Ignore Everyone (at least at first)

If you want to be creative, actually live creatively, Hugh MacLeod has some great advice for you. His new book, “Ignore Everybody and 39 Other Keys to Creativity” offers encouragement for artists and entrepreneurs, but everybody should read it. After all, creativity is humanity’s birthright—not just that of artists or visionaries. As MacLeod says in his insightful little volume, “Everyone is born creative; everyone is given a box of crayons in kindergarten.”

As someone who attempts to live from the soul, to be true to my creative callings, who spends the majority of my time in artistic endeavors, I find “Ignore Everybody” encouraging, inspiriting, affirming. But it’s not just for people like me. As a book about ideas and ways of living, it’s as much for new mothers as novelists, accountants as much as artists, makeup counter salespeople as much as musicians.
What is being creative except being true to yourself—to your very own unique, idiosyncratic individuality?

Since our best selves are our creative selves, MacLeod’s work should be viewed as a lifestyle advice—strategies for being your truest, most original, most you, you.

“Ignore Everybody” shares how when Hugh MacLeod was a struggling young copywriter, living at a YMCA, he started to doodle on the backs of business cards while sitting at a bar. Those cartoons eventually led to a popular blog – gapingvoid.com – and a reputation for pithy insight and humor, in both words and pictures.

MacLeod has opinions on everything from marketing to the meaning of life, but one of his primary subjects is creativity. How do new ideas emerge in a cynical, risk-averse world? Where does inspiration come from? What does it take to make a living as a creative person?

“Ignore Everyone” expands on his sharpest insights, wittiest cartoons, and most useful advice.

Of course we shouldn’t really ignore everyone. We all need trusted counsel, we all benefit from editing, from being questioned and challenged. Openness to criticism, to feedback, to advice helps us become even better, keeps us grounded, but as MacLeod says, “the more original your idea is, the less good advice other people will be able to give you about it.” He goes on to say, “You don’t know if your idea is any good the moment it’s created. Neither does anyone else.” This is why “good ideas have lonely childhoods” and “the better the idea the more ‘out there’ it will initially seem to other people, even people you like and respect.”

It’s this kind of simple, sage advice that makes “Ignore Everybody” so empowering, compelling, wise.

Here are just a few of the many wonderful keys found in this fine book:

The best way to get approval is not to need it. This is equally true in art and business. And love. And sex. And just about everything else worth having.

Selling out is harder than it looks. Diluting your product to make it more commercial will just make people like it less.

If your plan depends on you suddenly being “discovered” by some big shot, your plan will probably fail. Nobody suddenly discovers anything. Things are made slowly and in pain.

Don’t try to stand out from the crowd; avoid crowds altogether. There’s no point trying to do the same thing as 250,000 other young hopefuls, waiting for a miracle. All existing business models are wrong. Find a new one.

The idea doesn’t have to be big. It just has to be yours. The sovereignty you have over your work will inspire far more people than the actual content ever will.

The best you can ever be is your best self. “Ignore Everyone” encourages you towards being nothing more and nothing less than just that, and gives you strategies for achieving it.

(Because of all the talk about self in the book and in this column, I feel it important to add that this is the beginning, not the end. Being creative, following our own souls, on our own unique paths, is not the end, but the means. The most rewarding thing we can do in life—with our lives as well as our creative endeavors—is share them with others, contribute to our community, to the world, those things only we can. We are given gifts to nurture and develop yes, but mostly so we can give them away. It’s what gifts are for.)