn’t I trying to do something more easy for mar­kets to digest i.e. cutey-pie gree­ting cards or whatever? You don’t know if your idea is any good the moment it’s crea­ted. Neither does anyone else. The most you can hope for is a strong gut fee­ling that it is. And trus­ting your fee­lings is not as easy as the opti­mists say it is. There’s a rea­son why fee­lings scare us.   And asking close friends never works quite as well as you hope, either. It’s not that they deli­be­ra­tely want to be unhelp­ful. It’s just they don’t know your world one millionth as well as you know your world, no mat­ter how hard they try, no mat­ter how hard you try to explain.   Plus a big idea will change you. Your friends may love you, but they don’t want you to change. If you change, then their dyna­mic with you also chan­ges. They like things the way they are, that’s how they love you– the way you are, not the way you may become.   Ergo, they have no incen­tive to see you change. And they will be resis­tant to anything that cataly­zes it. That’s human nature. And you would do the same, if the shoe was on the other foot.   With busi­ness collea­gues it’s even worse. They’re used to dea­ling with you in a cer­tain way. They’re used to having a cer­tain level of con­trol over the rela­tionship. And they want wha­te­ver makes them more pros­pe­rous. Sure, they might pre­fer it if you pros­per as well, but that’s not their top prio­rity.   If your idea is so good that it chan­ges your dyna­mic enough to where you need them less, or God for­bid, THE MARKET needs them less, then they’re going to resist your idea every chance they can.   Again, that’s human nature.   GOOD IDEAS ALTER THE POWER BALANCE IN RELATIONSHIPS, THAT IS WHY GOOD IDEAS ARE ALWAYS INITIALLY RESISTED.   Good ideas come with a heavy bur­den. Which is why so few peo­ple have them. So few peo­ple can handle it. 1. Ignore everybody. 2. The idea doesn’t have to be big. It just has to be yours.   3. Put the hours in.   4. If your biz plan depends on you sud­denly being “dis­co­ve­red” by some big shot, your plan will pro­bably fail.   5. You are res­pon­si­ble for your own expe­rience.   6. Ever­yone is born crea­tive; ever­yone is given a box of cra­yons in kin­der­gar­ten.   7. Keep your day job.   8. Com­pa­nies that squelch crea­ti­vity can no lon­ger com­pete with com­pa­nies that cham­pion crea­ti­vity.   9. Every­body has their own pri­vate Mount Eve­rest they were put on this earth to climb.   10. The more talen­ted some­body is, the less they need the props.   11. Don’t try to stand out from the crowd; avoid crowds alto­gether.   12. If you accept the pain, it can­not hurt you.   13. Never com­pare your inside with some­body else’s outside.   14. Dying young is ove­rra­ted.   15. The most impor­tant thing a crea­tive per­son can learn pro­fes­sio­nally is where to draw the red line that sepa­ra­tes what you are willing to do, and what you are not.   16. The world is chan­ging.   17. Merit can be bought. Pas­sion can’t.   18. Avoid the Water­coo­ler Gang.   19. Sing in your own voice.   20. The choice of media is irre­le­vant.   21. Selling out is har­der than it looks.   22. Nobody cares. Do it for your­self.   23. Worr­ying about “Com­mer­cial vs. Artis­tic” is a com­plete waste of time.   24. Don’t worry about fin­ding ins­pi­ra­tion. It comes even­tually.   25. You have to find your own sch­tick.   26. Write from the heart.   27. The best way to get appro­val is not to need it.   28. Power is never given. Power is taken.   29. Wha­te­ver choice you make, The Devil gets his due even­tually.   30. The har­dest part of being crea­tive is get­ting used to it.   31. Remain fru­gal.   32. Allow your work to age with you.   33. Being Poor Sucks.   34. Beware of tur­ning hob­bies into jobs.   35. Savor obs­cu­rity while it lasts.   36. Start blog­ging.   37. Mea­ning Sca­les, Peo­ple Don’t.   37. When your dreams become rea­lity, they are no lon­ger your dreams.