Category: Philosophy & Musings

IMHO, the key to reliably producing quality results means combining “speed of perception” with consistent audacity.  The faster you perceive what fits in your story, and the more audacious you are in instantiating it, the higher the pay-off for your audience, and the faster you can cycle on to a better project, which in turn…

To me, being an author is 20% reading (research), 80% daily word count, and 0% waiting for inspiration.

There is no inherent salvation in structure.  Adhering to structure can often lead to effective action, which can induce a positive course of events, but structure alone is not enough.  One must be EFFECTIVE.  And to do that, one must constantly question whether the structure is serving them…or if they’re serving the structure.  

For me, the premise behind living a disciplined life is so that when order breaks down, or reality turns into an ambiguous soup of opportunity/peril, you have the basics covered well enough so that you can focus on making big, audacious leaps.  Discipline is not an end in and of itself—if that stance is taken,…

Most will blindly justify structure and tradition, claiming they should be perpetuated because “that’s how things were done in the past,” or “that’s what worked for [some vaunted figurehead.]”.  But IMHO, perpetuation is only justified if it achieves the desired results while upholding an ethical standard.  If either of those parameters are not being met,…

Most of us love simplicity, but ironically, most of us hate doing what it takes to produce it.  A 2-hr movie is powered by HUNDREDS of work hours.  A house is more than just a set of walls; it is a network of structural supports, wiring, and plumbing.  A user-intuitive smartphone is a dazzling array…

In my opinion, being willing to aggressively test and challenge one’s beliefs is essential to developing a set of values worth believing in.

From what I’ve seen, strength of imagination is unimportant—eternal archetypes/tropes call to us in countless voices, asking that they be reiterated over and over, winking in and out of an infinity of soul-brightening incarnations, triggered by phrases that starts as simply as “What if ___”  No it’s not the strength of imagination that’s important… What’s…

(IMHO) At their basest levels, all disciplines/endeavors must serve some practical function.  One level above that, they are expressions of healthy competition, or new conduits for novelty.  But at the highest level, they serve as mirrors into our beings, reflecting our weaknesses and deepest tendencies back to us, allowing us to recognize and hack our…

“Addiction to potentiality must never get in the way of doing stuff.  (Translation:  Get past the fun part of throwing around a premise, and put that elbow grease in so that it manifests it into something real).”   —People who don’t just talk about novelty, but strive to produce it