Quotes About Inspiration

The men who have changed the universe have never gotten there by working on leaders, but rather by moving the masses. Working on leaders is the method of intrigue and only leads to secondary results. Working on the masses, however, is the stroke of genius that changes the face of the world. NAPOLEON BONAPARTE, 1769-1821

If you work on yourself first, as Faraday did, developing a solid work ethic and organizational skills, eventually the right teacher will appear in your life.

man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the luster of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty. —RALPH WALDO EMERSON

Think Like a Writer

For every famous martyr there are thousands more who have inspired neither a religion nor a rebellion, so that if martyrdom does sometimes grant a certain power, it does so unpredictably.

It is in fact the height of selfishness to merely consume what others create and to retreat into a shell of limited goals and immediate pleasures. Alienating

When the job you are doing is neither above nor below your talents but at your level, you are neither exhausted nor bored and depressed. You suddenly have new energy and creativity.

Reconnect with Your Childhood Obsession

To help yourself to cultivate serendipity, you should keep a notebook with you at all times.

Daily Law: Do something that makes you feel at the peak of your being today. Mastery, I: Discover Your Calling—The Life's Task

This is The Primary Law of the Creative Dynamic that you must engrave deeply in your mind and never forget: your emotional commitment to what you are doing will be translated directly into your work.

Right from the beginning, your troops must see you leading from the front, sharing their dangers and sacrifices—taking the cause as seriously as they do. Instead of trying to push them from behind, make them run to keep up with you.

Descubrió de este modo que, al dibujar cosas, tenía que observarlas con más detenimiento y captar los detalles que les daban vida.

He who has a why to live can bear with almost any how. —Friedrich Nietzsche

Periodically return to your original vision and imagine the immense satisfaction you will have when it comes to fruition.

Debes creer en algo, y con tal firmeza que anime todos tus gestos y encienda tu mirada. Un prerrequisito de la creencia ardiente es una gran causa que junte a las personas, una cruzada.

You must alter your very concept of creativity and try to see it from a new angle. Most often, people associate creativity with something intellectual, a particular way of thinking. The truth is that creative activity is one that involves the entire self—our emotions, our levels of energy, our characters, and our minds.

Find Inspiration from Your Heroes

Daily Law: Are there people whose work affects you in a powerful way? Analyze this and use them as models. Mastery, I: Discover Your Calling—The Life's Task

Leonardo was eager to learn all of these skills, but soon he discovered in himself something else: he could not simply do an assignment; he needed to make it something of his own, to invent rather than imitate the Master.

Leaders who try to dissolve that distance through a false chumminess gradually lose the ability to inspire loyalty, fear, or love. Instead they elicit contempt.

El aislamiento es tan fatal para las artes creativas como para las artes sociales.

Sooner or later something seems to call us onto a particular path. You may remember this something as a signal calling in childhood when an urge out of nowhere, a fascination, a peculiar turn of events struck like an annunciation: This is what I must do, this is what I've got to have. This is who I am. —James Hillman

Un verso [de un poema] quizá pueda llevarnos horas; pero si no parece una inspiración del momento, todo el trabajo habrá sido en vano. LA MALDICIÓN DE ADÁN, WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS, 1865-1939