AES71 Advice for Beginners

Nobody tells people who are beginners, is that all of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste.

But there’s a gap.

For the first couple of years what you’re making isn’t so good, it’s trying to be good, it has the ambition to be good, but it’s not quite that good.

But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer.

And your taste is good enough that you can tell what you’re making is kind of a disappointment to you.

A lot of people never get past that phase, a lot of people at that point… They quit.

Everybody that does interesting, creative work, went through a phase of years where they had really good taste but they could tell what they were making wasn’t as good as they wanted it to be.

They knew it fell short, it didn’t have this special thing that we wanted it to have.

Everybody goes through that, it’s totally normal.

And the most important possible thing you can do is a lot of work, do a huge volume of work.

Put yourself on a deadline so that every week or every month you know you’re going to finish one story.

Because it’s only by actually going through a volume of work that you’re going to catch up and close that gap.

And the work you’re making will be as good as your ambitions.

It’s going to take you a while

It’s normal to take a while.

You just have to fight your way through.

-Ira Glass-