Knowing Imagination

This article from Psyche rings true to me. I have had many conversations with friends and colleagues who have encouraged me to take whatever creative product I have just shared and monetize it by finding a commercial outlet. While I find this flattering, I also am displeased by their extrapolation of the product of a creative moment to the realm of the commercial. I know from my experience that thoughts of commercial success and the behaviors that would be expected are dampeners to my imagination and creative process. Although I would enjoy the attention that commercial success implies, I would not trade it for the joy of the imagination, the interaction with the media and tools, the problem solving, and sense of completion- however fleeting. The striving takes me out of the moment, or replaces the in-the-moment joy with attention to the future rather than the now and away from the intensely personal experience into one that invites the judgement of others. I have been fortunate to not have to depend on my amateur interests to make a living- my career took another path related but not the same. And so now retired from that career I can spend more time and attention what I love.

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When I rekindled my relationship with the piano and tapped into my inner amateur, I discovered a quiet room of my own
— Read on psyche.co/ideas/feel-free-to-stop-striving-learn-to-relish-being-an-amateur