About Until You Drop

Post 1041:

Maybe they warn against making judgments because we’re wrong a whole hell of a lot. Really. We have to assess values, it’s inevitable, but God knows we stink at it. Mostly the moment is too momentary—that is, perspective and wisdom are often lacking.

This is the world though. It’s too complicated and too hard and just too much. I hardly meet a soul who isn’t overwhelmed, underpaid, overtaxed, or underappreciated.

Oh well I guess. The world isn’t changing anytime soon.

The creative arts can be particularly hard to judge. Who decides what’s good and all that… well, the creator is often the most critical, and I’d like to criticize that for a moment if you’ll indulge me.

Sometimes when I look back on a book or song I wrote years ago, I have a completely different opinion than I had at the time. What once was great is average, what once was crap is now a gem that I couldn’t see. In another ten years maybe it’ll all shift again.

The point is to not waste too much time judging your own work. One thing you can do to simplify is work until you fall over or pass out. There’s nothing subjective about going full balls on a project and then passing out drooling on the person next to you. That’s objectively terrible, true, but there’s a bit of beauty in anything objective.

Or at least that’s what my judgment tells me.

Cheers and see you after.