August 3, 2020

Lucky breaks are everywhere

Luck, by definition, is random. As we hurtle through space on this tiny blue ball, a million and one moments are happening every second. Each one of those moments is a chance – a chance for something to go right, or a chance for something to go wrong.

Consider being one of the 2,208 people who scored a ticket for the maiden (and only) voyage of the Titanic. The chances of getting on board that ship – considering that the population of England at the time was approximately 33,561,235 – was pretty small. Were those 2,208 people lucky? Well, it depends.

Being onboard the Titanic *before* it sunk would’ve been considered very fortunate. After it sunk? Probably less fortunate. But what if you happened to be one of the 705 people who survived? Were they lucky, unlucky, then lucky again?

Perhaps luck, in itself, isn’t that rare. Perhaps whether we’re lucky or not isn’t about the event or random occurrence itself, but how we decide to look at it. The story we tell, in hindsight, when we piece together the fragments of our lives.

Other observations
December 10, 2024

Building muscles

No one expects me to run a marathon if I can’t even run 5km but when it comes to art, do we also need to build muscle?

December 3, 2024

It’s never felt more like work

Should picture book making feel like work? Or should it feel like some utopia where someone pays me for ‘art’?

November 26, 2024

Rendering the invisible

Perhaps the role of an artist is to render the invisible so we become more attentive to the world as it is?

November 19, 2024

The preparation ritual

Can a piece of paper create more connection than a wifi-enabled digital device when it comes to art?

November 12, 2024

The other side of loss is opportunity

Loss is difficult; we often like what we had more than what we may have. But how do we know unless we make space for the new in our lives?

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