Ideas from the book Ignore Everybody by Hugh MacLeod.

Ideas

  1. The more original your idea is, the less good advise people will be able to give you.
  2. You don’t know if your idea is any good the moment it’s created. Neither does anyone else.
  3. A big idea will change you.
  4. Good ideas alter the power balance in relationships. That is why good ideas are always initially resisted.
  5. Good ideas come with a heavy burden which is why so few people execute them.
  6. Sovereignty is to have complete freedom - without the need for somebody else’s money or approval.
  7. The sovereignty you have over your work will inspire far more people than the actual content ever will.
  8. Your sovereignty will inspire other people to find their own sovereignty.
  9. Your idea doesn’t have to be big. It has to be yours alone.
  10. The more idea is yours alone, the more freedom you have to do something really amazing.

Put in the work

  1. Doing anything worthwhile takes forever.
  2. Ninety nine percent of what separates successful from unsuccessful people is time, effort and stamina.
  3. If somebody in your industry is more successful than you it’s probably because he works harder at it than you do.
  4. When starting out don’t quit your day job.
  5. Having a day job, balances the need for making a living while still maintaining ones creative sovereignty.
  6. Being good at something is being able to make it look easy. But it’s never easy.
  7. Put the hours in, do it for long enough, and magical, life-transforming things happen eventually.
Go ahead and make something. Make something really special. Make something amazing that will blow the mind of anybody who sees it.

Pillars

Meeting a person who wrote a masterpiece on the back of a deli menu would not surprise me. Meeting a person who wrote a masterpiece with a silver Cartier fountain pen on an antique writing table in an airy SoHo loft would seriously suprise me.
  1. The more talented someone is the less they need props.
  2. There is no correlation between creativity and tools.
  3. A fancy tool gives a second-rater one more pillar to hide behind.
  4. All you can do is to keep asking yourself the question, “Is this a pillar?” about every aspect of your business, your craft, your reason for being alive, and go from there.

Stand out

  1. Don’t try to stand out from the crowd; avoid crowds altogether.
  2. Your plan for getting your work out there has to be as original as the actual work.
  3. Question how much freedom your path affords you. Be utterly ruthless about it. It’s your freedom that will get you where you want to go.
Is your plan unique? Is there nobody else doing it? Then I’d be excited. A little scared maybe, but excited.

Pain

  1. If you accept the pain, it can’t hurt you.
  2. The pain of making necessary sacrifices always hurts more than you think its going to.
  3. Doing something seriously creative is one of the most amazing experiences one can have.
  4. Even if you don’t end up pulling it off, you’ll learn many incredible, magical, valuable things.
  5. You are better off doing something on the assumption that you will not be rewarded for it, that it will not receive the recognition it deserves, that it will not be worth the time and effort invested.
  6. Once you realise there is no reward ask yourself, “should I make this exist or not?”. Once you can answer that truthfully for yourself, the rest is easy.

Rewards

  1. The more you practise your craft, the less you confuse worldly rewards with spiritual rewards and vice versa.
  2. Never sell something you love. You will subconsciously sabotage yourself from making a sale.

The line

  1. The most important thing a creative person can learn professionally is where to draw the red line that separates what you are willing to do from what you are not.
Art suffers the moment other people start paying for it. The more you need the money, the more people will tell you what to do. The less control you will have. The more bullshit you will have to swallow. The less joy it will bring you. Know this and plan accordingly.

Trust

  1. The people you trust and vice versa are what will feed you and pay for your kids’ college. Nothing else.

New World Order

  1. The old ways are dead. You need to spend more time around creative people - the real visionaries. Think more about what they need and respond accordingly.
  2. The only people who can change the world are the people who want to.
If you are creative, if you can think independently, if you can articulate passion, if you can override the fear of being wrong, then your company needs you now more than ever. And now you company can no longer afford to pretend that isn’t the case.

Weakness

  1. No one person can be good at everything.
  2. If you want to be really good, figure out how to circumvent your limitations and how to turn weaknesses into strengths.

Inspiration

  1. Find a way of working that makes it easy to take advantage of your inspired moments.
  2. If you have nothing to say, go do something else.
The less you can live on, the more chance your idea will succeed. This is true even after you have “made it.”

Truths

  1. Don’t turn a hobby into a job. A man needs both.
  2. No painting ever sells for as much as it cost for the artist to make.
  3. You can never predict how you will be successful.
Work hard. Keep at it. Live simply and quietly. Remain humble. Stay positive. Create your own luck. Be nice. Be polite.