how to fly a horse - The Secret History of Creation, Invention and Discovery by Kevin Ashton.
This book was recommended by a friend and it certainly has not disappointed.
It is a book filled with interesting historical inventions laced with creative inspiration, such as
“Stories of creation follow a path. Creation is destination, the consequence of acts that appear inconsequential by themselves but that, when accumulated, change the world. Creating is an ordinary act, creation its extraordinary outcome.”
“But creation comes for ordinary acts.”
“Work is the soul of creation. Work is getting up early and going home late, turning down dates and giving up weekends, writing and rewriting and reviewing and revising, rote and routine, staring down the doubt of a blank page, beginning when we do not know where to start, and not stopping when we cannot go on. It is no fun, romantic, or, most of the time even interesting. If we want to create, we must, in the words of Paul Gallico, open our veins and bleed.”
“To create is to work. It is that easy and that hard.”
“And all that is necessary is to begin.”
All of this sounds now like the masters I finished earlier this year - it was like that. My friends fell by the way side, as they simply didn’t understand why I was studying at my age, according to them I was boring not wanting to go out.
Somebody asked me recently what I missed from my masters (she too had done a masters, not in fine arts - so understood the involvement) -
I miss that stick behind the door with due dates and being challenged by others. But mostly I miss the complete indulgence a masters gives you. That complete immersion into your practice, as once you finish, first you breathe a sigh of relief and then you rebuild some of those broken friendships. And then life takes over.
So reading a book like this created a better understanding of why you make so much headway in a masters programme. The trick is now to incorporate this same dedication into my practice.