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The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast
1KHO 536: How to Foster Creativity in a World That Wants to Control It | Austin Kleon, Steal Like an Artist
01:01:07
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- [00:01]
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- [00:28]
Jenny Urich
All right. Welcome to the 1000 Hours Outside podcast. My name is Jenny Urich. I'm the founder of 1000 Hours Outside, and I'm so excited. I've really been looking forward to this. Austin Kleon is back. Austin, welcome.
- [00:39]
Austin Kleon
Thank you, Jenny. It's nice to be back.
- [00:41]
Jenny Urich
Austin, the author of these phenomenal books. I always say they're great for graduation. They're really great for any time. They are. Steal like an artist. Show your work, Keep going. And a new one is being added to the mix next summer called don't call it art. Austin, I crossed your path from this man named Daniel Heffington who gave away a copy of Steal like an Artist at this conference. You know, normally people give away stuff to promote their own business, and he didn't do that. He gave away your book because it was so impactful for him. So I got it. I fell in love with it immediately and got the other ones right away. And I just have been. One of the things I come back to all the time is don't throw any of yourself away. So many of these things that you write about in these books, which are really cool, designed, they have stuck with me, like having an analog workspace. So I'm blabbering. Thank you for coming back.
- [01:32]
Austin Kleon
I. It's my pleasure. And. And thank you to Daniel for spreading the book. That's such a compliment to me.
- [01:39]
Jenny Urich
Wow. It was a cool thing. What a gift. I mean, it really has been very generous. Such a gift for me. And now, obviously, as so many people have heard these different podcast episodes, obviously, I know you're everywhere, but I would love to kick it off with this concept of actually things. And especially in this day and age where there's a lot of fear about what we put out into the world, I think we have maybe shrunk back from risk to a degree. A lot of that stems back to childhoods and kids aren't doing as many risky things. But you talk about showing your work. The subtitle is 10 Ways to Show your creativity and get disconnected. You say Lots of people want to be the noun without doing the verb. So can you talk about just that motivation to actually do?
- [02:24]
Austin Kleon
Well, it's very easy to talk about with writers because people love the idea of being a writer. Like a lot of people have in their head what a writer is, what a writer does. And it's kind of like romantic notion of it. But then when it comes to the actual writing, ooh, that part's really. I don't know about that part. And it actually should be switched. You should be interested in the things that you do, the things that you love to do, the verbs, the things that when you do them, make you feel alive. And then whatever noun or job title comes out of that, fine. But I think it's so much more important to think about your verbs and what you like to do or what you do that makes you feel alive or meaningful or helps the world or whatever to start from your verbs first and then the nouns will come from that. And that's true of books as well. You know, we would all like to have a book that we've written, but the only way we get that book is to. Through the verb of writing and drawing and designing and editing and whatever. So, yeah, the thing about doing things is just that it's fine to have big pictures in your head about who you'd like to be and what you'd like to do, but it's really about what you do on a day to day basis. And I, I have very unromantic like, notions of what it's like to be a writer. I mean, I think a writer is someone who sits down and writes every day and like, that's it, you know, And I think that that's, I think that's why I've been so. I pushed over the years and years and years and now decades to push people to think about a daily practice, some little thing you do every day, some little chunk of effort that's repeatable every day. And those little repeatable bits of effort, if you could stick around long enough, they add up into something great. And I just think it's very, it's just simple math. But you have to show up and you have to do stuff.
- [04:24]
Jenny Urich
Yeah.
- [04:24]
Austin Kleon
And you have to be ready for that stuff to not do much at the time. Like again, writing's really easy because if you tell people like, just write a page a day and they're like, well, that's just, oh, like I just wrote a page, you know. But if you do that every day for 365 days. You've got enough for a book, right? You've got enough for three of my books. They're little, you know, so it's like. But, yeah. And I mean. And you have to be ready to throw some of those days away, you know? Some of those days you won't know what they're worth for years, actually. Yeah, well.
- [04:58]
Jenny Urich
And one of the things that you talk about then is there's just these sort of common distractions that maybe seem like they're more important. So one of the ones that you talk about is networking. So you talk about how people waste time and energy. They're just trying to make connections instead of actually doing so. You say. You talk about how the people that are actually getting ahead are not the ones who are schmoozing at cocktail parties, they're too busy for that. They're the ones who are cranking away.
- [05:26]
Austin Kleon
Yeah. And they're. I've been thinking about this a lot lately, because people, there are connections you can make in your work. Like, the connections you should be making are really in your work. So, for example, if you take one writer you really love that you love to read, and you think, gosh, I'd really love to meet that person, that's fine. But really, you'd have a better chance of reaching that person by saying, you know what? This person I really love really speaks to this other artist I really love. What if I did, like, a blog post or, like, just a little short Instagram video where I was like, you know, I've been reading so and so's work, and then I was looking at so and so's work, and they talk to each other in this really interesting way. And I think you guys will love it. Like, just read them together or whatever. You know, if you do something like that, you're making a connection in your work, and then that person you're trying to reach, you actually have more. You're actually doing more for that person actually than you are, and you're doing more for yourself than you'd be doing if you were, like, sending them cold emails, trying to meet them. You know what I mean? So that's the kind of principle behind show your work is to just simply do the work you'd like to see done and to be generous in the sense that you are merely sharing the things that you love. Because people worry about being experts. They worry about, well, who am I to share anything? Who am I to do this work? And the bottom line is, is that, you know, to be an author, you have to Authorize yourself, really. I mean, it's not that you give yourself permission to do this work. And it's really. It's not about being an expert. It's not about having all these great things. It's just about sharing in a spirit of generosity what you're in love with. And I think that if you share what you're in love with in the right way, you're going to meet people who love that stuff.
- [07:25]
Jenny Urich
Yeah.
- [07:26]
Austin Kleon
And they're going to become your connections, basically.
- [07:29]
Jenny Urich
What an interesting thing. I think about that because, I mean, who gives you permission to start a podcast? Nobody.
- [07:36]
Austin Kleon
Nobody.
- [07:36]
Jenny Urich
And now I go to the. When I'm at Barnes and Noble or I'm at the library, I'm constantly like, oh, I've talked to that person. Oh, I've spent time with that person. Whereas five years ago, I didn't know anybody. I didn't know any of the authors in the bookstore. And so it's the act of doing that helps you to build those connections. So that is one distraction that we feel like we have to already know the people. We have to already have the networks. But you say, no, instead, go do things, crank away at things, and that's what's going to help you make the connections. What about the distraction of that? There'll always be time. So one of the things that you talk about so, you know, you're like, okay, write a page every day. Well, I think one of the reasons maybe you wouldn't is because you think, well, there's going to be a time in the future where I'm less busy. But you talk about. You say, remembering that I'll be dead soon is. Is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make big choices in life. Oh, this? Steve Jobs said that. Steve Jobs said that.
- [08:33]
Austin Kleon
Yeah.
- [08:33]
Jenny Urich
It's a good quote.
- [08:34]
Austin Kleon
It is a good quote. Yeah. So death is something that our. Particularly our American culture, we do everything to avoid it, like, and avoid thinking about it. If you just watch TV, if you watch network TV, which I don't recommend, you know, for 30 minutes, every single advertisement you see is some denial of death in some way, you know, and then there's actually a wonderful book called the Denial of Death by this guy named Ernest Becker, who's one of my favorite. That's one of my favorite books. And it won the Pulitzer. It won the National Book Award or the Pulitzer Prize or something in the 70s. It was a very big book. And I don't know how many people read it now, but Becker's Point was that all of culture is about the denial of death, is that we do these things, we kind of we're the only creatures is a very simple point, is that we're really the only creatures on the planet that know the whole time we're living that we're going to die one day. And so what that does is it creates a kind of tension and anxiety in us that we have to live in this kind of state of knowing that our demise, you know, your dog doesn't know that he's going to die one day. He's just, he's just being a dog as far as we know. As far as we know. So for me, but this, this like thinking about death thing, it sounds really grim to a lot of people. A lot of people think it's very depressing. The one thing I tell people to do is to read obituaries is to have some sort of like kind of regular. You don't have to read them every day. I used to read them every day. I actually don't read them every day anymore just because I, you know, I had that practice for a while and now I kind of like check in every couple of days or every week on the obituaries. But obituaries, when you read them, you realize even though they're about people who are recently deceased, they're actually about life. And because if someone's written an obituary for you, that means you did something with your life, whether it was infamous or good or meaningful, it depends. But like obituaries are really interesting because they just remind you that this will happen to you too one day. And what's going to be in your obituary? I think it's a great question for people. What do you want to be in your obituary? And to have that kind of. I think the, the, the thing about being a human being is you just have to live every day as though it might be your last while simultaneously living as if you might get 4,000, 8,000, 10,000 more of them. Right? Or more, whatever it is, 20,000, whatever. I think 4,000 weeks is what we get on earth on whole. I think that's Oliver Berkman or a writer who I really admire, wrote a book called 4000 Weeks. And that's about the lifespan that we, you know, on average. And so, yeah, just keeping that in mind. I think it's a. I think we need prod. So the joke I always make is death and deadlines. So these are the two great, like kind of time based things that you need. So you need to think about death in the sense that you need to make sure that what you're doing is meaningful and it's what you want to be. You know what, you might want to go in your obituary. So you need that on one hand. Now on the other hand you need a deadline and you need regular deadlines to hit. So that, that's the kind of push to say it doesn't need to be perfect, it needs to be done. So my weekly newsletter, every week, every Friday I have to have a list of 10 for people and it has to go out on Friday and it has, it doesn't matter whether it's good, it just has to get done. And I know I'm going to do it every Friday. And that deadline, whereas for some people it would be a stressor for me is a great reliable thing in my life. I know that every Friday I have to do this thing, I have to hit this deadline. And so those two things, I'm a tensions guy. I think that when you have two things pulling at you, it actually, it's like a rubber band. It like creates a tension where there's energy to be found in there. So death on the one hand, what do you want your life to look like at the end? What do you want to have done with it? What, what's the meaning? What do you want to go in your obituary? And then on the other hand, the deadline coming up that you have to hit that it doesn't matter whether it's good, it has to get done. Having those two things in your life I think is just kind of a magical corrective for a lot of, you know, creative inertia.
- [13:06]
Jenny Urich
And you've done it. You can see, you people can follow along. They sign up for the newsletter, follow along on your social media and you see that you are actually, you're just, this is an outp. Outpouring of what you already do. That's what your books are. And you talk about that about good non fiction writers. They're just regular people who get obsessed by something and spend a ton of time thinking out loud about it. They, they're paying attention and they're sharing what they do. And you see that and you talk about how that a little bit of imprisonment, just a little bit of imprisonment. The fact that you choose that every Friday you're going to send these 10 things is a boundary that you've placed on yourself. A little bit of imprisonment is, if it's of your own making, can set you free.
- [13:47]
Austin Kleon
I just, I just flew on a plane. I don't fly that much anymore. I used to like do a lot of speaking and a lot of like. But I, you know, since the pandemic that's kind of like quieted down a little bit and I don't mind it that much. But I flew again and I'm about to do some more flying this summer and I just remembered again the magic of being stuck on an airplane. Like stuck in a chair in the sky and there's literally nothing you can do. Just what a. To me, it's like I never am able to focus more, to see my life more clearly, to know what needs to be done. There's something about being in an airplane chair in the sky, looking out. I always try to get a window seat because I like to look out the window and just watch things. And it's like I thought airplane mode. You know, I'm really obsessed with this idea of airplane mode where it's like. And I actually hate that flights have WI fi now because I, I always try not to do WI fi because I think what other time in your life can you just. You're strapped in and no one can get to you outside of the plane, right? Like there's just. You can't do anything. Oh, I was on a plane, sorry. You know, and it's so focusing. And in my book, Keep Going, I wrote about an artist I love. Her name's Nina Katchadorian. And she actually did this art thing called Seat Assignment where she made work in an airplane. So she would take these really long flights and she would just make artwork out of whatever was available to her on the plane. So she'd take the In Flight magazine, like take a photo and like sprinkle some salt over it and make like a cloud around some guy and take a picture of it with her mobile phone. She'd like go into the bathroom and like drape herself in her sweater and like put like use toilet paper to make like a Victorian wrap around herself. You know, she did all this crazy stuff on the airplane. And I just, I get so much work done on airplane. So one of the things I tell people is like, you know, if you need to get work done airplane mode, literally like put your phone in airplane mode, strap yourself in the chair and just be, you know. And I think that's, and, and set a timer, you know, because a, because a flight has a, A flight has a built in time, it's gonna last, you know. Yeah, pretty much know. Of course these days, you know, you might be on an airplane for two or three more hours than you expected on the tarmac. But, like, so that. So, yeah, the seat assignment, the airplane mode, to me, that is like. But I was just thinking about it again this week because I took an actual flight and on the one hand, it's one of the worst things you could do. You know, it's a really painful experience, but if you can give yourself over to it, it's a lot like writing in some ways. You know, writing can be really painful and, like, awful. But if you sit with it and say, hey, I'm here for the next hour and a half just staring at this blank page, like, I might as well write even if it sucks, you know, that's. So that's the mode you just kind of have to get into. But yeah, airplane mode, I recommend it to everyone. You know, airplane mode can be a way of life, actually.
- [16:57]
Jenny Urich
Yeah, it's a little bit of imprisonment.
- [16:59]
Austin Kleon
A little bit of imprisonment.
- [17:00]
Jenny Urich
If it's of your own making it. It can set you free. So this is about actually doing things and even just the titles, like, if you have the titles in your mind, do the work and keep going. Do it, keep going. Don't quit. Do it, keep going.
- [17:13]
Austin Kleon
Yeah.
- [17:15]
Ginny
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- [18:23]
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- [18:53]
Austin Kleon
Not all meals are created equal. For instance, breakfast has the spicy egg McMuffin for a limited time and lunch doesn't. McDonald's breakfast goes first.
- [19:09]
Jenny Urich
One of the things that you talk about is that when you do things, especially if you're just starting out and almost probably all the time when you're just starting out, that you're, you're an amateur. And so I think that's one thing that keeps people from doing something is because they're going to stink at it. But the interesting thing, and you write about this, is that because the world is changing at such a rapid rate, we're all amateurs. And we're all going to have these times where we're amateurs. I heard a statistic that said 85% of the jobs that will exist in 2030, okay, 85% don't exist yet. I'm like, how could that even possibly be true? Even if it's just slightly true, that means that there's going to be a ton of people in 2030 who are complete amateurs. Can you help people to get a little bit more comfortable and even look at it as a strength? You have all these quotes where people say, my greatest strength, you know, the Radiohead from him, My greatest strength is that I don't know what I'm doing well.
- [20:08]
Austin Kleon
So the next book is kind of. Kids are a perfect example of this. Kids don't know what they're doing and they don't know that they don't know what they're doing. And that's what makes them so powerful and creatively juiced. Basically, when you give a four year old a marker, they don't know that they're not an artist. They're holding a marker so they're ready to go. So the reason I'm calling the next book Don't Call It Art is I stole because I'm not very original, as people know. I stole the title from something that the artist John Baldessari said John Baldessari used to teach fourth grade, so he taught like at an elementary school level. And he said, I learned everything from watching a kid draw. Kids don't call it art when they're making stuff, they're just doing it. And I think that when you give a four year old the right time, space and materials and say, what are you going to draw? They are tapped in and they can do it. You know, it might be a scribble, it might be unrecognizable to you, but they can have an experience in a way that the most crusty, old, done everything artist can't. So I think that spending some time with children, spending some time with beginners is the best thing that people who are experts can do, because it restarts that kind of not knowing part of us that is. So I think everyone who started doing something knows the magic of being a beginner, that it's terrifying, but it's also incredible to be a beginner at something. So that word amateur, though, I would like to go back and say, you know, for me that word is not pejorative because to me, I think about amateur in terms of the original French meaning of the word, which is lover of amateur. You know, lover of an amateur is someone who does something for the love of it. A professional is someone who does it for money. And so the best professionals, however, have an amateur spirit. It's the, it's the. Again, this is another tension, the tension between being an amateur and being a professional, being a beginner and being an expert. The best experts figure out over and over again how to become beginners. The best scientists, for example, the minute a scientist figure something out, they go back and say, well, what do I not know? And then that restarts the whole process. Tom York, who you mentioned of Radiohead, it's like, well, we made the best guitar album of all time. What can we do now? Well, let's throw the guitars away, let's make an electronic album. And so I think musicians, it's very fun to talk about musicians because all a musician has to do is just switch instruments. So if you're a great piano player, all you have to do is switch to the guitar. And all of a sudden you don't know what you're doing, but you have all this other stuff that you've done, you know, music, you just don't know this particular instrument. So all of a sudden, like life is new again and you could see this all over. You know, artists do this all the time. It's like, well, I Know how to. The cartoonist R. Crumb had a period, you know, he did everything with an old fashioned nib, like a old fashioned cartoonist, like nib and. And ink. And then he switched to brush and ink, you know. And all of a sudden it's like the work's different and he's having a blast with it. And so these little things going back to the magic of beginning. And again, this is another tension. It's like the adult and the child. When you're editing, it really helps to be an adult. To have. Be like, well, this is what works and this is what people understand or whatever. But when you're making stuff, you have to be a child. You have to have that wild kind of, you know, what could we do here? What does this material want to do, you know? Oh, this marker. If you push it this way, it does this thing, you know. And that's what I learned from being around my kids is just that if you unleash someone who's a beginner with almost no instruction and you give them the time, space and materials to explore, it's magic. It's magic. And so that's what I've tried to. I wanted to try to bottle that idea into a book. And so that's what the next one is about. But it's really about my. You know, I had these kids and by the time they got here, you know, by the time they were alive to the world, I was this best selling author and this person that everyone thought knew something about creativity. And I just thought, oh, well, you know, I'll be. I'll be the great teacher here. I'll be the expert. You know, they'll have an in house artist and musician they can learn from or whatever. And then they got here and they just were so naturally brilliant at the stuff. I had set up the stuff for them. But they were so. They were like, okay, well, what do we need you for? You've already set this up. Oh, you've got a piano in the house. Great, I'll play it. Oh, you've got markers and papers laid out for us. Great, I'll make a picture. They were just so naturally good at. And so I had the experience of. I thought I was going to be the master and they would be the apprentices. And it was switched. I was the apprentice, they were the masters. And I just wanted to try to bottle that because it changed my life. And some of the stuff that's in show your work and keep going was obviously inspired by that experience. But yeah, the older I Get. The more I'm just like the people who are able to be comfortable with uncertainty, to be comfortable with not knowing, and to be brave enough to attempt things that they don't know how to do. Those are the people that really stay tapped in, and those are the people that grow.
- [25:51]
Jenny Urich
It's really against our natural inclination or my mind. My natural inclination is to, like, get good at something and stick with that thing.
- [25:59]
Austin Kleon
I would love to interrupt you. Can I interrupt you? I'm sorry. It's not just your natural inclination. It is literally the world. So pull back for a minute. The world rewards people who figure out how to do something and just keep doing it. That's what the world wants from you. That's called having a style. That's called having a brand. Right. So the problem is when you're a creative person or you run a business or whatever, that's attention. Give the people what they want, but also keep them interested and, you know, coming back for more. Well, if you give the people just what they want and no more, they're not gonna. They're gonna get bored.
- [26:41]
Jenny Urich
Yeah.
- [26:41]
Austin Kleon
If you give them what you want, but they don't necessarily want you, lose them. So this is, like, attention. So this is like. So I just interrupted you just because I was like. It's not just us who are afraid. It's. We have good reasons for being afraid of this stuff. Because commercially, what the world says to you. I just listened to you. Remember that Goo Goo Dolls song, Iris?
- [27:06]
Jenny Urich
Love Goo Goo Dolls. That's my favorite band.
- [27:08]
Austin Kleon
I give up Her. Yeah. So he was just on Song Exploder, and he was talking about having a hit song and how paralyzing it was. He did the song called Name. John Resnick is his name. He did Name. I don't know your name. And that was a big hit for Google Dolls. But, like, he had a hit. And then what did the record company say? Hey, do that again. That. Do that again is like, you know. And so Iris was him trying to. Iris was him getting out of writer's block because he. They. They. I forget this. I think it's like City of Angels or whatever that Nicholas Cage movie is. It's a remake of Wings of Desire where Nicholas Cage is a. Is a angel and he gives up his wings for some lady or whatever it is. But they invited him to do a song, and that's how he did Iris. But the point is, what did the world want from this? They just wanted another hit. They wanted the same exact thing. And what did it do to him? It froze him. And he said he wrote the original version of Iris. He had broken two strings on his guitar and he. He uses weird tunings if you're a guitar player. So he dropped the bottom string for guitar players out. This is only matter to guitar players. He dropped the bottom string to B and the other strings were tuned to D. And that's how he wrote the original Iris because he was like playing this weird guitar and he was just like strumming around. And then Iris came. So I just think what. The reason I interrupted you and I'm sorry is that I think in this culture right now, we take on things where like, this is my problem. Like, this is an issue I have. Like, I'm afraid to do something different. I'm afraid to like bust out of my comfort zone. I'm afraid to do this stuff. It' you have good reasons to be afraid because everything in the culture says do more of Ginny. Do more of what we like, right? Like do more.
- [28:53]
Jenny Urich
Stay in your lane.
- [28:54]
Austin Kleon
Do another square book, Austin, you know, or whatever, you know, and. And it's the same internally. So finding that balance. I'll do one more thing on you and then we'll move on.
- [29:04]
Jenny Urich
You say whatever you want. I'm just here to listen one more.
- [29:07]
Austin Kleon
So I read this story about Taco Bell. Taco Bell is like one of my guilty pleasures. So like Taco Bell, what do you get?
- [29:15]
Jenny Urich
What do you order at Taco Bell?
- [29:16]
Austin Kleon
I really like their. I actually now, these days I actually kind of just like they're like vegetarian menu because I feel like that's kind of like safe. They have to kind of make it. I don't even know what's safe at Taco Bell. But like, I like like a black bean Crunchwrap or something like that. I also do. I will mess with the seven layer burrito. Like I eat that. I'll eat any Taco Bell you put in front of me. Which is why I don't go Taco Bell very often. But anyway, going back. So like Taco Bell has this innovation lab, innovation kitchen at Taco Bell. And it's where they birth all the weird stuff, right? They like the Doritos Locos and all that stuff. So they had these like kitchen scientists who are always experimenting. I mean, they're basically experimenting with like, what, what, what amount of salt, sugar and fat can we put in this thing to keep you chomping on Taco Bell? Obviously. But they came up with this rule that I'm like obsessed with. And it's shown Me a way forward in my own work, which is the rule at the Innovation Kitchen is you can change the taste or you can change the form, but you can't change the taste and the form. Okay? So that's their. So that's their rule at Taco Bell. So for me, this next book is going to be another six by six square book illustrated. It's going to look like the other books, but the taste is a little. Because. Because it's through the lens of kids. I think the taste is just a little bit different that people will say, oh, I'm in good hands here. This is like an Austin Kleon book. But the taste is just like a little bit. Oh, there's like a little bit new flavor to this. Right? And so I think about that a lot with the newsletter because anyone who reads my newsletter knows it's literally just a list of 10 every week. And that's the form and it doesn't change. But what I fill it with, the flavors is like. Is different every week. And that's why people come back. So it's like, I. I think, like, so Taco Bell, Goo Goo Dolls, you know, these are the things that, you know, there's musical goo and there's food goo, and you can learn from it.
- [31:22]
Jenny Urich
So, I mean, you have. You have to be willing to embrace uncertainty, I think. Right, okay, so this is one of the quotes. You can't be content with mastery. You have to push yourself to become a student again. Anyone who isn't embarrassed of who they were last year probably isn't learning enough.
- [31:41]
Austin Kleon
I think that's Elaine. That's Elaine the baton. Who said that? Yeah. Well, I mean, like, it's good to be embarrassed of who you were. That means you're growing, you know, and you can be embarrassed or you can be. You can have. I don't know, it's not grace. It's like. Or you can be really, like, tender with that former version of yourself, right? Be like, oh, look at that little plant. It didn't know what it was. It didn't know what it was yet, you know, or whatever, you know, oh, look at that little puppy. You know, I think of that about myself. I'm like, oh, look at that kid. You know, Interesting. But the thing I really. I think I'm getting old now. I'm 42. So, like, I'm. I'm solidly in middle age, especially. Someone got really mad at me the other day. This woman got really mad at me and she said, what do you mean you're Halfway through your life. And I was like, well, I mean, I hope I'm not halfway through my life, but actuarially I'm halfway through my life. Like American men, if you look at the life expectancy, they don't live much past 80. So like, I'm 42. I'm trying to be realistic. This woman was really upset, I think partly because she was 80 years old. But anyway, so like, but, but anyway, but so I'm so I've been thinking about the former version of myself because people, so many people have read Steal like an Artist now.
- [32:59]
Jenny Urich
Yep.
- [33:00]
Austin Kleon
That they asked me about the book and I am kind of like, I don't really know that guy who wrote that book. I'm like, I don't. I know him kind of. But like, that's me, like, like 15 years ago almost. That stuff that's from 2012.
- [33:18]
Jenny Urich
And well, it came out in 2012. So you're ready.
- [33:21]
Austin Kleon
I'm writing it.
- [33:22]
Jenny Urich
So that would make sense. Of course you would be different. You should be a different person.
- [33:25]
Austin Kleon
I'm like, I'm a baby. I was 27, I didn't have kids. I like hadn't done that much yet, you know. And so when you read that book, the confidence, the voice that comes out of that book is the swagger of a 27 year old that thinks that they've got it figured out. And some people would say, well, like, so Peter Workman who owned Workman Publishing, who was still alive when Steel like an Iris come out. That was his response to the book. He's like, who the hell would listen to a 27 year old copywriter in Texas? He was like, who cares? And that was kind of his reaction to the book. And he wasn't wrong, necessarily. But in hindsight, what did we just talk about? Beginner's mind, amateur spirit. The person in Steel Like An Artist is this kid who's just figured it out, or he thinks he has and he's burning to share it with people. You know, he's throwing everything he's got at the wall. Steal like an Artist was everything I had at the time. Literally just like throwing it into this book. And that's why it has the energy that it does. And I'm just really, really, you know, people say, oh, you must have been so brave to do still like an artist and blah, blah, blah. I'm like, no, I was ignorant. I didn't know that I didn't have the right to do this. I just thought. I didn't know that you couldn't write that most people don't write and illustrate their own books. You know, I didn't know that you. You know, it takes a real audacity to design a cover and, like, bring it to your editor and be like, here, this is what I think the book should look like. And they're like, oh, okay, well, maybe we'll put this in the COVID meeting, I guess. Can I keep this? And you're like, yeah. So, like, the COVID for See, like an artist, which is kind of like people like, oh, that's such an iconic cover. I'm like, that's literally me. I. What I did was I remembered being a kid in elementary school when you'd make book covers for. You know how you take, like, a paper bag. See, kids don't know that, you know, so you take a paper bag, you had this big hardcover math book that they'd used for, like, 10 years or whatever, and you'd make this paper bag cover for it, and then you could doodle on it and, like, you know, whatever.
- [35:33]
Jenny Urich
That's like taking me back, right? Because you would have to go home and be like, yeah, the grocery store in Michigan, which is not in Texas. It's called Meijer.
- [35:41]
Austin Kleon
Yeah, I know. Meyer.
- [35:42]
Jenny Urich
It's spelled M A I J E R. And you. You would have to be like, dad or mom. You. Next time you go grocery shopping, you got to get extra of the. The paper bags.
- [35:50]
Austin Kleon
And then you'd wrap it. And the great thing, you know, if you were a fancy kid, your mom would get you, like, some sort of fancy. They made paper to do it with because it was such a thing. But it was better if you had. Parents are just like, here's a paper sack. Because then it's like, well, you get to make the COVID for this, like, textbook and stuff. So I went back to being a kid in elementary school, and I said, oh, well, you know what? I'll just. I'll find a book that's six by six in here. It was a guy named James Pachalka, one of my favorite cartoonists. He. He did this book called the Cute Manifesto, and it was six by six in paperback. It's like, okay, cool. So I drew the letters and I put it in my computer and I made. You know, I figured out about what the size should be on the, like, for the wrap, and I did the front cover and the back cover, and I printed it out on. I think I used the copier at my office because I didn't have a good enough copier to make a color Print like that. So I think I stole some paper from the office and made this cover, and I wrapped it around this book like I was in fourth grade. And that's what I took to my editor, Bruce Tracy, and said, hey, I think this is what the book should look like. Yeah. And. And then so what happened was I had made what's called a dummy book. So in children's literature in particular, guys like John Classen, who's like, one of my favorite children's book authors, they'll make what's called a dummy book, and they'll bring it into the publisher and they'll say, this is, you know, this is what the book should feel like. This is what it should look like. I had made a dummy book, but I didn't know it. I was just being a dummy, basically, you know? So, like, that's the kind of stuff where now I can look at steel like an artist. And so much of it is just, you know, luck is being ready. You know, it's just like, hey, they're letting me write another book. Because that's the other thing people don't remember about Steal Like An Artist is that it's a second book. It's a guy. That's because I have a first book called Newspaper Blackout. Yeah, that's like, oh, I didn't know that at all. Right. So my first book is called Newspaper Blackout, and it's a poetry book, and it's made up of those blackout poems that you see in Steal Like An Artist. So that was the first book that nobody really. That's kind of a deep cut. Like, not many people have heard Nirvana's Bleach, but, like, you know, they know Nevermind. So it's like. I'm not saying it's still like an artist is as good as Nevermind. I'm just saying.
- [38:15]
Jenny Urich
Well, but that's the whole thing about Keep going. I mean, that's so interesting, right?
- [38:19]
Austin Kleon
So, like, Steal like an Artist is a second attempt. It's like, oh, they might not let me do this again. I got lucky once, and I was kind of like, this is like, we gotta do this. We gotta give this everything we got because this might not happen again. And so. And deadline. I wrote that. I made that book in about two months. Like, just like, you know, because I had the slides and the talk and stuff. And then I had, like, two months to get it done because they were going to rush it out for the next year, which, in hindsight is great. That's how I love to work now that I'M older and I'm in like a more mainstream, you know, like this book has been done. You know, I've like this next book won't come out for another year, you know, and I don't think, I think we sold Steal like an Artist in March and then we had it out the next March.
- [39:09]
Jenny Urich
Yeah. So that means you had to have it done in a couple months. Yeah. And I didn't have print.
- [39:13]
Austin Kleon
Yeah, I didn't have time to think. Is this illustration perfect? No, just do a doodle. That's why the illustrations are so loose and like kind of like unique is that I didn't have time to make them better, you know. Close your eyes, exhale, Feel your body relax and let go of whatever you're carrying today.
- [39:35]
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- [39:38]
Austin Kleon
In time for this class.
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- [39:43]
Jenny Urich
And breathe.
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- [39:50]
Austin Kleon
Namaste.
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- [40:59]
Austin Kleon
But instead of being like George Lucas, so like George Lucas with Star wars, all he can see with Star wars is the problems with that, with that movie. And so he spends 20 years doing the special editions, remaking it, putting them out. And now you can't even watch the original Star Wars. People who went to see Star wars in 1977 in their people who went to see Star wars in 1977 can't go see that movie because it doesn't exist. You can't officially see that movie because all the movies have been remade with special effects and, like, all this stuff. So I learned something from Lucas. I said, when you make a book that people love, it belongs to them now. And so when it came time to do the anniversary edition of Steel, I didn't change it. People like, oh, are you gonna update it for AI? Are you gonna do this and that? It's like, no, I'm not gonna change this book. This is. This is a book that people have read for the past 10 years, and they love it. And I'm not messing with it, because it's not my book anymore. Right? So that's the weird. So, you know, we're talking about, like, being tender with yourself. I'm not only am I tender with who I used to be, I'm grateful to that kid that he put stuff out there, you know, because, like, I. You know, I'm still reaping the benefits. But again, it's because he was hungry, and he wanted it really bad, and he didn't know what he was doing. He didn't know that he shouldn't be doing this stuff, you know? And that's why I think people need to remember is so much. Citizen Kane is a movie that, like, every film buff is like, citizen Kane, greatest movie of all time, whatever. Well, Orson Welles, when you asked him about it, he would say, ignorance. He's like, I didn't know what couldn't be done, so I asked for it, and we figured it out. You know, we didn't know what couldn't be done, so we did it, you know, and that's. And he was 25 when he made that movie. And he was just. He was just a brat, you know? He just was like. And he got the right people, and, you know, so these are the stories that I really think that, like, people need to remember because, you know, Roman Alarm, who's. Who's a novelist, he wrote Leave the World behind. That was adapted into that Julia Roberts movie for Netflix. I think he said one time he was like, publishers want to duplicate the success, but they don't want to duplicate the conditions of the success. So people want you to duplicate your successes, but they don't want you to duplicate the conditions. Right. They don't want to give you the conditions that you could duplicate that success. Right. And that's an important thing to remember in the background, you know?
- [43:41]
Jenny Urich
Well, because how can you. How can you duplicate being 27 and you can't. I Mean, it is really interesting. I haven't thought about it. I mean, I love these books. I think they match cool and they look on the shelf. But I mean my, I've got bookshelves down our hallway that look similar to what's behind you. I don't think I have any other six by six square books. You know, think about if I go to the bookstore, it's like, what percentage of books are six by six square? You come in as a 27 year old and you're like, my book's going to be this size.
- [44:09]
Austin Kleon
Well, now I will say that that is my, my editor, Bruce Tracy. We were having, and this is a fun story too. My editor Bruce Tracy said, well, what do you think about trim size? And I was like, trim size? Oh, what's the trim size? You know, because I don't know, you know, I kind of knew what trim size was. And I was like, well, I don't know what do think? Which is always the great, well, what were you thinking? And he said, well, he was like, you know, slides are horizontal. They're like, they're like landscape and books are usually vertical. So what about a square book? I said, yeah, that sounds good. That's it. That's why it's square. That's literally. It took five minutes of Bruce just saying, what about a square book? I said, great, awesome, let's do it. You know, and the other funny thing about Steal like an Artist is that there are pictures in the book that are camera phone shots or they're like, they're very low res. And so there are these white borders that I hand drew around a lot of the pictures in that book. And the reason they look like that is that that's the maximum resolution that that image can be on that page. So it's me being like, well, how can we make this look intentional? Yeah, like, how can we make that look intentional? And so I was like, oh, we'll draw like a white border around it and then you leave a black, you know, so these are, these are called constraints and you need them. You need constraints, you need, you need time constraints, you need budget constraints, and you need medium constraints. Because time, space and materials in abundance, it's paralyzing. But if you only have a certain amount of time, you only have a certain amount of space, and you only have this certain kind of materials, then you have to be creative. And that's what makes the stuff.
- [46:04]
Jenny Urich
Oh, I hit one last topic as we wrap up here. So you talk a lot about this uncertainty. Uncertainty is the Very thing that art thrives on. And moving forward in the face of uncertainty is a way of dealing with uncertainty. And don't be content with mastery. The world is changing at such a rapid rate. It's turning all of us into amateurs or lovers of things new. And so this is the spot that we're in. But whether. And whether we're putting out something that's new or whether we've been doing something for a long time, there are people that hate it. And they even hate you. They even like, I hate you and I hate everything that you're doing.
- [46:40]
Austin Kleon
Definitely.
- [46:41]
Jenny Urich
And so that's part of the package too. It actually goes with both in order to do the work you have, you know, you know that at some point someone's going to be like, that's the worst thing I've ever seen. What are you doing with your life? And even I just read this book by Pat Flynn who. And he talked about how his son started. His son was young and he started a YouTube channel. And Pat had said, look, people are going to post nasty comments the first time it comes. Come talk to me about it. And so his son comes, he's like 10 years old. And the nasty comment said, kill yourself. So I mean, this is, I mean, this is a thing like, you know, sometimes I'm like, I wish I was just a. A plumber. Everybody. This day, in this day and age, everything is. There's people can leave comments and they can. They're going to give their opinion. So it goes with both doing your work and keep going because you're not going to quit because there's going to be critics.
- [47:32]
Austin Kleon
Yeah.
- [47:33]
Jenny Urich
You talk about really practical ways of dealing with that.
- [47:37]
Austin Kleon
Yeah. So the first thing to know about everyone's reaction to your work is that it's 95% about that, 99 about them, and 1% about what you made. The thing that I love to say about like, I, I didn't mean to talk about Steel like an Artist so much in this conversation, but it's just been around so long that that's what I have experience with the. Your typical Amazon review for. Here are the two kind of Amazon reviews for like. For Steal like an Artist. I hate reading my reviews. I usually don't. But like, in the beginning it was like this. It was like, this isn't even a book. This is like a pamphlet. I read this on an airplane ride and threw it out the window. Whatever. One star, a five star review was like this. This is barely even a book. You can read it on one single I read it on a single airline flight, and I was done with it, and I had these things to do. Five stars, right? So they were like. So it's like both these people were describing the same book. They're like, this is. This is a short book. Like, you know, they were accurate, but what they were looking for in a book was completely different. And so that's really important for people who write books is to say physically, although not always now with ebooks, but physically, you could give the same book, the same physical book to 100 different people. And then the really magic thing is you suddenly have a hundred different books. Because what people bring to the reading experience is what the book is. The book is nothing without the reader. And people have to remember this. You are only 50%, and that might even, even be high. The book does not become alive. It does not exist until a reader picks it up and opens it. So that's the one thing to remember, is that people's reactions to you are about them and not about you. Second thing I think is that Paul. Oh, why am I forgetting? Because it's. Because it's time for a snack. There's a guy named. I'm gonna remember his. His name later. His first name's Paul, and I don't know why my name is blinking. He's like one of my favorite online writers. But he wrote a piece a while back. I'll send it to you for the show notes later. He wrote a piece a while back, like, a long time ago, maybe 10 years ago, about the Web, called why Wasn't I Consulted? Why Wasn't I Consulted? And he said, if you want to know the secret of the Web and extrapolate that to the modern world, why wasn't I consulted? So when people leave comments, they are coming from a place of why wasn't I consulted? Well, you didn't talk to me first. This is what I think, right? And so whenever I read a comment, I think, why wasn't I consulted? And the, you know, the other thing to remember is that, you know, people are wounded. Like your average person out there is just. Is carrying so many wounds, and they're so hurting, and everything that they say to you is. Is about them, and it's very rarely about you. And so I think the thing that I extrapolate from all of that is it helps in the beginning to know who you're making things for. Now, someone like Rick Rubin will tell you to make things for yourself and only yourself, because you can't, you know, audiences, whatever I think That's a little self involved, personally. Like, I don't think that my work is a diary, like Rick Rubin's always saying, like, oh, your work is a diary and whatever. And it kind of is. But for me, I like to think about a reader on the other end because makes me think that it's not just about me. It's about, what is this thing doing? What am I trying to do with this thing? And I think it always helps to keep really just one single person in mind. Like, who are you making this for? I think it was. I don't know who said it. There was a roundup of all these musicians and speakers and comedians in the New York Times. Oh, Mel Robbins is who it was. And they said, like, when I get on stage, I just think about that one person that needs to hear what I have to say and I go on stage and I do it for them. And I think that Kurt Vonnegut said that. He said, you know, if you try to open your window and make love to the world, you'll get a venereal disease, which is a little. Is a little spicy. But, you know, if you try to do. If you try to please everybody. Yeah, no. So think about, can you make your thing for one person? Can you, like, picture one person in your mind? And I guess it could be you, it could be you, it could be you in the past, it could be you in the present, it could be in you in the future. Like, Keep Going was a book I read because I wrote. Because I wanted to read it for me now. So I wrote it for, like, me when I wake up tomorrow. What do I. Well, what do I want to know? But, like, if you can zoom in and, like, think about that one person you're doing that stuff for and then to kind of tune out the rest and have that kind of confidence, I think that's, you know. But the other thing, I. I've always been someone too. It really helps to have a partner. Someone. A partner in crime, an editor, somebody close to you who you really trust. Because I think creative people and I. That means everybody, really, because I think everyone can be creative. I think we're terrible judges at what we're really good at. A lot of the time we don't know what our real gifts are because we get in our heads. We have this idea of who we want to be, and who we are is never. It never matches up right. And I just think that in my own career, I have been served by listening to being really real about what I'm good at, right? Like I've been served. But I did not start. Look, if you talked to 19 year old me and was like, guess what? You know what you're gonna do one day and be like, what, you're gonna write self help books? I'd probably be like, oh, what, like what happens, right? But like now I'm like, this is what I'm good at. I'm good at like synthesizing all this stuff. I'm good at like writing in this very, like, clear, straightforward way and reaching people. I'm good at this, you know, but like, if I had started, I started out, I wanted to be like a, you know, I want to be like my heroes. I want to be like Kurt Vonnegar, Linda Barry or Saul Steinberg or whoever, you know? And I became Austin clear on because I had to, because it's like what I am. You know what I mean? So I think, like, it's this again. It's these tensions in life. Having the courage to be who we think we should be, but also being open to what the world needs us to be. Because like, it's almost the genius versus senior thing, right? On the one hand, it's like we think that great work is made by genius, superhumanly talented people who are able to give us something we'd never seen before. On the other hand, all great art comes out of a rich network of a situation in which something is needed and people make it, right? And so that tension. So like the whole thing is just about tensions. But I think it's that thing about also knowing that the reason you make things is you make the thing so it's outside of you and then it's not you anymore. It's not you. It's the thing that you made. Even a video of you that you've made, it's not you, it's a video of you. People hate the video of you. And even if they hate you, they don't hate you. They hate who they, who you think they are. Like if someone hates Austin Cleon, they don't hate maybe this Austin Cleon, they hate that Austin Cleon that they think they know, right?
- [55:33]
Jenny Urich
Yeah.
- [55:33]
Austin Kleon
And that's, you know, and that's the, that's the like multiple personality of putting yourself in the world, you know, and it's, it's, it's not for the. Here's another thing I would say to people. Maybe you shouldn't be out in the world because you can show your work and not be public. You can share your work with your Team at and you can share your work with your family, with your friends. Show your work works on any scale. Show your work works within a family. Show your work works within an organization. It works within, you know, it can work in a big scale. But sharing what you do and what you're passionate about with the right people, finding the right people for it, it's always going to be powerful and it's going to connect you to the people who love the same things.
- [56:19]
Jenny Urich
The books are phenomenal. Phenomenal. And, you know, just that thought of not quitting, I mean, it's. It's a big one. There was a story. It like, wrecked me. It was Peter Chan.
- [56:28]
Austin Kleon
Yeah.
- [56:28]
Jenny Urich
It was about these crumpled drawings, you know, and that his dad had, like, saved them when he went to bed. And I mean, he just. He found them later and, you know, you just say it's not every day is going to turn out the way you want it to, and you don't know what's going to happen. So, you know, don't worry about it. We don't have any much control over our lives. So take today and do what you can with it. Today's a seed, and it could grow into something beautiful. There is no time for despair. Just wonderful books. I need them. You know, they're important for me even, you know, because I get. People are like, I don't like you. You know, and like, you have to deal with all that kind of stuff and how do you deal with it? And so it's very practical, but also really inspiring. And I love you said. Oh. And I think in our first conversation you said, I'm a professional reader.
- [57:10]
Austin Kleon
Oh, yes.
- [57:11]
Jenny Urich
And, you know.
- [57:12]
Austin Kleon
Yeah.
- [57:12]
Jenny Urich
And that's the synthesizing of all the information and. And taking it into a spot that's really practical for people to grab onto these different nuggets and what have other successful people done and how can I incorporate that into my life? So, Austin, I am so excited for the new one. I mean, huge, huge, huge. Congrats.
- [57:28]
Austin Kleon
Oh, thank you. I can't wait to get you a copy. I think you're really gonna like it.
- [57:32]
Jenny Urich
Yes. It's called don't call It Art. Comes out in summer of 2026. These other books, fantastic. Add them. They're great, really, for any age. Any age, kid, that you have. They're great to read as a family. They are. Steal like an artist. I got to read the first one. I got to read the first one.
- [57:46]
Austin Kleon
Oh, newspaper blackout.
- [57:47]
Jenny Urich
Yes, yes. Steal like an artist. Show your work. Keep going, Austin. And sign up for the newsletter comes out every Friday. Austin, thank you so much for being here.
- [57:55]
Austin Kleon
Thank you, Jenny. It was a pleasure.