No Muse

Talent is the gift we are born with. As much as I try, I can’t make my wing span grow any larger. Skills, on the other hand, are everything else we can attain through practice and work. Coding is a skill. No one is born a great coder. And so is baking, driving, and really most things we do as humans. Some people think we can bypass the hard work of mastering our craft by waiting for inspiration. A muse that can whisper the perfect cord progression on the song you are writing. Genius that inspires us to create a masterpiece.

Unfortunately, there is no Santa. And the muse isn’t real either. No invisible, mystical entity that is waiting to come by and give us the inspiration we need to do our work. What a relief! We don’t need to take a ticket and get in line to start. So then, where do all the good ideas for your screenplay going to come from then? Simple. They are not going to come. You write and write and write. Sometimes it’s good. A lot of times it is bad. But you keep getting ever so slightly better, taking the criticisms and feedback, applying it to the work, and continuing to explore the edges until something your produce resonates. The more swings you get the more chances you have at a homerun.

We like to believe that if we wait long enough the muse will come to save us as we wander the desert of creativity but you will be waiting for a long time. Since you are waiting, you might as well get to work anyway.