*Typing*

When something good drifts into your immediate vicinity, your natural inclination is to reach out and grab it. But, good things aren't unlike Monarch butterflies in that if you reach out and grab them, you will almost certainly scare them away––or, worst yet, crush them.

Many of good things have been made bad at the hands of impatience and desperation. Instead, you must create the proper conditions for good opportunities to find you. You must show up, work hard and be generous.

Once you've created these conditions, you must then recognize that everything else is out of your control. If the Monarch chooses to land on your shoulder or some else's shoulder isn't really up to you. It's up to the wind and which direction it's choosing to move. It's more or less a matter of luck. Humans have been trying to control luck for centuries. It has left many broke, broken-hearted and dead. You can't control fate just like you can't lasso an F5 tornado.

This is perhaps the most difficult truth to accept: that we can show up, work hard, be generous and still not get what we want. However, relinquishing control allows you to remain still, calm, centered and content during the inevitable moments in life when you aren't getting exactly what you want.

And when it hurts––not getting what you want––try to remember that while you may want it, you don't need it.

You need so very little to be happy.

One definition of strength is the ability to withstand great force. Another definition of strength is the ability to ask for help so that you can withstand great force. We struggle accepting this latter definition because we struggle to ask for help.

We've been conditioned to believe that true strength is rubbing some dirt on it, pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps, putting our heads down and getting to work. Strength is all of these things. But, strength is also so much more.

Boxers have corners.

Formula 1 drivers have pit crews.

Astronauts have mission control.

Knights had squires.

The list goes on.

Strength in life, love and work requires help. Anyone who thinks otherwise suffers from extreme hubris and isn't truly strong. What separates men from boys and women from girls is their awareness to recognize when they need help and the humility to ask for it.

Asking for help won't only make you stronger, it will build stronger bonds and relationships with the people in your life you care about most. We feel closer to the people who ask us for help. We feel a sense of responsibility to the people who ask us for help. We feel love towards the people who ask us for help.

So, ask for help.

Let me repeat that:

Prolific output leads to profound work.

Isaac Asimov wrote 500 books (and an estimated 90,000 letters).

Emily Dickinson penned 1,800 poems.

David Bowie recorded 400 songs.

Pablo Picasso created 50,000 works of art.

Andy Warhol: 9,000.

Katsushika Hokusai: 30,000.

Georgia O'Keeffe: 2,000.

Salvador Dalí: 1,500.

Paul Cézanne: 1,000.

Henri Matisse: 1,000.

Your responsibility as an artist isn't to be perfect.

It's to be prolific.

With time, you will create something profound.

Your job as an artist isn’t to be perfect. Never aspire to be perfect. Perfection is boring. It’s uninteresting. It's underwhelming. If you saw perfect, you wouldn't look twice. It would be so entirely absent of any sort of soul, flaw, character and humanity, your eyes would slide over its surface like oil atop of water. Worst yet, the pursuit for perfection stalls creative output. Your job as an artist isn't to be perfect but to be profound. Your job is to create and share at such a fantastic pace the world can’t keep up. When someone blinks, you should have new art in front of them. While someone is judging whether the new art is good or bad, you should have new art in front of them. When someone is comparing the new art to the old art, you should have new art in front of them. You aren't an artist. You're a vessel. You're a vein. You're a channel. You're a conduit. You're a beautiful machine. You create and you create until the day you die and you hope that somewhere along the way you create something profound.

You should never hoard your ideas. They will only die on the vine like unpicked tomatoes. You should share your ideas. Tell the joke when you have the idea for the joke. Pen the poem when you have the idea for the poem. Paint the painting when you have the idea for the painting. Write the song when you have the idea for the song. If there is one universal truth to creativity, it's that ideas breed ideas. They aren't a scarcity, ideas. As long as you share your ideas when you have them and believe that more will blossom like fruit that has grown, ripened and then been picked only to grow again––ideas will never be a scarcity.