Staying true to yourself as an artist, the other side you haven’t heard.

Being true to yourself actually means being honest and sincere about what you believe, feel think and value to yourself and to others. And it could also mean being who you are without  pretense, knowing who you are and just being you.

As an artist being true to yourself is like when you are able to wholeheartedly share your experiences, ideas and inspiration with yourself and others.

It has to do with being authentic and original not fake not a copy but your real truth flowing through you to the world at large.

It also means genuinely being your own kind of “different”

The Importance of Being true to Yourself as an artist

It’s very crucial to stay true to yourself as an artist, it makes you standout among others, it makes you original because your works will represent your true person, your style, your beliefs and your values. It makes you special and not like any other etc. 

Just as we all hold in inestimable value the likes of Leonardo da Vinci, Claude Monet, Vincent Van Gogh or Pablo Picasso. Their works makes them their own kind of different creative and unique artist’s because they where true to themselves and sold their truth. 

For sure there can’t be another Vincent Van Gogh but their can be a greater artist. 

Being an artist is like being yourself for a living a common phrase people say that i think Picasso’s quote explains even better.

“My mother said to me, ‘If you are a soldier, you will become a general. If you are a monk, you will become the Pope.’ Instead, I was a painter, and became Picasso.” Pablo Picasso

Staying true to yourself as an individual or an artist is very important.

It’s has its numerous advantages but their is the other side to it that you haven’t probably heard or maybe you have and haven’t taught it through. I actually felt like writing about this because of my own experience. 

Here’s my story

In the cool of an evening i strolled out to attend to an errand, on my way back i noticed how the clouds had come together to form a figure that caught my attention, i was in amazement and wonder and the more i drew closer the more clouds kept changing the form of this creature i mean, it was beautiful! Amid the diffusion of sunlight. The closer i got, the more it changed in form. From an old wizard with a long nose then transformed to a fox with it’s mouth ajar then finally a tiny cute kitten. I stood right in front of my house and it was like a window of inspiration was opened and i wrote down a poem i tittled The Messenger which was expressing the beauty of nature and how it captivated my mind. 

Now after i poured down this inspiration, i made to post but on a second thought i read through and i told myself that i had to revisit it.

 I edited the piece of poem, used words that truely expressed my feelings and made more sense, by the time i was done. I truely felt like it was now a perfect master piece and when i posted people were inspired. 

Be you and do you.

The Other side of being true to yourself

Staying true to yourself as an artist cuts across several perspectives of what it means to be true to oneself. Often times as an artist or creative when you create a piece “some person’s” are used to the notion of saying oh this piece of peom just came to me and you it put down as inspired without actually going true to oversee what has been written down, it can be full of errors or just doesn’t portray what you really want to say like in my case.

It is actually more pleasant to take your time to read and revisit what you put down, search for synonyms that best fit the phrase or expresses your feelings. I’m not disregarding the fact that sometimes it is the errors that makes some works unique but i think as a creative you should draw a line between a badly written piece and an  ”imperfect perfect masterpiece”. It helps you not only to be more productive but to give your listeners and readers something to connect to.

Take out all the clutters that distracts your readers from the true message.

Most artist’s are fond of the keeping it real notion but sometimes your lack of proofreading and punctuations makes it seem unintellingent

Austin Kleon

So if it requires you do a lot of cropping, editing proofreading and others, you do the needful. How you structure your work is important, sometimes ideas and inspiration can come in  scattered pieces but it’s best to structure those raw experiences into a good story, peotry or song, if it means delaying the publishing fine.

I’m not saying we should go from being a self-expressing human to a content-creating machines No, but to have your readers in mind too.

If it requires learning how to become a better storyteller by all means become one. Staying true to yourself is important but also sometimes you have to organize your work to look professonal enough.

So everytime you edit your work, ask yourself, does this help what I’m trying to say or does it hurt it?

For you to have a balance.

if the art doesn’t connect with you, then how can you expect it to connect to other people? If you don’t say and paint and draw and sing and express what you know you have to express, then what’s the point in creating?

If i didn’t actually take my time to edit this post it wouldn’t have turned better.

So be you and do you.

Thanks for reading let’s hear your thoughts below.👇

What’s your view point on staying true to oneself?

What piece of work did you find out turned better after the update?

Do you believe we make a mistake in the process of staying true to ourselves?

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