Dorie Clark is a marketing strategy consultant, speaker and contributor to the Harvard Business Review, Time, and Entrepreneur. She authored the books Reinventing You and Stand Out, and is also an adjunct professor of business at Duke’s Fuqua School of Business. In this episode, Dorie talks about how she went from working on Howard Dean’s political campaign to being a business consultant, how you can reinvent yourself, and what you can do to stand out.
Marketing Your Art the Right Way
Selling Art, Not Selling Out
Search results: "stephen king" (page 2 of 2)
David Villalva is the creator of Story & Craft, a site dedicated to teaching storytelling formulas used in bestselling novels. In this episode, David talks about his storytelling blueprint, continuing to write after receiving devastating feedback, and why you should have a support system for your craft.
“The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.” – Walt Disney
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Everyone has regrets in life. There is always something we could have done. Something we should have taken action on.
One great thing about the internet is you find so much inspiration online. Pinterest and Tumblr provide endless fashion inspiration for the masses. The only problem is, many times, the images you find have no attribution. I thought I had the solution for this problem.
I started my last site Who Designed It years ago. My idea was, people could send in images of the outfits they saw online that had no attribution. Then the community on the site could help them find where to buy it or something similar to it.
I told many people about my grand visions for the site. I thought it was going to revolutionize the way people shopped online.
The only problem was, I didn’t take action on it. Instead of building the product I envisioned in my mind, I turned it into a blog. I was going to build up a readership, then introduce them to my new idea when the time was right. Then, a few years later, I saw that someone created the vision I had imagined years before. I was too late.
Don't let fear get in the way of doing something great. Click To TweetI’m not telling you this so you can feel sorry for me. I’m telling you this because I learned a big lesson from this experience. If you have a vision you believe in, don’t just talk about it. Do it. Don’t let fear get in the way of doing something great.
I don’t know if my idea would have failed or succeeded, but at least I would have taken the chance. Don’t let fear get in the way of getting started. Quit talking and begin doing.
Have a quote that inspires you? Leave it in the comments and you might see it as an art piece!
“Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill
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Like I have talked about many times before, failure is not something to be ashamed of. Each of us encounters failure in some form or fashion throughout our lives. Artists from Walt Disney to J.K. Rowling had to go through hardship to find success.
Here are just a few notable examples of people who have failed:
Walt Disney
Early in his career Disney created an animation studio called Laugh-O-Gram Films. This studio became loaded with debt and ended up bankrupt. He could have quit after this failure, but he chose to go Hollywood instead. There Walt and his brother Roy set up another studio.
Now, Disney is one of the most iconic brands in the world, and his characters are nearly universally recognized.
Steven Spielberg
Spielberg may be known for his many blockbusters, but he hasn’t always been so successful. Before becoming the icon he is today, he was rejected from the University of Southern California School of Cinema Arts three times for having poor grades.
Spielberg went on the create some of the most iconic movies in film history. In 1995 he was rewarded an honorary degree from USC, and in 1996 he became a trustee.
Harrison Ford
You may know Harrison Ford as one of his many iconic characters like Han Solo or Indiana Jones, but Ford was not always a successful actor.
Ford began his acting career as a contract player earning $150 a week. Initially, he did not find much success. One studio official even told Ford he would never be a movie star. Before catching his big break, he had to become a carpenter to supplement his income.
Ford is now one of the most well known actors in Hollywood and has acted for over 40 years.
Dr. Seuss
Theodor Seuss Geisel was the editor-in-chief of the Darthmouth humor magazine Jack-O-Lantern, and was kicked off the staff for breaking the Prohibition law. So he began using the pseudonym “Seuss.” He later became known for his pen name Dr. Seuss.
Seuss spent years making a living by drawing cartoons for advertisements and magazines. On his boat trip back from Europe, Seuss, the rhythm of the ship’s engine inspired his first book And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street. This book was rejected 27 times.
Seuss was going to destroy the book until he had a chance encounter with a friend who had just become editor at a publishing house’s children’s section.
That moment changed his life. The book became a sensation, and he wound up publishing over 60 books including The Cat in the Hat and Green Eggs and Ham.
Stephen King
Stephen King may be known as one the the greatest horror writers, but it wasn’t always this way.
When King left university, he got a teaching certificate, but wasn’t able to find a job initially. So he had to work at a laundry, where he wrote short stories on the side.
King even threw away his first novel, Carrie, because he became discouraged writing. His wife retrieved it from the trash and encourage him to finish it. That ended up being the tipping point of his career.
Since completing Carrie, King has written over 50 novels and nearly 200 short stories. He has sold over 350 million copies of his books and many of them have been adapted into films and mini series.
J.K. Rowling
Before J.K. Rowling found fame with Harry Potter, she considered herself a failure. She had a failed marriage. She was jobless and raising a child by herself. She was clinically diagnosed with depression and contemplated suicide.
Rowling wrote the first Harry Potter book while on welfare. You might think after the outrageous success the books had that publishers would have killed for the chance to publish the book. You would be wrong. The book was submitted to twelve publishing houses, all of which rejected it.
We know the rest of the story. Rowling ended up writing seven Harry Potter books in total, which turned into eight films. According to Forbes, she became the first billionaire writer and the second-richest female entertainer.
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These stories show the failures of some of the most well known artists of our time. Each one reached a low point in their careers, but was able to overcome them and move on to great things.
Failure is not uncommon, it is inevitable. Click To TweetIf you are to learn anything from these people it’s that failure is not uncommon, it is inevitable. It is only by making it through these failures that one will find success.
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Thanks to Business Insider for the list of failures.
“The brave may not live forever, but the cautious do not live at all.” – Richard Branson
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When you look back on your life, will you be happy with what you see?
If you want to leave a lasting impact, you have to be willing to take chances. Click To TweetIf you want to leave a lasting impact, you have to be willing to take chances. Otherwise, you will look back in disappointment.
Look at the world’s most memorable people. Do you think they were cautious?
What would the world be like if our forefathers didn’t fight for our freedoms? What would life be like if Guttenberg hand’t taken a chance and built a printing press? What if Edison decided building a more efficient light bulb wasn’t worth the effort?
We must be brave if we want to achieve our dreams. Click To TweetWe must be brave if we want to achieve our dreams. Cautious people accept their fate and life. There is nothing wrong with the cautious life. Just don’t expect things to happen to you. You have to seek them for yourself.
If you want to make a living from your art, you must be intentional about it. If you want people to recognize you for your gifts, you can’t just create and expect people to find you.
I’m not saying it will be an easy or short journey. It is scary putting yourself and your work on the line.
We fear rejection. We fear our work won’t be good enough. We fear failure.
People have fought and died for what they believe in. Is putting your art out there really that scary?
Make your life worth looking back on. Click To TweetLiving the life of your dreams takes bravery. Stop being so cautious. Make your life worth looking back on.
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” – Aristotle
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It was only after writing every single day did I become a more consistent and better communicator. Two years ago, I barely wrote at all and I was definitely not writing down ten ideas a day.
Since then, much has changed. I write at least 100 words every morning. Writing each day has helped clarify ideas I have in my mind. It has helped me grow an audience of dedicated artists who want to share their art with the world.
The blank slate is a terrifying thing. It is only when you begin to fill it that the world makes sense. Would I be able to get my ideas out there if I didn’t write daily? Probably, but, those thoughts would not be as refined. The habit of writing has helped bring incredible clarity into my life.
Before I found James Altucher’s ten ideas a day, I always had trouble coming up with ideas. Occasionally one would come into my head but it would die just as quickly.
Writing down ten ideas a day has made me an idea machine. It has shown me how to break projects down into manageable and actionable pieces. It has allowed me to write some of my most popular posts. It has given me direction when interviewing people for my podcast. If I didn’t practice this daily, I would not be where I am today.
You can not achieve excellence without habit. Click To TweetYou can not achieve excellence without habit. Shakespeare did not write his plays in a single day. Mozart did not compose concertos in a night. Michelangelo did not paint the Sistine Chapel over a weekend.
Habits create the foundation of greatness. Don’t believe in the exaggeration of the overnight success. People do not achieve success instantaneously. They achieve it through consistent and focused repetition.
“One who makes no mistakes makes nothing.” – Giacomo Casanova
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The blank slate is one of the scariest things an artist faces. Every time I create something new, I can’t help but feel a little worried.
I am worried that my work won’t be good enough. I am worried that people won’t like it. I worry that people will criticize it.
These are mostly irrational fears. I know that. But that doesn’t mean my mind is immune from having these thoughts.
One of the causes of these fears is the perfection curse. As artists, there is always something we can nitpick about our work. We are our own worst enemies.
We want to create art that meets our own lofty expectations. This means, we tweak a work to death. We want to get it just right before we let it out into the world. Although this may seem admirable, it often causes us to sit on certain pieces for far too long.
You can try all you want, but you will never attain perfection. Click To TweetI’ll let you in on a little secret. Nothing is perfect. You can try all you want, but you will never attain perfection. Let go of the notion that your work should be free of mistakes. Embrace the mistakes instead.
You need to know when something is good enough. I love the idea of iteration. Release your work and get feedback from it. Learn from your mistakes, and improve upon them.
If you are afraid to make work without mistakes, you will never make anything. Click To TweetIf you are afraid to make work without mistakes, you will never make anything.
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