“I've seen the Eiffel, I've seen an eyeful”
The more and more we practice our work and evolve into a newer version, the less and less people are going to understand the vision and where we are trying to go. It’s a fact, for us at least. It’s almost as if people like to assign a label to who you are, or to your work and what they expect from it, so every time you break it they are borderline offended and refuse to see what you are trying to say, like evolving is not the purpose of the work at the end of the day.
Like always, the more it happens to us, the bigger the chance of us writing about it here, so you, the readers, our family, can see what our work is going through and take notes, so we all grow together as a community and advance one another, as a humanitarian effort.
Yes, nobody is immune to it, on both sides of the map. You might’ve seen something your friend put out and think it’s either not representing their true skill or it’s miles away from how you know their work by now, so it’s strange. Our brains don’t like strange, they like familiarity, and while many overlook it, that mechanic also applies to creative work.
Maybe you created a new collection that is far from what people knew, a new aesthetic or a new sound you adopted, and all you hear is: what is that? Are you sure you’re not on drugs? Did you really do that? But what about the fans? It’s happened to all of us, to an extent, and today is the time to break it down.
Sometimes people don’t understand you because they don’t understand themselves, and it’s important to keep that in mind when we are venturing into new ideas or new styles, because the work is ours at the end of the day and not theirs. So are there really boundaries? And who said we can’t wear all black one day and prime Michele at Gucci the very next? You see, there are no limits, and if people don’t get the vision you have, it’s simply because they don’t know what they want from themselves, or they are too scared to break out of the box they created for you because it’s unfamiliar.
But that’s them. What about you? What about your work? If you are trying to cater to people’s approval just to get them to understand your vision, you are losing yourself in the process and, surely enough, losing the work too. Then you find yourself in a “creative block” where the whole time the block was an “opinion block,” but of course you confused it for a creative block because that’s the familiar term in the creative landscape. Did we say that the brain likes familiar yet? Well well well…
As long as you get your vision, your work can actualize itself and propel itself to new heights, because you are the only one you are trying to convince or fulfill. You leave outside opinions outside the door, as you refuse to let them limit what you can achieve or what’s possible for you, while you reject labels.
The fairytale continues, of course. once that vision works, everyone thinks you are a genius, but it’s just a different hill to climb. No matter who you are, at each stage more people will try to box you in and stop you from putting out the work you think is right, and it’s important not to listen to them.