“Do not be afraid of moving slowly. Be only afraid of standing still.” - Chinese Proverb
Have you ever thought about the importance of the small, steady actions you take every day toward your artistic goals?
You can’t imagine how important these really are.
Most of us have a very distorted notion of how things actually get done in this world. We think that great accomplishment only comes from great deeds in artistic goals.
We imagine our heroes striding toward their goal in seven-league boots–writing best-selling novels in three months, building business empires overnight, soaring to stardom out of nowhere–and this gives rise to painfully unrealistic expectations of ourselves. And yet nothing could be further from the truth.
Great deeds are made of small, steady actions, and it is these that you must learn to value and sustain in your artistic goals.
Often you feel you’ve done nothing when you’ve actually done a lot. That’s because what you did do seemed beneath notice–it was so small that you thought it didn’t “count.” But it did–just as each stitch counts toward a finished dress, each brick toward a house you can live in, each mistake toward knowing how to do things right.
Directed action, no matter how small, moves toward its point. When you change your perspective, you will start to see how small steps add up.