So how do we proceed? How should we live our lives? How do we approach our art? How do we shape our legacy?
I believe there’s no way to anticipate what we will leave behind. There’s certainly very little we can do to control what that will be, for more than a few decades, anyway.
All we can do is let ourselves be guided by the strongest intuition we have:
What is it you love?
Do you love to paint landscapes? Still lifes? Clowns? Paint them!
Do you love to sell your work? Sell with all your heart.
Do you love to see your name in print? Submit your work to every publication/exhibition/website you can.
Do you love to teach? Teach!
Do you love to write about art? Write!
Do you love to support yourself with your art? Be the professional you want to be, learn the skills you need, and sit in the driver’s seat of your art automobile.
Do you resent trying to make your art a business? Do the work you love to earn a living, and focus on keeping your art making open-ended and fun.
Trying to set a balance between all this? Set the balance that’s right for you.
What matters, in the end, is the kind of life you strive to lead. The ripple effect of your actions in the world—the kindnesses, love, energy, opportunities you were given, and in turn gave to others, create wavelets that move far past our own seeing. We have to simply trust they carry our best intentions, wherever they go.
What comes after, whatever is made of our efforts, when we are gone, whatever it is those others who come after will understand, will be what serves their need, not ours.
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