“In the abundant world, we have a greater capacity to complete and release our work. When there are so many ideas available and so much great art to make, we’re compelled to engage, let go, and move forward. If there’s only one work to do, and we intend to retire when it’s done, there’s no impetus to finish. If each piece is approached as our life’s defining work, we revise and overwrite endlessly, aiming for the unrealistic ideal of perfection. A musician may delay releasing an album, for fear they haven’t taken the songs as far as they can go. Yet an album is only a diary entry of a moment in time, a snapshot reflection of who the artist is for that period, and no one diary entry is our life story. 

“Our life’s work is far greater than any individual container: the works we do are, at most, chapters. There will always be a new chapter, and another one after that. Though some might be better than others, that is not our concern. Our objective is to be free to close one chapter and move onto the next, and continue that process for as long as it pleases us. Your old work isn’t better than your new work, and your new work isn’t better than your old work. There will be highs and lows throughout an artist’s life. To assume there was a golden period, and you’re past it, is only true if you accept that premise. Putting your best effort in at each moment, in each chapter, is all we can ever hope to accomplish. 

“There’s always more we can improve or another version to be made. We can work on something for another two years, and it will be different—but there’s no way to know if it will be better or worse. Only different. Just as you will be. And you may have evolved past the work you just spent years laboring on. The direct reflection of you has faded. The work begins to look like an old photo rather than a mirror image. It’s disspiriting to complete and share a work you’ve lost connection with. 

“The recognition of abundance fills us with hope that our brightest ideas still await us, and our greatest work is yet to come. We’re able to live in an energized state of creative momentum, free to make things and let them go, free to make the next thing and let it go. With each chapter we make, we gain experience, improve at our craft, and inch closer to who we are.”

—Rick Rubin The Creative Act

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