You’ve probably had that in your writing, art, and any creative work you care to mention. Added time and effort and technique doesn’t equal added appreciation.

This doesn’t mean we should be slapdash. But I’m just as happy to be efficient with my situation as I am to work on stuff for absolutely ages. If you care about your work, celebrate it all.

And celebrate it as the art that it is.

I keep seeing artists I admire talk about their sketches as if they’re almost not worth thinking about. “I know it’s not much”, they’ll say. Or, “Just a little doodle, no big deal”.

But it’s the little things, the playfulness, the exploration, the curiosity… These things make the art what it is. You could scribble without much thought and still find meaning in it. The narrative may come before, or during, or after you start the art. When it comes to creativity, don’t sell yourself short.

Here are some recent videos of artists talking about play, randomness, doodles, and how they’re so important to their work.

JOHANNA DUMET

“It’s...a game for me.” / “I just accept it and embrace it.” / “I’m just as a child.”

What a good place to start! Art happens, and it’s playful. I’m totally on board with that.

“[The fool is] the most free person […] The fool nowadays is the artist...I’m just one of many fools who is presenting my art.”

Not taking things seriously is part of taking things seriously.

“The paintings are never finished until they are in the gallery.”

It’s still art, just in the process of being finished at any point. Everything is a work in process. A scribble may be a humble beginning to wonder and greatness!

“Everything you learn through your life makes you do what you do now.”

I’ve been creating art for just over a year now. But the decades of life before that were part of the learning process. I just didn’t know at the time.

SHIRAZEH HOUSHIARY

“I first of all think that every human being is an artist.”

In other words, do something. See where it takes you.

“The work of art is an experience. It cannot be described. The moment you try to describe it, you almost destroy it.”

Art is simply what it is. No need for opinions and judgements. Just movement and interaction and existing.

“I have no idea what I’m doing. And I like that because that not knowing is the best part of the process. Because you now make a relationship with something you don’t know.”

Art is formed in many, many ways. A brief moment here, an eternity-and-a-half there. Every time, new bonds are formed.

“Titles are very important, because a title indicates what the experience is like.”

This one is for me, because I love titling each piece to help with a narrative nudge. Take it or leave it, but if I can share a little extra about the relationship I’ve formed with my art, you may appreciate it. Or not. It’s all good.

JOSH SMITH

“There’s nothing to understand. There’s just something to see and something to feel.”

Similar to what Houshiary says. Art happens, relationships start, more emerges from that.

“There doesn’t have to be any precision.”

Your scrappy doodle could be a masterpiece. It could be a scrappy doodle. It may be discarded and it may live on forever. No need to decide straight away or play it down.

“I love cats... I put a cat in there.”

Sometimes you just do the art because you like the art. No big story, no major purpose. If you’re more of a dog person, why not put a dog in your next piece of art?

Or a cat, to juxtapose something. I dunno. It’s all play!

TOM BURCKARDT

The artist literally calls his paintings “very large doodles” in the video.

Burckardt also explains that the meanings and narratives aren’t always apparent at first: “I realised, after I started to make them, that they were much more about light.”

Again, art doesn’t have to be understood in advance for it to form and take shape.

Also again, who’s to say your doodles can’t go on to be in a gallery? Or, at least, maybe other people will see your doodles and fall in love with them? Right there, that’s an experience of art.

BRUNO GADENNE

“I am not one of the artists who always wanted to be an artist. It came gradually.”

Some people decide they want to be an artist when they’re just a few years old. Some call themselves an artist when they’re just a few years old. I hope they keep that title ongoing!

Other people don’t think about being an artist until much later. I started in my mid-40s. It’s been a lifetime coming, but I guess my path has been gradual too, just like Gadenne’s.

No need to deny the art or say you’re not an artist just because you’re no longer a child. Remember what Johanna Dumet says on that point: “Everything you learn through your life makes you do what you do now.”

“There is a whole lot of photographic retouching involved, where I usually completely change the lighting mood. [...] There is a lot of image editing here, but there is always at the origin, at the base, a travel photo.”

Another one for me. My works go through different amounts of post-processing and, sometimes, the final piece is unlike the layering part of the collage. But I’ve still put it together as a collage. Same with all the drawing and coding and photography that may be layered in a piece. I’ve done lots of these things myself, but I call practically every finished item a collage. Is it more like a digital mixed media composition? Maybe. But it doesn’t matter. Y’know, unless I choose for it to matter. Or… if the art decides that’s what it wants to be.

Respect the art’s wishes! 🫡

“It’s up to the viewer to find the thread. I’ll give some clues. And I’m not sure myself if I have all the elements of the story, but I like to suggest things that everyone can then interpret. I know not everyone will know what it is at first glance, and they may have different perceptions...I like the ambiguity.”

Ambiguity is a great place to finish. Once overthinking steps in, ambiguity starts to get problematic. So I embrace the ambiguity, the contradiction, and the unknown. I’m very much with Gadenne and Houshiary on this one—offer clues and titles and descriptions to guide viewers toward your experience. It’s up to the audience to take it or leave it. If your art gives someone else an experience, each time will be unique anyway. Sometimes it takes the initial guidance and sometimes it’s experience at first sight!

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A little extra note: If you create something visual that ends up not engaging you in the way you’d hoped, that art may still be worth sharing. On a few occasions, I’ve posted collages that didn’t quite hit with me, yet I’ve had comments from people saying it’s one of the best things they’ve seen by me.

If that doesn’t speak to how personal the experience of art is for everyone, I don’t know what will.

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To get a taste of where my curiosity has taken me in the past year of creativity, here’s a journey of what I’ve been exploring, told through eight of my most recent collages. And 2,000-ish words.

[The audio version of this has extra chat about the narrative around each piece, so give it a listen if you want more backstory. And more words!]

1. Layers of Impermanence

Torn photos, scrap paper, and a block of Post-Its. No careful cuts or gluing together. The analogue work I do is designed to live on in digital only. The physical is dismantled in the way mandalas can have an impermanence, no longer existing once the intricate form has been completed.

So while I do an increasing amount of physical work in my art, the final pieces are deliberately digital.

But how far to take the digital thing? I’m sure you’ve got views on generative AI, so let’s consider those with my second collage. Don’t worry, it’s not just an AI piece.

2. Visions, Obscured

I source imagery from as many places as possible. A ridiculous number of places. Including paid stuff from big sources and from small independent creatives.

But when I first started, my focus on digital was to make a point of using AI generated imagery to reclaim creativity from it (which I’d been trying to do for years before, breaking the AI algorithms as much as I could to get bizarre and unexpected results). The focus was a play to explore creative pursuits, to engage with what’s acceptable and what’s not, and to firmly keep the debate open on the ethics and important arguments surrounding AI outputs.

Collage has sooooo many examples of artists using material that’s in copyright, or which uses imagery through recognisable brands and faces, or which comes from questionable sources despite copyright not getting in the way (challenging what’s okay to use with/without permission).

The AI images aren’t able to be in copyright in many countries, although that’s strangely different here in the UK. Here, I am effectively allowed the copyright on the AI outputs I’ve prompted for. But that doesn’t matter, because there are still many questions over how the AI models were trained, among other things. In different ways, AI outputs are both fair and unfair game.

Visions, Obscured uses some old poster imagery, some stock photography, and even a couple of digital lines added. But it’s still quite heavy on the AI imagery.

Now my art and collage journey is a year in, I’m using AI outputs less and less. My point was made in my earlier works and I can always go back to them. Part of revisiting the journey. But I do still look at the range of opinions, emotions, and possibilities the world-changing tech of generative AI is introducing. Art needs to simultaneously accept and reject in order to reasonably explore.

A few months ago, I posted an AI image and explained that it was only AI. There was a point and I wasn’t particularly excited at the image’s AI-ness. But a commenter (who doesn’t follow me and has never interacted with me before or after), made a sarcastic remark about how proud I must be for my creation. They also linked to several artworks with similar colours and shapes that they claimed must have been stolen and used in order to make the AI image.

Humanity has been thrown something new, with no instruction book, and told to have fun and argue amongst ourselves. Any attempt to deal with the way LLMs have been introduced is playing catch-up. Worse, it’s too slow to actively manage catching up.

But there are many valid issues and I want them to stay seen. At the same time, rejecting AI in one sweeping gesture looks likely to be similar to rejecting the internet or rejecting phones or rejecting electricity… Kind of doable, but practically impossible.

But over my year of creating art, I’ve worked with AI so I can end up working without it. The remaining pieces use very little, if any, gen-AI stuff. Yet none of it would have come to fruition had I not started my journey by exploring all the new stuff.

I mean, look back at the very first newsletter I published here:

That’s from just over a year and a half ago. Long before I started making art. And here we are, a mere ONE AND A HALF YEARS LATER!

3. The Audacity To Do It

More recently, I try other generative experiments instead of the AI gens. The above piece includes a random blob of transparent noise, plus a load of lines that were drawn in a battle between me and a random line generator. The resulting shapes are fascinating and look great in a collage.

Am I working with a computer program, or am I manipulating imagery in the same way I make art anyway? How many artists combine automation with their sudden interruptions and directions?

My aim is to find interesting ways to make artistic assets that will fit into my collage work. Collage is how I want my artworks to be presented, even though my experiments could form artworks in and of themselves. It very much works to my mantra of “art within art within art”. Zoom out or dive deep, there are more layers of art to be found.

Collage is where I’m at, but let me know if you’d be interested in a series of dedicated automation/interruption pieces. Knowing me, it’d be a chance to take the idea even further.

4. An Outing of Textures

This piece uses photos I took on a walk. The images were supposed to be textures, but I see how the beauty in textures and overlays can be enough that they can form the artwork without any other imagery.

I only walked around the block. It was a nice moment with my family. I wasn’t worried about how the photos were composed, so I just snapped an image and walked on. Casual, in other words.

To be honest, you don’t even need to leave the home to snap a few texture pictures. And once you’ve got them, you can make art with them.

If the near infinite possibility sounds overwhelming, I do make restrictions. For this piece, I loaded the texture photos and applied them in order, one by one, until I had no more images left. No need to think about what piece to use next, no looking around for that perfect asset to place, and no overthinking when there are so little choices to make. All I have is the piece that needs placing on the canvas and the ability to manipulate and cut and crop until the placement is to my liking.

5. ROCKDOG

Photographs, cut up and photographed. Hastily done. Impermanence again, which lets the temporary analogue collage rise up in its layers and stand out in strange ways. I love it!

I placed some faint overlay of another analogue collage (the one below) so it had some extra texture. Other than a little colour grading, you’ve mostly got a photograph of a collage. But it’s not. This *is* the artwork. My choice is deliberate.

As for the narrative, I create with narratives in mind (before, during, and after the creation). But I want you, the viewer, to explore for your own narratives as you look at the image. I can talk about my own thoughts and offer little nudges on things to consider, which can add to the artwork in the same way your own thoughts can. In essence, the artwork lives on long after I’ve released it to the world. That’s the case with all works of art. And even the concept of art.

It’s all to play for and explore.

6. The Missing & The Never

A heavily post-processed analogue collage. I’m so drawn to this piece and I don’t want to stop looking at it. For me, manipulating the collage digitally can be a big part of allowing the stories to come alive in ways that suit me just right.

There are apps with one-click ways of getting weird and wonderful effects to imagery. I prefer to mess around with settings until I find the balance I wish to convey. And it’s fun. 😁

But I still like apps that are easy enough for me to use without taking up loads of my time.

Whether you want one-click or totally manual, a tool I heartily recommend with both methods is Mosh. It doesn’t seem well known, but Mosh is amazing. You can literally click for random stuff if that floats your boat.

But like I say, I’m all about the options. More on that in a moment.

7. Meaning through adversity

Bold colours, a text in German, interesting characters. All sorts going on here.

The image on the left is from a piece by John Elsas, found on Artvee (an amazing resource for public domain art images). The German text also comes from Elsas, which is about meaning through adversity. That features in text twice, and is the name of the piece. Maybe I’m signposting too much… 😅

The images come from various sources, including a couple of things I scanned when testing a new scanner. Analogue becoming digital once again.

The colour scheme and the texture draw me in most. By adding extra noise, a bit of blur, and some posterisation, the image goes to places the original collage didn’t manage.

My collage works are finished when I’ve processed them. I may make another post where I show before and after pics of the artworks. Although the after images are the approved artworks, you may prefer the pre-processed versions. While I like a bit of noise, enjoy upping the contrast, and like changing the hue from time to time, you may prefer more faded tones and less buzz. If so, I’m happy for you to see what I considered work in progress as a more representative artwork for you.

It all counts. Scribble on a scrap paper with a biro and it could be considered a finished piece of art. See a crack in a pavement and it could be considered a discovered piece of art. Look at someone’s WIP and see an already complete piece of art.

Art is not something humanity will ever complete. That said, are we going around in circles or still making key progress?

That question takes us to the final piece today.

8. but is it?

Progress… but is it?

I’ve used images from almost every type of source I grab from for this collage. Stock photography, textures I’ve made, randomly generated patterns, artworks out of copyright, stuff like that. Funnily enough, I don’t think there are any AI outputs used as assets, but I wasn’t trying to make a point—just worked out that way.

The em-dash in that last sentence also just worked out that way. But since I mentioned AI…

I’m a big fan of em-dashes after talked about them a while back. Despite having a degree in English, I’d long ignored the em-dash with a shrug. I used ellipses (…) everywhere instead, but I concede the em-dash serves much much betterer much much more of the time.

Before the em-dash became an AI-spotting thing, I was happily typing Alt-0151 to make the magic appear. I mean, Alt-0151 to produce an em-dash—it’s no wonder peeps are suspicious when even social media posts are littered with them so often now.

My work on art has been a big personal exploration over the past year. For me, it’s progress and a half. But how much does it represent progress beyond that? An unanswerable question, but one I like to chew over. Hence the collage above.

Like the em-dash shenanigans, changes are happening all the time. Societal, technological, and more. But change doesn’t necessarily mean progress. We take steps forward and backward, and it can be immensely scary.

When I see your art, and when I create my own, I see beauty and joy even in the scary moments.

Progress or otherwise, please keep arting your art.

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It's one person with the answers and the other hoping the question hasn't changed in the interim.

In other words, it kinda works—until it doesn’t.

Expertise has limits. Perspectives grow stale.

Creativity is more about the search and discovery. Not that many of our experiences of art at school necessarily looked like that...

In recent months, I've enjoyed collaborating with artists and writers through both private and public projects. It’s made for prolific visual art and poetry, as well as fruitful exploration of methods and techniques.

The emoji that sums up the last few months for me? 🤯🤯🤯

Most recently, and I published our first collab where Joe provides a photograph and I provide a poem.

Here’s an audio reading of Un/Settled:

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The other day, I put together a piece inspired by . Not copying their style or incorporating deliberate elements, but working with certain vibes and letting them appear on the page (or screen in my digital situation!).

has been prompting on Poetry Pals for ages, and I enjoy rising to the challenge (you’ll have seen some here before). Similarly when sends out one-word prompts for writing a poem in 10 minutes (I’ve also posted poetry from that on here), there's an enjoyable collaboration—from both the prompter and also from the growing group of people who post their attempts in a lengthy stream of responses.

Through these community-building events, I’ve got to know numerous amazing creative people. And the wheels keep on turning!

We're working together, building together, exploring together, learning together. Togethering together.

When it comes to art and other curious disciplines, the chance to learn from others for me to walk behind them is useful. But only up to a point. Instead, the chance to collaborate in new ways to bash skills and experiences together seems a much bigger win for both—indeed, all—of us.

We're all mentors, in a sideways learning way—peers swapping tricks and saying, “Oh, I like that!”. Not so much a teacher/student relationship, but two learners at respective points on their journey.

We won't find everyone gels with us. We may prefer to work alone. We can start thinking about which of our 'team' efforts are 'best' even when there aren't actually winners and losers.

So the process isn't always easy. But it's worth pursuing and finding what works for you.

You can even turn back to your finished work and have a meta-moment. When I finish a collage, I find new art and patterns within, as I post-process the image. When I write a poem, I think about a visual representation I could create.

Your past work can mentor your future self. Your future can learn from your past.

You can probably tell by now that I'm driven by a lot of this stuff! 😆

I asked AI about these small collaborations and mini-mentoring moments. It offered a reasonable point:

"Collab-lite: Not quite mentorship, not full collaboration. Just a creative handshake. Call it a gateway drug to trust."

AI loves metaphors…

I've had so many creative handshakes with fellow artists in recent months. The move to trust doesn't take long in most cases and the artistic mood is overwhelmingly friendly.

let me take a selection of his collage work and bring it together into another, single collage. There’s trust in that. Here’s the piece:

So I'm all for reaching out to other creative people to see where it goes. Every time a collaboration occurs, there’s potential for growth in at least one direction. Sometimes I'm more closely the teacher. Sometimes I'm more like the student.

But most times I'm both. As are they. I’m so thankful for the wisdom and kindness they’ve imparted. Sharing is growing!

And for all the exploration, discovery, and learning that we do, something else brilliant happens.

We have a lot of fun in the process.

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P.S. You may have seen a lot of words that start with the letter C in this article. That’s typical for me. C-words seem to have followed me around my whole life. Over the coming months, I’ll introduce more about these words and the impact they’ve had. Also coming soon is a new podcast. The tongue-in-cheek title: “Surrounded by C-words” - And I’m guessing a tagline like, “Connections, Curiosity, Community & Courage in a sea of Cs”, just to ensure peeps that I’m not just being rude!

No particular order, just enjoyable thoughts, poems, and artworks.

Starting with a poem. A #tinyautumnpoem to be exact.

has a quarterly challenge to write a poem in 10 minutes, with no editing. Each day, Beth delivers a one-word prompt… and we write!

Here’s one of those poems, Movement:

Writing with speed and without editing is useful for making any inner editor get out of the way, letting the wonderous words through instead.

I like to let collages through too. Instead of overthinking a situation, I find that running with an idea and letting it emerge is a great way to stay within my style, while also exploring what’s possible around the edges.

Today, I worked on a collage collection around a cup.

Instead of making changes for each piece, I used my original collage and post-processed to bring out different qualities around the same structure. The last piece, Cup 005, mirrors the left half to create what looks like a symmetrical face on the cup.

Parasols. It’s an umbrella term.

Ahem. Swiftly moving on…

My 8-year-old hit his elbow on a chair the other day.

He yelled, “Owwwwww!”

I said, “Did you hurt your funny bone?”

He gave me a funny look, pointed to his elbow, and said, “No! I hit it in my arm-cap.”

And that’s why I love language!

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Okay, another poem!

This time, using prompts that gives in the fantastic Poetry Pals. This one is around Autumn/Fall.

Bracing & Pacing

Autumn broods as if it will live on forever,

Yet scarpers the first moment it gets to leave.

Mad dash, leaves and ash, festering, another turn—

And all I do is put the kettle on.

-

"Do I need a coat?" you ask at the hallway door.

"I haven't checked the weather," I call out.

Too stuffy for coats, too chilly without. We sigh

As I catch up and we both leave, bracing.

-

Once out in the wild of pavements and calm streetlights

We walk to the edge, to woods and good times.

Forgotten are kettle and coats and temperatures;

Remembered is why this is all worthwhile.

A couple of thoughts on art

There’s such an abundance of beautiful art being shared by people. It could feel overwhelming. All those styles and expressions to explore.

That said, I’ve found a particular direction and style that still has plenty of space to discover more from. It’s like I’ve found a magic area that’s currently open for lots of responsible adventure.

I don’t need to feel overwhelmed by extra choices. Instead, I can enjoy all the excellence elsewhere as a visitor.

I am a hard-working, enthusiastic resident in the area I choose to art my art in. And I am an inspired, observant, appreciative visitor to many other areas of artistic beauty.

Everyone has room to art their art where they choose to be a resident. The key, perhaps, is to visit far and wide for inspiration, whilst being resident in only a limited space.

Limiting the space doesn’t limit the possibility and the opportunity—it can actually give more room to be the most welcoming and wonderful resident for all to see.

You might just find yourself getting a lot more visitors, and you might also find yourself happily visiting more places than you’ve visited before.

Enjoy your residency, wherever you’ve pitched up. There’s a world of art. Explore it. And find your home in it.

Here are some of the collages I’ve created in recent days:

The thing about art is that it is (and always has been) an elusive beast.

What do you create is for? What do you enjoy it for?

Love, profit, escape, politics, fun?

Do you create art for yourself, or for others?

Does it cover all this ground, or is art something very specific to you?

There’s no particular answer, even though it’s important. In fact, despite the chaos faced around the world in both local and global proportions, art is crucial.

Art builds bridges, opens conversations, and considers the unknown.

We're all working on masterpieces, waiting to find them—and for them to find us. Whatever you feel art is for, keep going. Feed that elusive beast!

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What has spoken to you from the above? The poetry, the artworks, my brilliant joke about parasols?

Maybe not the parasol thing… 😁

Does that fill you with joy or dread?

For now, some art-heavy discussion!

[Listen along (or instead) with my voice recording of the piece at the top of the article.]

My first post on Substack was all about trying to bridge gaps and find a way to better work with both art and generative AI. But there was only so far I could go with talk of how gen-AI is more about curation than creation.

So I was thankful when I shifted to creating collages. That move seemed to come out of nowhere a couple of months ago. But the truth stretches back much further.

While I’ve been curating stuff with AI, I’ve also been finding my way to more visual creativity. It’s what I’ve wanted to do from an early age, but the scope was limited. Fun, expressive, useful, and wonderful—but still limited compared to my vision.

It’s why I moved to other forms of creativity. Prose, poetry, podcasting. And stuff that doesn’t begin with the letter P. Hey, I’ve even been on TV.

If anything, I felt spoilt for choice with all this, making visual art unnecessary.

Until visual art became the missing link.

I now found myself limited, despite so much fruitful opportunity.

Thankfully, a throwaway joke turned into a serious pivot. I made a ridiculous collage for my 11-year-old, called it an ‘avatar’ and we had a giggle about it he made fun of me.

Yeah, my other kids weighed in on telling me what they thought too. 😭😆

Shortly after our amusement, I stumbled into more serious placement of unlikely imagery. The main artistic drive started with a bear. A bear that’s even found it’s way to being hung up on a wall in a house in Berlin (hello, !).

It’s two months since I started my journey.

And yet, it’s been so much longer in the making. What started as a joke didn’t start there at all. The curiosity goes wayyyyy back!

Stupid Stuff as the Good Stuff

Mike Sowden identifies two types of curiosity—diversive and epistemic. The first is about narrow novelty and newness (a place of clickbait and doomscrolling), while the second is about focused and deep interest (a place of meaningful learning and building skills).

The speed and the sheer amount of stuff on the internet means diversive curiosity is easily served, even though there’s massive possibility for driving epistemic curiosity. Diversive wins out because it's algorithmically pushed and quickly consumed. Sowden explains how the situation means people are exploring loads of stuff on a superficial level, yet limit the deeper learning to a very limited scope of interest.

Sowden's suggested solution? "You just have to try lots of different stuff for no damn reason."

The joke with my son was actually an important piece in my epistemic curiosity, in finding new ways to explore within realms I already understood. A bit of play turned out to be trying different stuff for no reason.

And, in turn, for massive reason! I was working with stuff I knew, but in strange ways I didn't know.

Sowden mentions that too: “…you need to add a little chaos to the proceedings…Maybe even something stupid."

Jokes are clearly a valid path to wonderous things. And you may not even notice.

I certainly didn’t notice what was going on until a few days later, with some actual full-on collage pieces under my belt.

Pivots and shifts aren’t always deliberate. It’s only in retrospect that everything fits in place and the backstory becomes clear. I didn’t mark 25 August on my calendar as a special date, and it’s only because I posted a Note on Substack that I can look back at the specific act that took me down a curious path.

On top of that, the moment only occurred because I’d been doing some digital design before that. And if you go back in time far enough, you get back to my being a 2-year-old boy with my first computer. In between all this, I drew comics for friends and studied designs and logos—not with any outstanding ability, but with a curious mind clear for all to see. That bit’s always been there!

Even though we can be taken by surprise, our run-up to new discovery is subtle.

Stuff was brewing. Stuff brews in all of us. Some stuff may not appear, some stuff may slowly emerge, and some stuff may explode—like magic—as if it hadn’t been brewing at all.

The journey isn't a clearly defined route to a destination—it's every step, every stop, and every situation. The journey is ongoing.

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A Bit About My Process

Back to art being the missing link…

In a previous post, I spoke about art within art. Why start a new artwork when your current piece has other magic to reveal? In many ways, I consider each collage I create as a potential exhibition that works across a theme, or a colour palette, or an exploration of some sort.

The bank of 9 images above is a collection based off a single artwork, which itself is inspired from this collage, Chance Encounter:

Chance Encounter happens to contain elements from many AI generations. I cut parts out to make elements, then I manipulate them to get the right tone and opacity and colour and so on, then I place them and tweak as I see fit.

But because this was from AI assets, I wanted to use stock photos for the next. I’m building up a personal style that works for me, and interested to work out how that style can look with a range of assets.

Unsplash+ has a daily update of premium images, so I grabbed a selection from there as a base to work with. To get an idea:

By Daniel J. Schwarz / By Point Normal / By Polina Kuzovkova / By Natalia Blauth

I somewhat randomly cut elements out and had many laid out in front of me for placement. Not my usual way of working, but another bit of curious fun for me. [Yes, I do impose limits, but that doesn’t always stop me from swerving around in other directions!]

Using the stock elements and a couple of other assets I already had, I created it’s just my way of relaxing:

This piece served as the main artwork, with which I would create other pieces from in post-processing.

A collection takes shape, with a bit of narrative flow. Each work can be appreciated as a standalone and as part of the wider collection. They can be exhibited together for added story and consideration.

Some limits were important, given how much freedom there was here. For instance, I wanted to keep the collection to no more than 10 images. And I already had a rough narrative structure in place. These limits offered a barebones structure to work within, helping not to narrow down the possibilities, but to keep the messiness of discovery manageable.

If you’re interested, here’s an audio interlude of me explaining more about the links between the images. Feel free to skip if it’s TMI.

The final piece in the collection, Admiring the New Pair of Curtains, forms a closure to the collection, but also speaks of superficial matters and a move away from other connections. Think bittersweet, think less satisfactory than expectations, think friction.

In other words, there’s been a desire to bridge gaps and find connections, but there’s still work to be done. There always is.

Everything Has Come Together With Curiosity

It’s clear that I’ve been seeking to bridge gaps all along. These digital artworks still come from a place of curation, just like I’ve been doing with the work on generative AI. I’m still finding things, making links, bringing stuff together.

Finally, the AI imagery stops jutting out, even though it’s still clearly and deliberately visible. A lot of this art has been a purposeful effort toward a balanced and healthy past, present, and future. All part of my plan for Ongoing in the first place.

To think I missed this point almost as much as I mysteriously found it!

Well-worn ideas of journeys in life often sound twee or simplistic. They don't really work with easy beginnings and middles and endings. The past/present/future won’t align in a perfect pattern with neon guides and massive arrows pointing the way.

Without curiosity, matters can get even muddier. That’s why the Ongoing Network celebrates curiosity as a superpower, especially when viewed through a lens of a balanced past, present, and future. That’s also why none of it is easy, despite it being practically essential.

Substack is filled with “hero’s journey” articles that outline the history, background, and intentions of the writer. In a weird way, I sense that the greater clarity in what I’m doing makes for an increasingly disjointed journey. There’s a nagging contradiction and confusion to it all. Which makes sense. After all, two of my favourite things are contradiction and words beginning with the letter C.

You’ll soon find this out when I introduce my two frameworks for curiosity. In a nutshell, these frameworks allow for different types of discovery. One acts as a hierarchy with curiosity as the main starting point to encompass everything else. The other has curiosity as a central node, with all other nodes working off it. Between the two frameworks, a lot of useful ground is covered, with room to tweak as needed for anything that’s left.

All of which leaves me with a rather rambling post. Kind of fitting really.

As with my sudden/eventual/slow move into art, the journey is more of a ramble across different terrains, at various speeds, with many side-quests along the way.

The Chance Encounter collage above led to another collage, which led to an entire collection of work. Where did that side-quest begin and end? For me, that part of the adventure has come to a satisfactory conclusion, ready for the next step of my ongoing journey.

I also know I’m probably wrong. Chance Encounter wasn’t necessarily a beginning, while my conclusion isn’t necessarily the end.

Put another way, I step back from each artwork to consider what it is now, what it harks back to, and what comes next. Each collage serves as a beginning, an end, a loop, a step, a moment, a thought, an invitation, a provocation, and an urge.

It’s enough to make my head spin. And I love it. I get to be a hero, an anti-hero, and all the other heroes. But I’m not at the centre of the story. I’m simply a bunch of heroes in the same way you’re a bunch of heroes too. We’re loads of things—multitudes—winding our way on a journey that’s got everything and nothing to do with us.

The next step is usually filled with curiosity or fear… or both. Either way, it’s ongoing.

What will your next step be?

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And I want to share all sorts. Instead of leaving the newsletter quiet for ages, what better way to showcase the importance of curiosity at all stages than to demonstrate what’s going on.

Everything is linked—everything is related. Curiosity brought me to a surprise route into art when I needed it more than ever. I’m just over a month and a half into a brand new creative avenue.

It’s about time I made the journey (and the curiosity) more apparent here. In essence, creating more curious work within the work I’m doing. Stepping back to see increasing layers, whilst also moving forward to see further details.

In the two parts below, a look at how one artwork can give rise to so much more.

Part 1 - Different Moods

I love how a finished piece of art can contain brand new offerings. A new canvas can appear out of a finished one.

The collage below is called "not in the mood". Ready to show the world.

That artwork would normally be the endpoint—but I could sense unfinished business.

With so much going on in the piece, I wanted to isolate some of it and create an entirely new piece out of this collage.

A bit of post-processing later, and I got this pattern, which I call "Mood":

Totally different to the original collage, but I still felt more needed to be said. The endpoint still not yet discovered.

My perspective kept shifting. Mood looked like it wanted to tell more than one story, but the piece was fixed in an unsatisfactory loop.

Having a narrative endpoint that leaves much to be considered is absolutely fine. An active audience plays a huge part in moving the conversation further.

But the creative process still had me involved at this stage. I wanted to move things on. There was more art within the art.

I turned Mood on its side and isolated a section to give a clearer idea of the narrative I was working toward. The apt title for this was "Changeable Mood":

But given that I wanted the friction and juxtaposition to feel more alive, I chose to turn the piece into a 2-frame movement, "Changeable Mood Animation":

Although I prefer the portrait aspect, it works in landscape perspective too—telling a different story, or another version of the same story. I added “(side alternative)” to separate this from the portrait version to make the point.

And this formed a satisfying endpoint for me.

Kind of.

There is still so much left for the viewer to consider, but I now feel able to move away from the work and appreciate the journey taken.

I'm also happy that several pieces came out of the process. For some, the animated works may not work as well as the still artworks. Everyone, artist and audience, has a different endpoint. Maybe the original collage is where a viewer feels everything could have been left. And perhaps there's still a lot missing for another viewer. It's all valid and part of the process.

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Part 2 - Hum

Another pattern came out of my exploration from the original collage. This one wasn’t supplementary or additional to the collage. Instead, I had something standalone.

Yes, the piece was waiting to be found in the details. But this time, the origin didn’t matter in the same way. Its relationship merely coincidental.

I call the piece, Hum.

The piece moved me to the point where I wrote a poem to accompany the art.

Hum

Gathering feels right—
Belonging appears.
No noise, no rush,
Just threads and hums
Held closely;
Dizzy bursts.

Folded,
Whispered,
Fragments that continue and co-exist.
Cooperate? If only the near silence
Other than loving hum
Would overtake the gloomy bloom
Within the endless stretch.

Like folded hands
In prayer for all.
Turns out, it seems,
That hum has plans
Beyond the reach,
Yet soon within the grasp.

With all this going on, another two patterns emerged. And yet…

For the patterns below, I love how they look, but I’ve not even given them names. Patterns, not even supplementary artworks.

Because it’s all subjective. The only thing making Hum an artwork of its own accord is my personal choice.

Untitled Pattern

For this one, I keep looking at it—appreciating more and more. Almost as if it’s more than just a pattern. But I keep it locked away, in this low position.

Boundaries help make sense of things while not making much sense of anything. It's a playful friction. And there's room for change within that friction. So I could use the above pattern as an asset, or use it to find new artworks within it, or I could decide further down the line to give this piece more recognition and assign it a title and further narrative.

Sounds arrogant and pretentious, to be honest. But it's part of the creative process. In a way, the boundaries are more for the artist than the artworks.

I've already hyped up the pattern above, yet denied it a title. And I prefer it to the pattern below. A pattern I’m still very happy to see in existence, yet in even lower position to the above pattern with no name or credentials.

What do you think?

Untitled Pattern

Maybe you're looking at this final pattern and you find it the most satisfying of everything you’ve seen so far in this post. That’s entirely valid.

Context matters too. If any of these were, say, patterns on a carpet, that placement would make me choose this final pattern as the most favoured of all. The original collage, “not in the mood” would be least favoured.

A carpet, a clothing design, a gallery wall, an outdoor event, a magazine… Placement is important.

In fact, everything plays a part. Artists, audience, artwork... All of it!

There is art within art and art beyond art too. Arrogant and pretentious, but also playful and curious.

It’s all here, on show, sometimes bold and clear, other times hiding in plain sight.

Have fun, explore, and see how context matters ongoing.

Where will the next canvas take you?

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I’ve been writing a lot behind the scenes, including a dedicated 1,000 words or more daily in ’s September challenge.

But long story short, I’ve spent the past couple of weeks on an even broader range of curious discovery than usual. Among other things, I’ve been doing a self-learning crash course on collage art.

Far from feeling a sense of imposter syndrome, as I discussed here in May, I’m happy to throw myself into unknown territory and give it a go.

If anything, the process helps me to feel more a part of the places I wish to frequent. Following so many incredible artists and illustrators here and all over the place, I feel more usefully and practically connected. Regardless of whether anyone else appreciates what I put together, the collage art is meaningful and special to me. If that enjoyment spreads further afield, that’s a bonus.

A number of new opportunities have opened up through the fortnight I’ve spent exploring in different ways. The art aspect is the biggest thing, so I’d like to share with you three of the works.

1. There Is No ‘I’

Starting with my latest piece, There Is No ‘I’ explores the way people are complex and multi-faceted, but can so often be seen (especially online) in two-dimensional ways.

So much happens beneath the surface that even the individual doesn’t fully know their own mind. For some, the self is as much a mystery as the external world.

This piece was also an opportunity to work with a couple of new tools that I’ve just got my hands on. Tools are great, so long as you don’t collect them in the hope more tools will equal more art. It doesn’t—more art equals more art!

2. Escapes

This piece is what started it all off for me. Almost by accident, I placed a couple of pictures together and realised I could blend and layer them. After some proper thought and manipulation, I had a contrasting background scene with a blue door.

It made me think of the many frictions in the world right now, not to mention wider global issues like the climate crisis. I had an image of a bear from another project, so I made a cutout of the bear and gave them a bluer tone.

The placement of the bear not only seemed to shape the scene well, but also gave it a longing perspective toward the blue door. Similarity and contrast made this piece pop—I couldn’t look away, and I knew I’d stumbled upon something special.

The ideas from creating the piece, combined with the door, led me to call the piece Escapes. Escapes to what, I’m not sure, but that seemed to make the title even more apt.

3. More Than a Daydream

Since I’ve showed you my first and my latest piece, More Than a Daydream represents the midway point in my initial burst of collage creativity.

A fantastical piece that’s familiar and other-worldly. Like the character to the right having a vision of sorts. It’s hard to say what is past, present, and future. It’s tough to tell what is hopeful and what is out of reach. It’s difficult to know if any of it represents a reality or a fantasy.

I like this piece just for the way it is. The story itself doesn’t seem like it’s mine to tell. I’m being allowed in on someone else’s ponderings, leaving me none the wiser, but filled with wonder and appreciation.

I wish the character well! It is but a snapshot, even if it is More Than a Daydream, as the title states. So I can only assume things have moved on, just as time does for us all.

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Over to you!

Do any of these artworks resonate with you? Would you like to see more while I continue to learn more about collage? Have you got anything specific you’d like to see in a future collage? And does hearing more about the process itself sound interesting to you?

I’d absolutely love to hear what you think, so please drop me a comment about any of this.

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Grandma lived in a small bungalow for decades. 42 years. It was her special place, her calm and inviting space.

She called her home, "Solitude". A stone plate proudly stated this at the front of the house, even though the place itself had a number, not a name.

Solitude was Grandma's name for this joyous place she called home. And she took the quiet strength of this solitude everywhere she went.

I saw this quotation in the Farnam Street newsletter yesterday:

“Solitude is a condition of peace that stands in direct opposition to loneliness. Loneliness is like sitting in an empty room and being aware of the space around you. It is a condition of separateness. Solitude is becoming one with the space around you. It is a condition of union.” — Kent Nerburn

Grandma's outlook was always one of generosity and togetherness. Solitude wasn't just about the bungalow she lived in, but a peaceful way of living, with a respect for wherever she was and for everyone she spent time with.

The relaxation I felt every time I visited had nothing to do with the bricks and mortar, nor the style of decoration. That serenity was brought about by a big, accepting heart. Solitude engulfed me and I felt that union. It was hard not to. With a laugh in her words, I would be greeted with "Hello stranger, how wonderful!" or "How nice to see you, Martin!" or "I'm so glad you're here, how are you?".

That's the condition of union right there. Sums it up well.

Another thing I saw yesterday was a Substack Note from :

Needing the "healing of time alone" is a big deal.

And while I may be extrovert who recharges through connecting with others, I still believe there's a need for alone time. I feel it when practicing qigong daily or when I have a walk on my own. I can go introspective even if I'm not introverted.

In other words, though we have many different ways of perceiving the world and working within it, solitude can benefit us all in one way or another.

I've been left reflecting on Grandma's sense of solitude and how it went way beyond time alone and quiet moments. She lived in a way that prioritised a sense of purpose and connection with others.

So, how can you and I work toward our own solitude? What practices can help us transcend the empty room and actually become one with the space around us?

I've come to realise that, after having spent so much lovely time in wonderful fellowship and conversation with my grandmother-in-law, that there are certain principles that seem to align with the beautiful life she led:

1. Embrace a calm simplicity with a strong sense of purpose/duty and a generous mindset toward others (and yourself).

2. Find balance of celebrating others deeply and compassionately whilst also working inward with self-acceptance and peace.

3. Develop presence and a mindful outlook (even with a strong will and an assertive confidence!).

4. Connect with nature and art and life as broadly as you can, physically, mentally, and spiritually.

These principles start by accepting yourself and what truly matters to you. This is no easy task, as we are often compelled to do things far more than wanting or needing to do it.

With time and practice, you can direct your energies toward purpose and generosity. Just remember that the generosity begins with yourself and that peaceful acceptance and understanding you extend to others.

Outward compassion and inward peace is a balance. Looking to the world as a whole, it's clear the balance is hard to manage. We are flawed and strong. We are still and active. We are only ever in the moment, even though past and future keep on calling.

Within this mix, assertiveness and confidence can work alongside mindfulness and peace. The more this mix is nurtured and accepted, the stronger our connection to the world and a deeper understanding of ourselves.

This can all be made possible through connecting and engaging with the many beautiful things we encounter. This includes nature and art and just about everything we encounter. Even online! And even for things that don't have a tangible presence. Impossible thoughts and feelings aren't impossible if you've thought of felt them.

Within the four principles, there are infinite possibilities for peace and joy—both within and beyond yourself, leading to a deeper sense of connection.

I publish this piece today, in part to celebrate the life of a wonderful, deeply caring person, and in part to help that condition of union extend as far and as wide as possible. Solitude is about togetherness even when alone.

There's a yin-yang quality about solitude. And some of you will know I'm a sucker for that. Yin needs yang and vice versa. It's why the yin-yang symbol has a little bit of yang inside yin and a little bit of yin inside yang.

When Grandma let people into her home and into her heart, it didn't break the solitude—the solitude extended in powerful peace.

-

As a little extra, has a seasonal poetry challenge in which she offers a one-word prompt to write a poem in 10 minutes, without editing. Today's challenge was "REMEMBERED" which is, of course, incredibly fitting for my family given the circumstances.

So I spent 10 minutes prior to the funeral, writing the following piece, which I'll leave you with. In peace, love, and solitude. Martin.

-

REMEMBERED

We celebrate a life today

By knowing they are here no more

We feel some unexpected things

That floor us and then bring up sore

Wounds that used to be monuments

Not torn down but somewhat changing

Into fragments we can’t reach now

And that keep on rearranging

All the while supporting others

With their own landmarks of memory

As they fumble with pleasantries

And seek to give out remedies

They know won’t work yet have to try

Because it’s what you do at times

Like this where all the feels are felt

Emotions at a high and climbs

To heights you’ve never felt before

As smiles and tears and fears explode

In every way and every shape

And none of it can you decode

A good life led with all the love

A calling now to pastures new

And while we miss what once was here

It won’t be long. We’ll see you soon.

The good news is that I see many people on Substack doing a fantastic job of speaking and narrating their beautiful articles. Their newsletters also have audio versions, which is excellent. It doesn't matter if there are stutters or pauses, or if there are sounds going on elsewhere. It doesn't need to sound professional or like a studio recording. You don't need to tidy up the audio one bit, add filters, or check for anything. Just record it once and let it go.

I celebrate you and think there's no need to apologise or point out that it's rough audio or that something might offend people. We're human beings; we say um from time to time and have noises around us. I can hear an aircraft overhead right now; you may hear it, you may not. None of it matters.

[In fact, if you want to compare the raw audio with an enhanced version using a free online tool from Adobe, the enhanced version is below… Do you think it sounds better, or that it’s lost its edge?]

So, I thought I'd say that anything you decide to push out with an audio version is wonderful. Bring it on because some people want and need the audio to appreciate, read, and enjoy your work. Others will only look at the text, so it won't make a difference either way. The different ways we do things provide variation and options for people in various circumstances.

I want to celebrate that and say if you just want to hit record and say something, that can be good enough for a post. There's even a tool I use at times like these where I'll record some words, and have the words tidied up. They remain pretty much my words, and I’m still free to edit afterwards, as I deliberately have at the end of this sentence. [But to make a point, I’ve left practically all the text as per the tidied transcript, so you can see where it differs from the audio. And I’m putting full-on extra text inside square brackets, so it’s clear.]

The service I use at the moment is amazing, and I wholeheartedly recommend it. It's called audiopen.ai. Everything is AI these days, but basically this service takes audio, transcribes it, and can re-jig it in any way you want, including keeping the transcript as is. So anything you want to do will allow you to write with your voice.

I love being able to speak to dictate and let the tidying process happen because speaking the words is like a first draft. I may have lots of notes or nothing at all. This time I've just rocked up to the mic to speak this piece, and I'll get something out of it. You can hear the rough recording right now, and that's okay.

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[Two dictation heroes. First, my Dad. When I was a kid, he’d dictate entire reports into a Dictaphone. It blew my mind at how he could do that. Second, who wrote a book about dictating back in 2015. Below is an interview from the brilliant Creative Penn podcast. I tried to speak my writing as a kid, with no success. I tried to speak my writing after Monica Leonelle pushed it back to the top of my agenda… Again, with no success. With immediate transcription and accurate tidying, I’m finally dictating! 🥳]

There's no need to apologise for imperfect audio. In some ways, it's documenting another part of the process.

So kudos to you if you're putting out your own content with audio as well. It allows us to get a feel of who you are or lets people who can't read the text for some reason hear your voice.

Or maybe someone’s on the go and wants to hear the article because they can't stop to read the text. Well, let's celebrate that! It's more potential for an audience that otherwise wouldn't have been there.

[Aaaaaaand, it’s less than 50mins since I hit record and started talking. I’m about to hit send on this. Nearly 800 words of text (and the audio version!), with extra bits and a YouTube embed for more info on dictating your writing. Talking it through can help speed up the process for some pieces.]

If I love to hear your voice as much as I enjoy reading your writing, I can’t be the only one who’s happy when there’s a play button for listening.

Bring it on! Let's record audio, warts and all. Allow the blemishes, ums and errs, and noises—it's all good. The main thing people come along to listen to is you: your voice, your words, and the wonderful things you have to share.

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I’d been using the service for free and I was still willing to pay the £80. But consensus online was that my small use case wasn’t close to any limits, so wasn’t worth paying for. I was considered a light user.

But one day, without warning, the service restricted my access. They placed a hard stop on my use. The company had placed a new limit on free use, giving them a one-off number of runs before allowing nothing until they pay up.

When I went to pay, I found the one-off payment had gone up in price by far more than double, to over £200.

This sudden change made no sense.

I explained to the public-facing member of the 3-person team that I'd still happily pay up to £100 right away, and I told them my basic use case. But apparently, the team had been clear and explicit when they stated there would be no exceptions when the price went up. I guess I lost that memo; more fool me!

Their suggestion was to pay a monthly fee instead. Even the most basic monthly tier would cost nearly £200 over a single year.

And that was that. No exception.

Not the time for hardball?

There are cases when it makes sense to refuse negotiation or make concessions.

But for small companies wrapping a bit of extra functionality around generative AI? I'd say it's worth finding ways to take on interested users, even if they can't—or won't—pay full price.

If the company can't afford to budge for anyone, it's probably worth upping the list price. Or change the pricing structure. Or something.

Playing hardball when I was willing to pay money didn't make sense.

I don't know their business case, but the events leading up to the situation, and the subsequent refusal to go beyond a hard no, didn’t seem an approach to benefit anyone.

Maybe the company needs to establish more stable revenue. Strict pricing projects a confidence of their worth, but at what cost?

They expressed surprise that many potential customers were far less willing to pay monthly than to pay a one-off fee. That sounds like a possible disconnect or a gap in understanding. My use case wasn't using the full power of the service, so I guess I was not worth their bother?

But it's a small and competitive market. That's before you even think about how quickly the companies could become obsolete. With that in mind, I can't help but think they would have benefitted with my money, especially given my already limited use.

Winning… For how long?

All these little companies popping up have tools that perform specific AI tasks well. Some are free, some cost a little, and some are super expensive. They range from fully featured to quite basic. Most have built their services on top of generative AI, like the algorithms trained by OpenAI, Anthropic, and so on.

The better a user knows how to manipulate the main generative AI, the less they'll need the extra services.

I simply went back to my original free method that took a bit of extra time. And very soon after, I found another service that did exactly what I needed. They even offered extra features at a lower cost than the original £80 of the first service!

Because AI stuff is still in an early and evolving stage, lots of small companies that offer a service on top of algorithms are in a position to lose.

These services may survive for the short- to medium-term, but eventually, the proprietary AI services will add more features and get easier to use. They'll make extra services unnecessary, even for basic users.

What you want. And you’ll never know it.

So this isn't a complaint, or me calling out a company. It's a curious comment on how precarious much of the AI scene is. Messy and confused. I'm guessing only a small proportion of companies will stick around. Far, far more will disappear.

It may include companies that do exactly what you're wishing for right now. And the likelihood is that they'll disappear before you've even found out about them.

Let's just say this... I'm not about to start my own dedicated AI company any time soon!

I went to the websites and newsletters of many top-tier copywriters and marketers—those who produce exceptional content.

As I looked through their best advice, examples, and stories, I found a stark contrast. Some of the copywriters hit with the gems, time after time, but some of them left me cold, with every point seeming forced and contrived.

They're all trying hard, but why couldn't I shake the feeling that some were trying too hard? Because the difference lies in personal perception.

Even the best copywriters can't appeal to everyone.

As creatives and curious learners, this is a good lesson. No matter how hard we try, and no matter how perfect our words seem to us, not everyone will see them that way. There's no need to work to perfection since others won't see our work as flawless down some objective line. So, by all means, put in the hard work and solid effort, but don't overdo it. You reach that point of diminishing returns, which is counterproductive.

Aim to do enough without overextending. Unless it's some sort of magnum opus that's above and beyond your other output, the added stress and wasted time won't help anyone.

There's no doubt you want to be happy with what you publish. These days, the next post could be the game-changer. You never know when the moment of magic will materialize.

But once published, we're letting go. It's up to the audience to appreciate it. If they do, fantastic. If not, it's okay—it wasn't for them this time.

And you've got every opportunity to edit further, to add more, and to update as you go. Hitting publish isn't the end of the road. Sometimes the first send is the start of something amazing. I've seen books emerge from tweets. I've seen movements built off the back of a personal rant in a hastily written newsletter.

Hold on just enough that it's easy to let go. If a top copywriter leaves me with little more than a sigh or a ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ that's good. It means I can rest assured that nothing will land with everyone, no matter how well crafted the piece is. They won't lose sleep over my opinion and I don't need to lose sleep over theirs. We just have a different audience.

And good writing still needs the right audience for it to work. Context matters.

Did you need to hear this? How hard do you find it to let go. And what times do you lean in too hard to perfection? Share your experiences in the comments. I’d love to hear from you! 🫂

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So I've got a collection of seven curious thoughts for you that may seem random, but are connected.

The key here is... Balance.

No need to overindex one way or another; instead, find a sweet spot that brings both you and your audience what's needed.

I’m always learning, constantly working at that balance, and trying to make a conscious difference where it counts. The ongoing journey with Ongoing!

Time to get stuck in.

For any thoughts that particularly resonate with you, I'll offer a couple of follow-up actions for your own curious exploration.

1. Balancing Creativity and Audience Expectations

Where are you bringing joy and value to others in your writing/art? How much is for you, how much is for the audience you're looking for, how much is for the audience you think you should be speaking to, how much is for the voices in your head, how much is for...?

Many directions, many voices, many considerations. How many are swirling around in your mind and in your priorities?

Where are those priorities, and are they where you want those priorities to be?

Want to think about this more deeply?

⦁ Think about your 'why' behind your creative work.

⦁ Analyse your current audience, seek feedback, and brainstorm what your perfect audience might look like.

Worth a look:

https://austinkleon.com/show-your-work/

2. Creative Tools and Dependence

Balance reliance on the best tools with your best work. Sway too far one way or the other, and things could tip over.

Want to think about this more deeply?

⦁ Unless the aim is consistent and reliably similar, use tools to enhance, not dictate, your work.

⦁ Consider what tools and techniques your work is dependent on. What if you used something else, what if you removed them completely, or you made a total pivot?

Worth a look:

Craft Talk - How Do You Make Your Time Your Own?

https://aliabdaal.com/book-notes/the-magic-of-thinking-big/

3. Evolving Narratives

Messages and narratives shift depending on where you're at in your role as a creator. Acknowledge that shift as you engage with your community.

And plan out what your narrative looks like before it happens, study it while it's happening, and amend it when necessary.

Want to think about this more deeply?

⦁ Will you consider shifting your narrative if the needs/tastes of your audience change? If so, why? If not, why?

⦁ When you plan your narrative, is it based on where you are now or where you wish to be in the future?

Worth a look:

https://seths.blog/thepractice/

https://aliabdaal.com/book-notes/storyworthy-matthew-dicks-summary-and-notes/

4. Paths and Plans

Plans and strategies, visions and values, goals and ambitions... There's no single path or one right answer. Choices have to be made, detours accepted, and roadblocks tackled (maybe climbed directly over, you rebel you!).

Pick one path or several, knowing you can pivot if you need. No need to regret choices based on unplayed narratives. Who knows what would have happened in alternative histories? Learn from the actual past, consider your present, and use them to guide your future accordingly.

Fictions are not real, so you can make them as ideal or awful as you like. Considering the "What if..." only works up to a point. Too many variables and too many external factors.

Want to think about this more deeply?

⦁ Where are you most flexible in your grand plans? And what must stay rigidly the same?

⦁ Work on actionable insights rather than past regrets.

Worth a look:

Strategize Your Career - How To Plan Your Growth

Values Based Decision Making [PDF]

5. Minimalism and Stuff

You streamline, you get systems down to a fine art. And yet... stuff gets in the way.

Be on the lookout for stuff. Decide what stuff stays and what stuff goes. Stuff rarely stays the same.

Unless you're my late grandparents. They did what they did for decades. Their stuff worked and that was that.

But 99.99% of us aren't like my late grandparents. They had all sorts of challenges, but they didn't have STUFF to think about beyond the necessary challenges.

Most of us tend to have STUFFFFFFFFF stuffed all over the place. Never mind, there's still room to conquer so the stuff helps more than hinders.

Want to think about this more deeply?

⦁ Minimal and functional are different. How could you find a happy mix of both?

⦁ Does your stuff revolve more around needs or wants?

Worth a look:

https://www.thesimplicityhabit.com/why-i-focus-on-simplicity-not-minimalism/

https://theinscapist.substack.com/p/a-journey-into-minimalism - “Since that October day in 2019, they have had two little boys now ages three and two. They had to give up the little red house on wheels, but life in that house gave them a few lessons on living in a minimal way which they grew to love and they sought now to incorporate those lessons into apartment living.”

6. Go Big and Small

It's easy to get caught up sorting the short-term in favour of the long-term. It's easy to fantasise about the long-term in favour of the pressing matters in the short term. The details and the big picture both have their place. Make peace and friendship with each of them separately and in coming together. There is much to learn in that messy, yet rewarding, middle.

Want to think about this more deeply?

⦁ Take your daily/weekly schedules and consider how well they'll help your quarterly/annual schedules. Use a monthly schedule to keep these aligned.

⦁ Look at a big picture situation and think of it from a perspective as if it's a small detail. What's the even bigger picture as you step out of it? On the flipside, look at a small detail and think of it from a perspective as if it's the big picture. What minute details have you not yet considered that make an impact?

Worth a look:

https://davidepstein.com/range/

https://www.maddyness.com/uk/2023/09/30/how-to-balance-short-term-task-planning-with-long-term-vision/

7. Two Versions of You

Your personal growth versus your professional ambition. Where are they closely related, where are they distant cousins, and where are they total strangers?

Want to think about this more deeply?

⦁ What elements of your personal and professional fit together? What elements cause trouble for each other? Brainstorm how to lean into the former and how to improve or remove the latter.

⦁ How much of your time and energy do you spend on personal growth versus professional ambition? Is it working for you? And is it sustainable in the medium to long term?

Worth a look:

Lots of stuff that has written about over at Culture Study will resonate.

https://kadavy.net/love-mondays/energy-journal-prompt/ - “When did my energy match my task? When did it not?”

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Which thought got you thinking most? Let me know in the comments. And please do share any of your own thoughts on striking that masterful balance. From weaving your way through personal and professional differences, your art and your business coming together, and finding what works in growing your own voice with your audience's needs, I'd love to hear what's on your mind.

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Go far back in time and there were fewer problems in our daily lives. Bigger problems, perhaps. But not the cascade of doomscroll dilemmas that demand action and attention.

That, plus a dose of liking and subscribing and all the other things we're asked to do.

Such as leaving a comment, which you can do so below... You know you want to.

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Sometimes you want to comment when you really, really don't. Compulsion could be a better word than 'want'.

History Today

While yesterday's problems were generally more dangerous and unknown, the sheer number of issues weighing on our minds wasn't close what we have today.

You can probably reel off a list of stuff that's exacerbated the situation: Our global connectedness; status notifications 24/7; rolling news; endless choice; adverts and marketing and capitalism; what people expect of you.

Hardly an exhaustive list. Pick some yourself. Take some of mine away. The point is, loads of stuff calls for your consideration. Your attention is needed everywhere. No wonder we're safer in the world, but suffering from more anxiety.

At the same time, the algorithms are seductive, as mentioned in a recent edition of Down the Rabbit Hole. A wave of interest to distract you from your own choppy seas.

The piece explains: “The dizzying buzz of social media and 24-hour news cycle can keep us constantly preoccupied while the real lights in our lives burn out.”

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Advances in tech, tools and connections are beneficial too. I'm not suggesting any of it is simply bad. But these things come with a host of new problems, and those with privilege have more scope to fly ahead while those without have more obstacles in their way. Privilege doesn't mean you get what you want, but the potential gets easier with the more layers of privilege available to you.

What Next?

The more I go down this path, the more I imagine cries of, "Yes, but you're not exactly providing a solution, are you?"

As with so many of these big picture problems, any assumption that an easy answer is there for the taking is likely an assumption too far.

Rather, I wonder if the current big picture is already far too steep to work out a reasonable plan without involving the pain points we're trying to avoid.

If TikTok comes to an abrupt end in America, it'll be interesting—useful, even—to see how a sudden social shift works. At the same time, the recent pandemic didn't usher in as much change as had been expected at that time.

However things pan out, you can't solve the world's problems—current and future—with too much of an imbalance. How are equitable solutions possible when division and disagreement take centre stage? You can vent at someone on the socials when you see the facts are wrong, but what difference does that make to either of you? The tiny chance that you may persuade someone of the error of their ways (indeed, if you are correct in the first place!) isn't going to spark the revolution. I mean, it might happen, but the chances are basically zero, and that method of activism is hardly going to turn the urgent tide in a timely manner.

SWAPPING (UN)LIKE FOR (UN)LIKE

That doesn't stop the wave of demands on your time and attention. Nor the pleas of help from all angles. If you don't have an opinion, you're part of the problem, apparently. If you don't help every cause, you're a monster, apparently.

Would you rather fight a horse-sized duck or 100 duck-sized horses? If yesteryear was the horse-sized duck and today is a bunch of tiny equine beings, maybe there's not that much difference in the two.

For now, there is generally greater safety, but a state of perpetual anxiety for many. Have advances resulted in a trade off that's replaced physical safety with mental turmoil? If so, is that advancement? Or is it one bother replaced with another?

Love 'em? Hate 'em? Bored with 'em?

What's your take on AI images?

And with that question, please don’t run away just yet. Pretty please.

Over the weekend, I stumbled upon several conversations about the pros and cons of using AI for... ahem... art.

I don't call the raw generations art, but I do see good uses for the images.

First off, however, I must acknowledge the big-picture situation before parking that to one side. It’s not the main drive of this piece, but we need to start there before veering off.

The Legal, Ethical, and Economic Considerations

We need to get these out of the way here because we can’t just get them out of the way.

I'm uncomfortable about the legal and ethical situation surrounding the way AI models have been trained. I see use in the tools, but I see valid and important arguments being made about the way any style and flavour of image can be created. I've explored how easy this is behind the scenes. If you know what you’re doing and what to use, pretty much anything is possible. And it’s getting easier. The high-end art scene and physical artworks won’t necessarily suffer much for it, but working artists—particularly digital artists—reliant on commissions, are already caught up in economic woes in attempting to make a sustainable living from art more difficult than they already are.

A commission request can turn into a headache for an illustrator if the offered terms are not favourable. A potential client might offer too little compensation. Rather than negotiating or finding another artist more suited to their budget, they might turn to an AI solution. In no time, they achieve a style similar to what they wanted, but at much lower cost, if not practically free.

This situation was thrown upon an unprepared public. And now we're left to mostly argue amongst ourselves. One day, not in the near future, some cases will be heard and some rulings made. Maybe some appeals. Maybe the tech having moved on in new ways that need yet more lengthy cases.

On that front, I'm stumped.

Don't do anything and I fall behind from my curious place. I'm interested, I'm looking to learn, and it makes sense to.

Yet do too much AI-centric stuff and I risk ignoring the controversy altogether for personal pleasure. Perhaps excessive personal gain.

All I can do is navigate with balance, and keep the bulk of my work and learning behind the scenes. I can explore all angles and document stuff, but without going all in. Unless...

Unless that's my main focus. At first, I thought it was. But my aim isn't to deliberately court controversy or suggest answers when they aren't available in anything other than dynamic extremes right now. Neither cry of "Let it in!" or "Keep it out!" seems valid through my own curious lens, though I don't take issue with those who currently have one of those cries in place.

As I said above, there are valid and important arguments.

It's why I'm impressed with how game-changing the AI explosion has been, yet I'm also more aligned with the skeptical view until I see further progress in capabilities. Check out Gary’s excellent posts on Substack for all the deets. We've already got enough to chew over without the need to throw ourselves into a future that hasn't yet been proven.

A Curation of Creations

With those big-picture issues firmly mentioned, I'll stick to the art and creativity part of this AI discussion. If training data and the like weren't a consideration, where would algorithms take art, if anywhere at all?

To start, the image is not the art when I'm creating. For me, the curation is my offering. Any image outputs help me bring shape or flavour or extra context to what I'm doing. Those images don't need to be the centre of proceedings, or they can be the bulk of what I work around. Either way.

The aim isn't to produce visual art and impressive canvas works. I seek stories. I want wordplay. I look to build a narrative and maintain a suitable structure that pleases me and, hopefully, others. Something to enhance a message.

I call my AI image work, "creative curation". I don't create the work itself, much like a stock photo, but I've brought it into my creative fold.

I can use reference images of my own sketches and abstract doodles and forcing the algorithm to concentrate mainly on my own work. It pushes me out of my comfort zone of not having been one to draw much in the past (other than comics for friends many years ago!).

Even with reference images used and setting the AI to use them to greatest effect, I still wouldn't see the AI outputs as all my creation.

My struggle to see how to work in a safe space with all this has been at play for nearly two years now. As a lover and supporter of art, but not a graphic artist or illustrator myself, I find uses for the images to complement my other work. I like to give titles and have a consistent theme, and sometimes I'll produce full narratives and poems and other elements around the images. Even the collections are curated with purpose, making the curation more artistic/creative than the pictures in principle.

Is “Instead of AI” a Useful Approach?

When the main goal isn’t to curate collections or find creative ways to support another body of work, is there more value in finding alternatives to AI image generations in order to explicitly supporting artists?

Even Substack, where I write this newsletter, has an AI generation option when I select the option to add images. Type a prompt, get some generations, then add away.

Simple. Maybe too simple. Almost to the point of showing little creative return. And while this might be fine for the person publishing their piece, have they thought about the choices they’ve made. And do they even care?

I ask that not to go back to the big picture issues, but to explore the possibility that art and creativity may not even be big considerations for everyone. A writer may value their words, without realising that an artist values their illustrations. To be a creative is a broad range of things.

For creatives who want to collaborate with others and help fellow creatives under that broad umbrella, there are some cases where “instead of AI” can benefit.

suggested that writers can work with illustrators and use actual artworks to complement the work. That, in turn, would support those artists. It’s an excellent angle, and I'd love to work in this direction too. I’ll reach out to artists and see if any are interested. I’ve long been a fan of seeing magazine articles and newsletter pieces that use illustrations across one theme. They both shape and complement the written word in beautiful ways. It’s what I try to do in some of my articles with themed AI curations. The opportunity to do the same whilst supporting a working artist would be fab.

For all the AI imagery I’ve explored, alternatives to using AI-gens as a default are important.

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Room For Everything… Is Balance Possible?

The difficulty in finding balance is something I've talked about before, and it formed my very first newsletter piece on Substack. Not much has changed with the AI situation over the months, even as I change. A lot has happened for me on a personal and professional front in a few short months. But the AI and art thing... Everything is similar. The tech marches on, relentless. The public continues to argue the toss. The company bosses and government leaders still say their thing about regulations and the future and all that jazz.

So I thought I'd bring this up again. After all, I commented on the subject of AI images in three different Substack conversations over the weekend. The universe is trying to tell me something. Or is it the algorithm? 🤔

Whatever the case, I'm subscribed to hundreds of newsletters. That's more than enough to see people who are leaning in to AI images as their norm, people who are rallying against AI images to the point of blocking anyone who dares to use them in a newsletter, and people who haven't even considered the matter much more than with a shrug.

And that's understandable.

For the foreseeable future, things will continue to stay this way. Balance is hard to achieve when we don’t have a standardised set of scales to work with.

I hope you like my doodle at the start of this essay. All for the 30 seconds it took. And I hope you can forgive the AI generations that followed after. I liked the theme, I liked putting words to them, and it made sense at the time. :)

Here, have another 30-second doodle.

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Can AI and Writing Offer Any Clues (or Threats)?

AI images don’t replace art. AI images don’t replace 30-second doodles. I’m happy to go down that route alongside artworks and doodles and all sorts of visually creative endeavours.

AI writing isn’t a threat to me at the moment. Maybe one day it will be, and maybe it will never be. I’ve used these tools more than enough to know that the low-hanging fruit of lazy writing, clickbait stuff, and purely informational detail can be replicated a reliable amount.

Everything else has a long way to go. At best—or worst, depends on your view—a fully AI-generated text will need a lot of editing and polishing.

Can the same be said of AI images? Maybe not so much. For all the talk of these images lacking emotion and depth, plenty of viewers are happily moved. And some images will look real enough to appear real. I’m not referring to photos, I’m talking about paintings and digital illustrations.

Just because the majority of AI stuff looks just like AI stuff is irrelevant. It’s still early days of people prompting en masse.

And some generations that aren’t quite right can be amended by AI means until they do look fine. Or you can do a bit of tweaking in an image editor… How much tweaking is needed to make it your own creation? A little? A lot? No amount whatsoever?

If I use a reference image, have I started the process? Or is that the same as writing an article and then getting AI to help with editing. Have I turned my own writing into AI writing?

Well, I'm happy to use AI as a tool. You can probably tell that based on this piece. And I’ve also said that using my own reference images don’t turn AI outputs into my own artist talent. In the UK, I can currently claim copyright for the outputs, which is unlike many other countries, including the US.

That’s right, more complications because some things depend on where you live. And, of course, they can change.

This is why I agree with Christopher S. Penn when he recommends disclosing the use of AI.

So let’s go through what I’ve done for this article.

Did I get AI to write it? No.

But I did ask for a quick editorial check. Several minor suggestions were made, all about making the piece more formal. Nope! I’m happy with my voice, cheers.

But it did pick up on one paragraph in particular and said it was far too awkward. I agreed.

It's the one thing I've changed.

With full disclosure below, see what you think and let me know if the decisions (both AI and mine) were worthwhile.

—

My original first-draft paragraph:

"For illustrators, what could have been a commission can end up a headache if the terms aren't favourable enough to accept. Someone looking to commission the artist may offer too little, for instance. Instead of negotiating or seeking an alternative artist within price range, they may instead turn to AI methods. In no time, they get the style to match close enough to what they wanted anyway, for a fraction of the cost, if not for free."

AI suggestion:

"For illustrators, a potential commission can turn into a headache if the offered terms are not favourable. A client might propose too low a fee, and rather than negotiating or seeking another artist within their budget, they might opt for AI solutions. In no time, they achieve a style similar to what they wanted, but at a much lower cost, or even free of charge."

My final edit (as published above):

"A commission request can turn into a headache for an illustrator if the offered terms are not favourable. A potential client might offer too little compensation. Rather than negotiating or finding another artist more suited to their budget, they might turn to an AI solution. In no time, they achieve a style similar to what they wanted, but at much lower cost, if not practically free."

—

Even suggested edits need an overhaul to get it working to suit your voice/style/needs.

That said, I've got limited time. If I was able to write this piece myself, but use AI to draft social posts for me, how much is my voice and how much is automated content?

Here you go, see what you think!

If I intended to use them, I'd edit these Instagram and LinkedIn suggestions for sure.

But they'd just about work without changing if I was really pushed for time and desperate to post. Again, does that make it shameless AI, partly me, or close enough to let it pass almost verbatim as my own words?

Where do we draw the line?

As you can see, this has been a big deal since ChatGPT dropped little more than 18-months ago. A year and a half. That’s nothing!

The global conversation over AI has been plenty over that time, but I'm not sure we've got much further either. That's reassuring in some ways and worrying in others.

For now, I can’t see where to draw the line. Or how to draw it. But I know it won’t be sensible to let AI draw *that* line for us.

After all this, what's your perspective? AI images as part of the toolbox or a step too far removed? Is there acceptable context before lines are crossed? How much creative work does a writer or an artist need to do before using AI to make some sort of decision, change, or (dare I say it) creation? And will we ever get clarity on all this to allow a more settled and balanced approach for all? If you've got this far, I'd love to hear your take.

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A cup of tea seems ordinary for many, especially in the UK. Kettle on, teabag in, bish bash bosh!

For me, tea is my main hobby. I seek out boutique teas, loose-leaf, often from small family farms or from factories that don't supply much at all to a western-facing audience. The type of stuff that requires specialist vendors.

I tend to brew my tea in a gaiwan, which steeps a large amount of leaf for just a few seconds. I re-steep 10-20 times in sessions that can last a meditative hour or two, or span a large part of my day.

And while I do this daily, it's anything but ordinary.

After reading this week's writing prompt on , and seeing Pat Schneider's poem "The Practice of Ordinary Things", I wanted to write a piece that looked at how ordinary can be extraordinary and vice versa. gave this writing prompt:

"Write a poem about the persistence and generosity of ordinary things and invisible joys."

I used several of the terms within the prompt in my poem, as I explored the contradiction that tea can be as dignified as it is everyday. There is persistence and generosity in the leaves, which we can enjoy in a multitude of ways. The range of experiences differ, but the tea leaves are still tea leaves. They offer their own range of tastes, mouthfeels, and qualities, yet they are the same plant. The plant persists and brings us together, despite differences.

It seemed fitting to title the piece with a slight play on words: "The Leaves, They Remain"

Whether treated as an invisible part of our day-to-day or given great majesty, the humble leaves don't show off unless we choose to focus. The leaves see us take them for granted and value their every vein simultaneously. And they persist.

No matter how we drink up, we can accept joy. As Nelly Bryce says, "Oh the generosity of the ordinary".

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The Leaves, They Remain

It stays with me, because

Decadence in everyday deceives

In the best ways possible.

I take your simple pleasure

With a gusto that confuses you,

So you just smile politely.

Our experiences here

Differ, yet bring their own completeness

At a personal level.

You don't think about it much—

An unseen ritual. A moment

Of calm, invisible joys.

It carries on, this humble

Thirst. Again and again it calls you

And me. Individuals.

What brings us together is

Persistence in the tool; not in us.

Our sense of control, untrue.

We're actually not all that

Different. We're extraordinary and

Ordinary. Room for both.

With your polite smiles, I give

You a cup. You offer the same to

Me. And we both accept joy.

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Poetry Pals

Poetry (pen) Pals #19

Sometimes a writing style immediately has me. Immediately makes me want to put on the kettle on and share a cup of tea with the writer. This was very much the case with our guest poet for this week Lucy Beckley . I’ve never heard Lucy’s voice but I think I can imagine what it might sound like from this post. It’s got all the tone of a gentle arm around the shoulder…

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2 years ago · 14 likes · 3 comments · Nelly Bryce

If you want to hear my recommendations for some of my favourite specialist tea vendors, let me know and I’ll spill the beans teas!

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If I could pay for hundreds of newsletter subscriptions, I'd do it. Since I can't, I've been looking for other ways to support as many writers as possible in an expansive and engaging way. A couple of months ago, I suggested this:

The conversation continued after restacked it, and more peeps gave their thoughts.

I'm thankful for the great ideas and thoughtful comments everyone offered. The project has clear merit and I’m excited for what’s in store.

Working title: The Substantial Substack Subscription Submissions - or The SubSubSubSub for short. :)

As a prelude to my plans, today I take a quick look at the teeniest fraction of what's on offer from the impressive archive of the .

I'm showcasing this newsletter first because I discovered on my subs list that I had access from a free month of subscription to the Unschool. I don't know where it came from, but I'm thankful to or whoever gifted me access until today. ❤️

First off, the Unschool title alone promotes curiosity, letting the writer investigate without a strict emphasis on hard rules and directions. Foundations and principles are positive, as long as they're recognised as a point to jump off and explore beyond when the writer is ready to play in new ways.

Alison's Unschool covers so much ground to play with too. From the details of punctuation, characterisation, word choice, and layout, through to the practical points of book promotion, finding a literary agent, and the publishing process (including self-publishing).

There are regular features and series collections, amassed across what must be hundreds of articles. This is a big and valuable collection to help writers at every conceivable level of experience. Seasoned pros are as welcome as budding beginners. We're all able to unschool our way to new learnings!

That's certainly my approach. I challenge my assumptions, set a course for lifelong learning, and am always on the lookout for new areas to examine and analyse. Alison Acheson offers so many tools—or toys, since this is an unschool—to take away and have fun working with.

The idea of writers helping writers encapsulates so much of the community I see here on Substack, making Alison's publication a fitting start to my exploration of what goodies are on offer via this platform. I'm going to skim the surface of some of the gold within, from key insights to unique tangents. One is such a doozy that I plan to make it part of my toolkit/toy-box right away.

I hope these tips whet your appetite and maybe get you signing up for much, much more!

• Everything you write is part of your useful creative process, even if you don't end up using it in published form. Ghost pages cannot be destroyed and form part of the whole, even when they are invisible. They exist as a past for your published words to exist in the present.

• If you're going to have a literary agent, be thorough in your research. Don't just marry the first one who shows an interest in you.

• Calendars are useful. I've long seen that for non-fiction purposes, but the advice on using blank calendar pages for fiction is one I'll keep in my back pocket now.

• Hyphens, em dashes, and en dashes are great fun and worth using more often. I found the use of "And look what I found—apples" particularly useful. I'd have put "..." instead, which I'm far too fond of doing. This is a new tool for me to overuse now. :)

• Pick a manageable word count or timeframe to reach every day, to keep the ritual of writing going. 500 words or 20 minutes are suggested as relatively reasonable. But find what you can do and bring that game as a minimum each day. Remember, not all of it will end up published, but it will all be useful.

• Communication trumps dialogue. Think not just about what is said, but what is unsaid. Also consider body language, subtext, and so on.

• "There should be a 'genre wheel'—something like the circle of fifths in music—that reveals what can be gleaned from one genre or form to inform another." - I'm just full-on quoting this one. I love this idea of finding new ideas from other genres. You can take strong common elements from specific genres, styles, and subjects. Each has the potential for use in unexpected crossover ways. An unusual piece of advice with massive practical value.

• Thoughtful repetition helps enhance narrative, create rhythm, and emphasise themes. It's a favourite of mine, along with alliteration. For unconscious repeats of words, revisit your writing and read it aloud. You're far more likely to notice. [You could also use a tool like ProWritingAid, but reading aloud showcases anything unnatural. If you grimace as you speak it, that's an edit screaming to be made!]

• Promote yourself—don't hide! You don't have to go big either. Lots of small actions build up in the promotional ride. This can go beyond the obvious social media platforms and extend to educational forums, book clubs, email lists, and supplementary resources to complement your writing.

• Alison has a detailed two-part "show, don't tell" masterclass. Senses, movements, actions, outbursts. The "getting inside," which Alison describes as, "the real work of a fiction writer: to inhabit characters. And to allow them to inhabit us." At the same time, heed this: "'Telling' can be useful to move the plot along at times. Honestly, if we were limited to showing-only, novels would be 1500-page dragging things that no one would read."

• The terrifying second draft is also fun. It's tough but also enjoyable. You'll get messy, but you'll also go deeper. In many ways, the second draft isn't the editing phase as you traditionally expect it. Maybe it's Writing 2.0.

• Paragraphs. There's a deep dive on these. I threw out the rules forever ago and I keep practically all paragraphs short. But there's one thing I need to remember—a long paragraph can come in useful sometimes:
  "Hard and fast 'rules'—which are too often the go-to now—don’t always take into account the reality of your story. So… what does your story need? Sometimes you want flow or a certain type of flow… even a bit of purposeful muddying."
  I don't like getting muddy. And that's the point. There are times it might be worth the mess. I can clean up afterwards!

I've chosen that last piece of advice not only because I need to challenge my lazy rule-breaking rule on paragraphs but also because of the dashes and the ellipses Alison uses. Writing isn't just about having fun with writing... It's also about enjoying the punctuation!

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Are you ready for some unschooling in your writing? What tips challenge you the most?

I hope you enjoyed this taster of my intentions to explore other publications in depth. My aim is also to interview the authors and find transformational links through curiosity. If there's any specific direction you'd be interested in me taking, please share your ideas in the comments.

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Many thanks once again to for the chance to check out your rich repository of writing advice through your .

Unschool for Writers

Playing and working with words: finding your own way to fiction and nonfiction, poetry, and writing for young people

By Alison Acheson

What’s in a name?

In art, everything.

Picking the right title is an art of its own, bringing influence and guidance. Artists can alter and define the art experience through a few carefully chosen words.

recently posted about (probably) finishing a new artwork. Their discussion over what to call the piece sparked many thoughts I’ve been chewing over for a while.

The Life Boat

Art does not 'speak for itself'

Hello friends Ta da! It’s finished! (I think….) If you’ve been following along you’ll know that this painting has taken me about 126 hours of painstaking work to reach this point. If you Zoom in you can see the detail. I’m now swithering about the title. Originally I was thinking about the salted s…

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2 years ago · 36 likes · 22 comments · Samantha Clark

Clark makes some excellent points about the importance of artists using their words to articulate and share their art. Titles and descriptions help audiences engage with and appreciate art beyond mere observation. The artist can enhance the experience through careful naming and explanation, making it more accessible and inclusive.

Words are a vital tool for artists, inviting the audience into their world and opening doors to deeper understanding and inclusion. This conversation goes far beyond the visual elements, offering a broader dialogue about the artwork.

It’s why Clark is running a course for artists to “find the right words to speak from your art”.

Testament to that is how Clark’s piece begins. The tentative completion of an artwork: “Ta da! It’s finished! (I think….)”

Art can keep evolving and changing. But at some point, especially with visual art, you’re probably looking to sell the piece or allow it a final resting point. If you want to revisit after that point, it might be best to do it again. And again. And so on.

Like Edvard Munch’s “The Scream”. More on that in a bit!

Clark calls the working title, “Salted Light”, inspired by the salted sea mist over the Atlantic. Over time, the painting gathered new meanings and connections, developing into a complex web of ideas that mirror the blurred boundaries and interconnectedness of our surroundings.

The choice of a title, therefore, isn’t just a label but an integral part of the artwork’s journey and its conversation with the audience. It reflects the growing thoughts of the artist and contributes to the artwork’s legacy and interpretation.

Connection Through Title

Making art goes beyond visual perception and expands to shared understandings and connections. An ongoing interaction shapes the artwork’s meaning and its impact on both the creator and the viewer.

Jason Horejs, a gallery owner, shares a pertinent example of an overheard discussion between a husband and wife. They were looking at a sculpture of a person and a dog looking at each other intensely:

“Look at this one,” the husband said.

“I love it,” replied the wife.

“Now look at the title.”

“‘Who Rescued Who,’ Oh, I love it.”

“The title makes the piece,” said the husband. The wife agreed.

So how far can we take the significance of titles?

Imagine if the Mona Lisa had multiple names, perhaps ten. Differing titles, like “Seeking Within”, “A Longing”, “A Study in Brown”, “You Don’t Know Me”, “A Travelling Woman”, and so on. Each could add extra dimensions and perspectives to the piece.

The presentation and curation of the titles will also make a difference.

One example is giving a work of art 10 names, then displaying all the names at once beside the artwork.

Another example is to give a work of art 10 names, but display the piece in 10 different places, each with only one of the names on show.

Titles, and how they’re represented, can dramatically influence the focus and reception of an artwork. They help audiences engage more deeply with the art, offering insights that go beyond the visual elements of the piece, whether it’s a painting, sculpture, or another medium.

A study looked at titles and how they affect the viewer, finding differences between elaborative titles and descriptive titles. While elaborative titles helped increase the understanding of abstract paintings when viewing for over 10 seconds, descriptive titles were more effective in enhancing understanding when viewed for a brief time of just a second or so. Each individual case of the audience engaging with art makes a difference.

It also shows that an elaborative title can bridge gaps between the viewer and the artwork. When enough time is spent looking at the piece, that title can help further interpretation and deepen appreciation. All this suggests massive importance when considering how to present art to the public. Curators of museums and galleries play an important role in showcasing art. In other words, art works far beyond the artwork.

I’m increasingly convinced that we’re all art. Everything we stop to engage with allows us to have some authorship of it.

That said, I don’t suggest you try to claim ownership or copyright for this reason! 😆

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Connection Through “Untitled”?

You might have unnamed art too. You might view it and have your own thoughts and feelings; it might move you, or it might not resonate at all.

Art doesn’t have to speak for itself. It might, but it often benefits from the words associated with it.

And while I see the benefits, words can both expand and limit. There’s yin and yang at play.

Words can open up new interpretations, or they can confine thoughts to specific meanings. It’s not so much about providing simple answers or objective views as it is about exploring the endless possibilities and inherent contradictions of art.

Questionnaires taken in some Tehran art galleries found that “The most significant function of title for visitors was communicative function”, which is “the roles of titles in establishing a primary connection with the artwork and artist’s intention, and communicating the primary messages of the artwork”.

That communicative function is a bridge to connect the viewer to the artist’s intention and the artwork’s message. The name of a piece isn’t just an identifier, but an active component of the art. At the very least, an entry point is made to help direct the theme, emotion, message, and so on.

So consider how a title—whether it’s “Salted Light” as Samantha Clark uses, or a globally recognised name like “Mona Lisa”—sets a context and helps focus attention. It helps the audience to interpret the artwork. Even when artworks are simply labelled as “Untitled” with a number, they can provoke thought or evoke emotion due to their ambiguity, challenging viewers to fill in the gaps.

But this approach to titling can also make contemporary art feel inaccessible to some, as they search for something to grasp; a hook or a key to unlock the artwork’s meaning. Clark’s discussion highlights the importance of titles in helping audiences feel included and engaged with the art rather than alienated from it.

Tatum Dooley makes an interesting point about calling artworks “Untitled”: “...some artists think that their work speaks for itself and that titling it would be a distraction or unnecessary. [...] This practice of ‘untitled’ pieces allows artists to elevate the significance of the visual experience over contextualization. The American artist Cy Twombly, for instance, often left his paintings ‘untitled.’ This approach is far from neglectful; it is an invitation for viewers to engage directly, devoid of any preconceived notion. The ‘untitled’ title invites viewers to dive into the artwork without the preconceived notions often attached to a descriptive title.”

I see pros and cons to this method. Untitled works may serve as an invitation to the viewer, or may alienate them. A lot depends on the curiosity, intention, and wants of the viewer. This is especially pertinent for more abstract art, which could mean anything.

Pros of “Untitled”

• Personal interpretation: It’s up to the viewer to determine. Their blank canvas is filled by engagement with the art and the art alone.

• Aesthetics above all else: Medium, shape, texture, colour, senses.

• Curious delights through mystery and exploration: Searching for possible meanings are needed, because no title is given. What you see is what you get. Take it where you wish.

Cons of “Untitled”

• Alienation: Nothing can be just as much a barrier as it can be freeing.

• Lack of context: The viewer may even see this as lazy on the artist’s part. No depth, no communication, no message.

• Fear: For someone unused to art, or someone who feels threatened by how opaque a piece is, an anxiety can form.

• Emotional weakness: “Untitled” may fail to stir an emotional response. With no theme attached, there may be no attachment or engagement.

AI, Memes & Curation

Balance is needed, especially if we give a piece loads of names or a deliberately abstract title. Those might distract from the artwork itself.

At the same time, emphasis on title is especially valid for AI generations. The image may be the least arty part of the art with AI. Title can take centre stage, bringing context to why the piece was curated and chosen. The description, similarly, matters a great deal here. Where does the image end and the art begin? What led to that image being chosen? Why those titles? Why that description?

There is validity in focusing on everything surrounding the image, more than the image itself. It’s all art and it’s never art.

And that’s the point. Just because a physical hand makes a random splatter of paint on canvas, doesn’t automatically qualify it as art. Pollock perhaps, but also maybe not. Similarly, consider Marcel Duchamp’s “Fountain”—an ordinary urinal made art by the act of signing and placing it in a gallery. The origin of its artistic attribution is also contentious, adding to the debate over what truly constitutes art.

Duchamp also took a postcard print of the Mona Lisa and added a moustache. He then called this piece, “L.H.O.O.Q.”, which reads in French a bit like saying “She’s got a hot ass” (“Elle a chaud au cul”).

This is like remixing and making some sort of meme today. Did Duchamp’s alteration create new art? Is his contribution valid on any levels to make him the artist here?

Modern creative processes and “TikTokification” of content let original artworks get remixed with new and alternative elements. These remixes raise questions about the originality and transformative nature of art, as well as how much new titles and descriptions bring out an entirely new work of art.

I also wonder how important Duchamp’s choice of name was for the piece. What if he hadn’t added a moustache, but had simply taken the postcard of the Mona Lisa and given it a different name? That alone would provoke the viewer into a new perspective.

Like an early meme, perhaps? Duchamp acting more as creative comedian more than artist?

Where does this place us with current reactions to AI art, in which it faces criticism for potential copyright issues and the ethical use of training data? These controversies are needed because the legal considerations are still unfolding. The future of art, especially AI-generated art, is filled with unknowns.

I understand and support the feelings of anger and betrayal expressed by artists, even as I explore AI images myself. There’s a lot to unpack here, largely because the future implications are unclear. As a society, we often receive technologies and innovations without clear guidelines, driven not just by progress but also by profit.

As I work through the impossible quandaries that we face right now, I seek not to call myself an artist by means of prompting AI (even when I use my own reference images and turn off as many AI styling options as possible).

Instead, I see myself as a “Creative Curator”, finding ways through with emphasis on ideas, descriptions, and titles. Just as a urinal is probably the least artistic part of the art, the algorithmic positioning of pixels may be mere utility. The art (whether or not you see art there) comes from the context surrounding the utility.

The Staying Power of Names

Going back to Samantha Clark’s work, even the simple act of naming a piece—like referring to it as “Salted Light”—can significantly affect its reception and interpretation.

“Salted Light” is not going away. It’s now documented, even as a working title. There’s still something tangible for the audience to grasp, even if a new name is decided upon for the finished piece.

The art itself becomes empowered, transcending the visual image presented. You don’t even need to see the artwork to engage with these concepts. I’ve deliberately left you to look for yourself, if you so wish. I do heartily recommend that you read Clark’s full post and inspect the image closely. Explore the implications of “Salted Light” and how it could represent blurred boundaries and interconnected humanity.

Think of all the different interplays that this artwork can represent, and then think about what it represents to you. What does it mean in your eyes? What would you call the piece?

I’ve considered all sorts of different names, including ones which were just daft or even playfully inappropriate. Just to explore where it takes me as I engage with the artwork.

The Museum of Modern Art in New York advises guides and teachers to promote further discussion and engagement by offering questions about the titles. After offering the name, useful follow-up questions would include:

“Does knowing the title change the way you think about the work? How?”

and

“What title would you give this work? Why?”

These questions promote dialogue, personal connections, and new perspectives. A title can profoundly influence how something is viewed and understood. And by considering alternative titles, art opens up to multiple experiences and interpretations, including through the audience.

Ultimately, the number of titles an artwork can hold is boundless, each guiding the audience toward new understandings and transforming the piece beyond its initial presentation.

As fits the AI-generated images, without a clear and obvious author, these images require additional context. As Clark suggests, text is therefore essential in providing this context, helping viewers understand the broader narrative and implications of the artwork. It’s about transforming visual art into a richer, more dialogic form that incorporates textual elements to enhance understanding and engagement.

By naming and describing their works, artists set the stage for dialogue, adding meaning and provoking viewer interaction.

I notice a contrasting point, which I recently discovered through ’s , that Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” is not a singular piece, but four different versions. Each distinct, two in paint, and two in pastel. Munch also produced lithographs of the artwork.

Art Every Day

Edvard Munch - The four Screams

Edvard Munch’s most iconic work is another of those paintings that really requires no explanation. As one of the most famous artworks in the world - The Scream is a piece that even people with little to no art knowledge at all will still be able to recognise on sight…

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2 years ago · 121 likes · 26 comments · George Bothamley

I had overlooked the numerous Screams because all versions carry the same title. If each had a unique name, would I have noticed? And how might my perception of each have differed? Samantha Clark’s point about the power of words in art is important: they provide context that challenges the notion that the artwork should speak for itself, allowing the audience to see beyond the surface.

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Hanging by a Shred…

Talking of the audience, is the viewer the artist as well? And can you have a finished work that is never truly finished? Or a work that becomes something else, even when it’s supposedly a fixed entity?

Banksy’s “Girl With Balloon” was shredded the moment it sold at auction, back in 2018. Someone buys a work of art, yet they take away a different work of art. The shredding of the piece transformed it into a piece Banksy called “Love is in the Bin”. The same thing, yet not the same thing. From one title to another.

Once auctioned again (or for the first time...?) in 2021, “Love is in the Bin” sold for around 25 times the amount that “Girl With Balloon” went for.

Ultimately, these interactions suggest that art isn’t merely about what’s presented. The language surrounding art shapes its legacy and how it is understood and appreciated.

All this talk of shredding and memes and so on could lead you to think this is exclusive to the time we’re living in.

But some of this goes way back. Myths, legends, historical poems...They used to be told through spoken word. The main, and often only, way for these stories to persist through generations was for someone to hear, learn, and subsequently retell them. Thus enabling a continuous oral tradition.

This cycle of storytelling could continue for countless generations before perhaps being transcribed into written form or translated into artworks. But does recording these tales into something more permanent change their original meaning or their fluidity? Does such documentation add new context, or merely preserve what was already there?

Let’s meet in the middle of the timeline and consider the Mona Lisa again: Is it actually called the Mona Lisa? Even the Wikipedia page seems uncertain. It is believed that the subject is Lisa del Giocondo. However, there is a potential misunderstanding in her name. ‘Mona’ is likely a corruption of ‘Monna’, an Italian term of respect. This hints at further complexities, such as the possible dual meaning of its Italian title, “La Gioconda”, which not only refers to the subject’s surname but also plays on the word for jocundity or happiness.

The name “Mona Lisa” itself, whether accurately titled or not, has permeated global consciousness, becoming a dominant narrative. Who determines this? It seems to be a collective agreement by humanity to an extent. Even if one day it’s definitively revealed that the painting’s correct title is something else entirely, people will probably continue to refer to it as the Mona Lisa.

Thus, the title of an artwork holds significant power. Titles shape our perception and understanding of art, anchoring it in our cultural psyche.

A Title Provides Voice

Turning back to Samantha Clark’s piece, the working title of “Salted Light” adds a layer of meaning and intent to a piece, influencing its reception and interpretation. They are right that art can’t always speak for itself. The titles, descriptions, blurbs, and artist’s intentions all play a critical role in shaping how art is perceived and understood. The potential for multiple titles opens up a spectrum of possibilities, challenging us to think about continuity and transformation.

Art is complex and nuanced, which is what makes it so intriguing and beautiful. Curiosity drives our exploration of art, and while it may not always lead to clear answers, it propels us on a journey of discovery that can be profoundly rewarding.

If art excludes anyone, I hope there are ways for those who feel alienated or rejected to find their path into the community.

At the very least, something as simple as a title can play a big part in welcoming in the viewer. Their journey is as complex as the artwork it names. Titles challenge, direct, and connect. They compel us to look closer, to think deeper, and to play our own part too.

Art is communication. The title is a leading voice in that communication.

What are your thoughts? Leave a comment!

Until late March, I was thinking about my sudden imposter syndrome regarding art and artificial intelligence.

An interest in both was leading to friction. Some people instantly blocking me on social media.

Yes, even on the new platforms that I'd been told were really welcoming.

I’ve never been one for imposter syndrome. But friction was setting me up to fail in two areas I had previously felt comfortable within. Now wasn’t the right time to centre my energy around bringing together a divided audience. Not when I was looking to start big new projects.

A balanced appreciation and commentary on current ethical and legal issues around AI and art was too big an ask. My past work didn’t start with controversy; it started with love.

My main aim had only been to write a book. And that wasn’t enough on its own to take a new direction for me to:

• bring my different social audiences together;

• build a strong email list;

• diversify my writing output;

• and work toward more sustainable creative/freelance income.

Around the same time, I noticed how Substack had developed in such a way that I could build a wider network, set up multiple money models around a media network, and have more room to write without the controversy.

Not only that, the email list was one of the main points.

The stars had aligned!

Nonetheless, my first post had been spurred on by the art & AI stuff, especially after a timely post by Nishant Jain (The Sneaky Artist).

My post got a Sneaky Artist like. Last time I checked, getting a like is better than being blocked, so I felt that a reasonable Substack welcome!

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Over the first couple of months writing the Ongoing newsletter, I came to see better routes to what I truly wanted to get into.

When I say "the journey is ongoing", there are multiple routes and pathways. The first steps taken may be bold, but they’re also exploratory. Curious steps. In keeping with my overall theme of curiosity.

It’s safe to say that the first route you take isn't always the one you settle on.

That's why the first couple of months writing Ongoing was an adventure of discovery. It wasn't until that first, curious investigation that I had a more complete vision for the Ongoing Network.

But first, I’ll go back to my initial idea on writing a book about art and AI...

From Controversy to Curiosity

Art is timeless, while AI is current and contemporary. So where will that lead us into the future? Fear and excitement lead to different views. Often dynamic, determined, and deeply entrenched.

It's why any mention of AI led to artists blocking me. It's why any mention of legal and ethical matters in AI led to less fruitful discussion.

And since I'd been more known in the past for writing about higher education policy and students making the most of their time in university, I didn't have a ready audience desperate to discuss art and AI as a matter of course.

So I stepped back on my big book idea and took a wider view.

It's what I'm used to. Sometimes I start with a small detail and then zoom out, and other times I'll seek a broad overview and then zoom in. Both have their uses.

As I did this, I realised that my own perspective could be the whole topic. I've always valued curiosity from these different angles. And here I was, trying to work a mixture of past, present, and future thinking.

This had been my vague idea from the outset as I started Ongoing, but I hadn't worked out what was truly needed. And I hadn't seen it as an opportunity to focus all my efforts moving forward.

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Over the next couple of months, I published different types of content to work out how I felt and what would make sense on the platform.

Turns out, a lot of it actually!

But the main thrust came around the time I posted The Courage to Hit Send and I could see that my entire outlook could be shaped by curiosity.

That got me thinking more about the multiple publishing perspectives, business angles, community focuses, and so on.

So I set to work on curiosity frameworks. I framed the drive to know more around humanity's wholeness. This drive isn't just about interest in the future, but about a timeless journey that doesn't have a clear beginning, middle, and end.

Just as art is timeless, so is curiosity. Everything is ongoing.

Buoyed on by this, I'm focusing my time with Ongoing as my work, rest, and play. Business and pleasure with clear boundaries, yet also part of the same thing. Embracing yin and yang.

Ongoing will end up having a paid tier among other things. Not by putting lots of posts behind a paywall, but finding various ways to provide value through a subscription model.

And I'll still be writing a book, but more toward curiosity as:

⦁ a creative superpower;

⦁ crucial to business, learning, fun, community, and everything we do;

⦁ a set of frameworks;

⦁ a way of finding the right balance, blend, and combination of past, present, and future considerations;

⦁ an ongoing endeavour for Ongoing.

This will allow many opportunities to build so I can work in all sorts of directions, and all around the Ongoing theme. A growing network.

That's why I'm now putting these posts out from the ongoing.network domain too. A web address to fit the mission.

I love how this can be a network of ongoing pathways, leading to everything, leading from everything, and all filled in with a curious vision.

All this has been a surprising turn of events. But it’s been down to many unforeseen circumstances that took place over a number of years. Among them, I'd fallen badly ill for a considerable time. Only now, I'm beginning to get back to a sense of normality. I've barely been out the house for years.

And yet none of the surprises, none of the illness, nothing that's brought about change over these years has taken away my mental energy and positive spirit.

And it certainly hasn't taken away my curiosity!

The Path of Many Personal Paths

One thing I've noticed through the many newsletters and publications I'm subscribed to is that personal stories and explanations help us to connect and feel understood. We find like-minded people, as well as those who have been through similar situations. We connect with those we may never have known if it wasn't for this type of communication.

So please expect more writing like this among a whole host of other things. Look back at my archive so far and you'll see various ideas. I'll be using several now, moving forward.

This publication alone is set to contain:

• longform articles;

• personal essays;

• voice notes;

• poetry;

• link roundups and shout-outs;

• short blasts of curious information and advice.

In exploring which of these would float my boat, I found most of it did. Instead, the angle I thought I’d be taking has shifted and evolved in ways that give more clarity and direction along that path. My niche is more general than I’d imagined, but it fits well for my outlook, and it’s still a niche.

Regardless of the subjects I explore, I’m on a mission to promote curiosity as a superpower while I’m on the adventure.

The second half of March helped me build my vision moving forward. April allowed me to work on my setup. For May and onwards, the Ongoing Network pushes out with curiosity…framed around curiosity.

The journey is ongoing. I want to use this platform to help others, to bridge gaps, and to build the Ongoing Network into a passionate and purposeful place. All without need for big controversy, even when looking at chewy subjects.

In other words, yes, I’d still like to tackle more about art and AI among everything else. :)

There! I’ve brought you up to speed on the Ongoing Network. I’m all in!

Are you?

There’s lots of space…and I’ll budge up more if needs be. 😄

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"To have a beginner's mind is to be willing to be reborn over and over, eyes open and curious about the world. Every moment, every day, every new project, and every new opportunity, invites us to approach it with a beginner's mind, in the knowledge that we stand upon everything that has gone before. All of our experience, resources, connections, lessons learned from mistakes made, and all the rest of it. Nothing is wasted. Everything leads somewhere, even if we don't yet know where." - Beth Kempton

Supporting others isn’t easy. But it’s necessary. Even though it doesn't always work out the way you'd like it to.

You try your best, but you're one step removed from the action, trying to navigate the needs of someone who may not know how to achieve those needs, nor what their needs are in the first place.

I spent a week in that delicate place of supporting a loved one, and celebrating the positive progress, despite the challenges for that loved one in seeing how any of it constituted progress. Or positivity, for that matter.

The work was worth it. I'm thankful to have the patience and love to give. My curiosity helps too.

Many times as I offered my support in various ways, there was a certain push and pull. Think back to a time when you felt stuck and you were struggling with something that seemed to be working against you. An opposing force getting in your way.

I consider Yin and Yang in these times. But not as if they are separate forces at extreme ends to each other.

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Yin and Yang aren't actually pulling apart, never ready to meet. The Yin-Yang symbol shows a bit of Yin within Yang and vice versa. They need each other, joining together rather than staying apart, creating a flowing shape. There is a deliberate need for both to exist together.

Understanding the balance of Yin and Yang is important, as well as how they interact. For instance, too much of one is a problem, but that doesn't mean balance is about getting exactly the same amount of both.

You sometimes need more energy in one direction, but there's always an understanding that these needs work within a flow towards equilibrium. Hence why the two forces are complementing each other.

Support works in this way. Too much support can be just as big a problem as not enough support. Refusing support when it's sorely needed is a friction point that gets in the way of equilibrium.

The way I've supported is a dynamic we can't always understand, but showcases the Yin and Yang principles. Sometimes my subtle nudge (Yin) brought on someone's frenzied activity (Yang). Other times, my rallying cries of support (Yang) could gently push someone from overwhelm or procrastination (deficient yin or yang) toward a balanced state to help them take their crucial first step. Our energies interact with a complexity where the yin and yang work together to find their equilibrium.

I found myself thinking about all this as I read ’s beautiful and searching new book, “Kokoro”.

Kempton takes a journey (both literally and figuratively, physically and mentally) through the smallest wonder, the deepest grief, the largest hurdles, the biggest questions, the quietest moments, and the most amazing experiences.

As I finished the book, I made a summary note: "Of moths, mothers, mountains, meals, and more."

The poetic order was deliberate. Moths and meals on the outside, at either end. Less important, despite performing the first and last specifics. The moth representing a special, miraculous experience, and yet 'just' a moth. [Not just a moth!] The meals representing the everyday, almost ordinary. Yet also necessary and supportive; often a meditation that can easily go missed.

Mother and mountain hold a special place, grounded and centred, whilst also providing support for those unseen things, those ordinary things, the everything. And they, themselves, supported by those other things, the nothing.

All supporting all. All as one. Everything together, including nothing, making one and zero the same thing.

A little bit of yin in yang and vice versa.

And all forming a circle, as the journey is ongoing.

It's a big part of why I chose Ongoing as the name for this. And why the logo is circular, representing multiple pathways, as well as showing both the ground and the air, as well as being two separate halves that are also very much together.

Within all this is my take on curiosity, best viewed through a lens of past, present, and future. Considering so many things in an interested way while researching what has gone before, being grounded in the current moment, and stepping confidently toward a future within our constant state of now.

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This should all feel exhausting, shouldn't it? Yet I've always felt a joy from it. I feel excited and, indeed, curious.

In true yin-yang style, there are moments of feeling exhausted, and times when I'm scared and uninterested. But it's the balance that makes those moments fleeting. And, all the while, I don't take any of those for granted. That balance can be upset, or thrown into unexpected places of turmoil and suffering.

I do trust that the balance can return, though I never assume it with some greedy expectation.

All these feelings are our own, since we can only ever know our own minds. Yet those feelings change when things happen both internally, through our thoughts, and externally, through events experienced outside.

As for the feelings themselves? says this: "A feeling is not something we can teach someone else. It is something that bubbles up from somewhere deep within."

That is why, no matter how much we wish to support others, we cannot simply fix things and make everything better. Our best efforts may or may not work. When they do, it's not our doing, though we played our part. When they don't, it's not our fault, and we tried our best.

There were times in the past when I didn't know to tell myself this. Either high on my own supply when some sort of intervention worked out, or desperately trying more and more before drowning in confusion when no type of support seemed to help.

I'm quick to ask for support and to accept support when it's offered. But I don't always know when I need support for something. None of us have it all sussed out. If we always knew when we needed support, we'd probably never need support.

Round and round we go, trying to work ourselves out, trying to work others out, and trying to make sense of everything. And nothing.

Beth Kempton's "Kokoro" has been a fantastic literary friend over the past week of reading it. Necessary at this exact point in time for me. That's a wonderful serendipity and also no fluke at all when you consider all that has come before it. I needed support of my own and I didn't know I needed it. Even a couple of chapters in, I didn't know. There was a certain push and pull.

Bit by bit, the balance was found and the yin-yang combination was in effortless flow. There was no start to the process, there is no end. The journey is ongoing. And in all these moments, in every breath, we have a moment to experience that oneness.

Ebbs and flows, ebbs and flows. Life gets busy and stressful at times. Special moments may not always be at the forefront of your mind. Even the simple passing of time over days, years, decades...can lead to a forgetfulness.

I've always wanted to remember as much as possible, sometimes by noting down or through active and dedicated remembering. Despite all this, forgetting will still occur. Yet reminders jump out too. Seemingly unrelated encounters with others, and conversations about shared experienced help me to re-remember what I had forgotten.

In those rememberings, I also find new links and lessons, ideas and connections. It's worth forgetting in order to re-remember just as much as it's good to learn and discover things in the first place.

Kempton talks about a space in between - a gap or an unsaid moment where something is known but not told - where this space contains many rememberings, forgettings, and re-rememberings.

The more we stay in touch with our memories and respect the ebb and flow of forgettings, the better we can return to them and grow from them. By doing so, we can also connect with other people's memories and experiences.

It's through this space in between that we can never touch, yet try to bring our awareness to, in which we can feel that strength of support for one another. We notice more about ourselves and more about those around us, and that collective experience allows what is within each of us to find a balance that shows how yin and yang are both necessary and both striving to work in whatever equilibrium that's needed in every moment.

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To clarify a few key points you can consider in your own journey, seeking balance:

1. Stay curious - Use the beginner's mind with an openness, even in those areas you have great knowledge and skill in. You may find growth in novel places, and better understand the world and yourself.

2. Find harmony through challenge, and challenges through harmony - See your experience as Yin and Yang at work. These forces are opposing yet complementary, needing to find suitable balance together to achieve the greatest harmony.

3. Reflect and adapt - Consider your past whilst living in the moment, ready for the future. The only moment you truly live is the present. When you're grounded within this present, the past and future can be considered more freely, allowing you to reflect through all these lenses of time, adapting as necessary.

4. Remember what you forget - Memories play a big role in shaping how we live and interact. There is a beautiful art — and in-between space — where you can remember, forget, and re-remember. These playful moments of awareness at different levels can lead to great depth of insight and many new connections.

5. Give support, seek support, and accept support - Help from others is okay. And, on the flipside, our ability to help others is often greater than we believe. Support and be supported.

The other thing I'd heartily recommend is for you to read Beth Kempton's “Kokoro” in full. The book served as a meditation for me, and as a support, coming at just the right time for my needs. The Yin and Yang kept doing their job, and I felt present and balanced and harmonious. Had I faced my challenges less grounded, I might have resisted the very elements trying to keep me safe.

We all need support, even at times when we don't realise we need it.

What resonated with you? Where do you provide key support and where do you most value it yourself? How do you find balance and harmony? Show your support by giving a heart and leaving a comment. 🤗

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Here it is:

After posting this, my son wanted to talk about it a bit, because…well, I’ll let him explain: “I really think doing a podcast thing is a good thing to do, and that’s what I want to start doing too.”

Good for him!

So here we are having a little chat about being inspired, creating stuff, and working with mistakes so they become new bundles of amazing creation instead.

Here’s to your art and creativity. Stay curious!

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And please do let my littlest know what you thought about his ideas, and let us know what inspires you on your creative journey.

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