To succeed in a healthy way, choosing a model worthy of your commitment is essential.

The operative word here is model, an exemplary model that you can live up to and be proud of.

Each age has had a model, or archetype that represented the zeitgeist of the times—from the hero, the saint, the martyr, the knight, the renaissance man, the explorer, the gentleman, the mystic, to more recent media-spawned phenomena in the guise of the film or rock star who is more admired than the humanitarian; and, to further reveal (split infinitive notwithstanding) society’s conceit, the cult-worship of youth and surface appearance has become mainstream idolatry.

This is the climate of prevailing values in which you must persevere. 

In our culture, we have mostly given our power away to those who have made a business of gathering information. This is, of course, the dangerous road to perdition.

Does anyone truly know more about your vision than you?

There have been too many occurrences when experts advised me against this or that, and were wrong. But, how could I know they were wrong?

I went ahead, did the “thing” and proved to my own self that intuition is the infallible expert after all.

Advice from experts, even of sincere quality, is often completely inept. 

Celebrity art critics:

The other day I received a letter from an organization that helps artists develop their careers—so they say.

The invitation was to attend a gala event seminar (cost: nearly $1,000) in NYC to hear and meet some well-known art critics—you know, the mavens who are eager to tell you the ropes and what “they” are looking for so you will know to make it as an artist. 

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In honor of all the veterans who served and gave of themselves.

Let us never forget to remember those who paid the ultimate price to defeat the haters and oppressors. 

Freedom in this world does not come cheap.

What one culture, or an era calls music another might dismiss as noise.

What one culture, or an era calls art another might dismiss as absurd, ludicrous or, worse yet, trivial.

Compounding the confusion and dogma inherent within these variables is the identity of art itself, which evolves organically over time into new forms by its creators. 

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