Book Notes｜Steal Like An Artist

Table of Contents

1. STEAL LIKE AN ARTIST
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Stop trying to make something out of nothing, embrace influence of what came before instead of running away from it. Nothing is really original.
Every new idea is a mashup or a remix of one or more previous idea. You are a mashup of what you choose to let into your life. You are the sum of your influences.
Everything is up for grabs. Figure out what’s worth stealing, then you move on to the next thing.
Morgue File: keep a swipe file to keep track of the stuff you’ve swiped from others, e.g. scrapbook, pictures with camera phone.
See something worth stealing? Put it in the swipe file. Need a little inspiration? Open up the swipe file.

You have to overcome impostor syndrome, just start making something.
Fake it’til you make it - pretend to be making sth until you actually make something.
Copy your heroes and steal the thinking behind the style-to internalize their way of looking at the world.
From imitation to emulation: Our failure to copy our heroes is where we discover where our own things lives. That is how we evolve.

“It is our failure to become our perceived ideal that ultimately defines us and makes us unique.” — Conan O’Brien

Write the kind of story you like best-write the story you want to read.
Same principle to your life and career: whenever you’re at loss for what move to make next, ask yourself, “what would make a better story?”
Think about your favourite work and your creative heroes. What did they miss? What didn’t they make? What could’ve been made better?

Stay away from the screen; find a way to bring your body into your work.
Art that only comes from the head isn’t any good.
Computer is good for editing ideas and getting your ideas ready for publishing out into the world, but it’s not good for generating ideas. With computers, we start editing ideas before we have them.
Create an analog-to-digital loop: set up two workstations separately, focus on possibilities with the analog station and execute your ideas with the digital station.

Practice productive procrastination: bounce between side projects you like; take time to mess around; get bored.
Don’t throw any of yourself away; keep all your passions in your life and make new connections.

Enjoy your obscurity while it lasts. Use it. When you’re unknown, there’s nothing to distract you from getting better. No public image to manage.
Do good work and share it with people: when you open up your process and invite people in, you learn.
If you’re worried about giving your secrets away, share your dots without connecting them.

You don’t have to live anywhere other than the place you are to start connecting with the world you want to be in.
Build your own world around you. Surround yourself with books and objects that you love. Tape things up on the wall. Create your own world.
Enjoy solitude and temporary captivity without interruption.
Place is not unimportant. At some point, when you can do it, leave home. Your brain gets too comfortable in your everyday surroundings. You need to make it uncomfortable. You need to spend some time in another land, among people that do things differently than you.
Find a place that feeds you-creatively, socially, spiritually and literally.

Make friends and ignore enemies in our hyperconnected world.
Stand next to the talent; follow the best people online; be as good as the people you surround yourself with.
Quit picking fights on Twitter and go make something. Get angry but keep your mouth shut and channel the anger into your work.
Write public fan letters to admire someone’s work; show your appreciation without expecting response.
Get comfortable with being misunderstood, disparaged, or ignored-the trick is be too busy doing your work to care.
Keep a praise file when you need the lift in the dark days, but don’t get lost in past glory.

Take care of yourself. It takes a lot of energy to be creative. You don’t have that energy if you waste it on other stuff.
Keep a day job that gives you money, a connection to the world, and a routine.
Establishing and keeping a routine can be even more important than having a lot of time.
Schedule a regular time for your creative pursuits and never stop.
Get a calendar. Fill the boxes. Don’t break the chain.
Keep a logbook to remember past events/done list. Keep track of how far your ship has sailed.

Choose what to leave out in the age of information abundance and overload, and concentrate on what’s really important to you.
Nothing is more paralyzing than the idea of limitless possibilities. Place some constraints on yourself. The right constraints can lead to your very best work.
It’s often what an artist chooses to leave out that makes the art interesting.