Love the story, and the pictures that went along with it!
But evaluation is costly.
I would express it differently—it’s not necessarily that internal evaluation is costly, but that the external signals are often loud relative to the internal evaluation. Or even more precisely, the parts within a person’s psyche that respond to external signals are often stronger than the ones that care about the internal evaluation. As you put it:
The sculptor felt recognized for the first time. Not famous—but understood. His private work had somehow become communicable. He carved more angels, trying to understand what made these particular statues resonate.
At first, the sculptor’s art was driven by something inside him. We don’t know what it was. But with the first visitors, something stronger raised its head—the feeling of being understood, something he’d never felt before.
Having had a taste of that, he started craving it. Various thoughts and impulses began to emerge from that craving, subtle at first—maybe just wondering what made some particular angel resonate with people so much.
That question was still coming from his original creative energy, but now it was starting to get intertwined with his desire for feeling seen. And as that thought led him to working on another angel, it felt natural to think about how the visitors might see it.
With each new angel that people liked, the craving became stronger. And then came a terrible fear—what if he created a sculpture that people wouldn’t like anymore? He was getting so used to the experience of being seen and understood, the thought of losing that became intolerable.
Yet another force made its presence known. One so afraid of even thinking about losing his new position, it became fixated on doing only the thing that had been working. It would not do anything that might risk the Unbearable Outcome. Stay focused on following the crowds, watching them take photos and marvel at the statues, figure out exactly what it was that they liked, do more of that.
As that force became dominant, it wasn’t just the original creative impulse that quietly dropped away. The sculptor became so obsessed with repeating the kinds of actions that would make him feel seen, he didn’t even notice he hadn’t been feeling seen for a long time.
3. Resisting the trap
I’d also add something like “make sure your audience isn’t the only way you are getting your needs met”. If your art is the only source of validation in your life, then the more validation you get from it, the scarier it will feel to lose. The scarier it feels to lose, the less courage you’ll have to experiment doing something else.
Love the story, and the pictures that went along with it!
I would express it differently—it’s not necessarily that internal evaluation is costly, but that the external signals are often loud relative to the internal evaluation. Or even more precisely, the parts within a person’s psyche that respond to external signals are often stronger than the ones that care about the internal evaluation. As you put it:
At first, the sculptor’s art was driven by something inside him. We don’t know what it was. But with the first visitors, something stronger raised its head—the feeling of being understood, something he’d never felt before.
Having had a taste of that, he started craving it. Various thoughts and impulses began to emerge from that craving, subtle at first—maybe just wondering what made some particular angel resonate with people so much.
That question was still coming from his original creative energy, but now it was starting to get intertwined with his desire for feeling seen. And as that thought led him to working on another angel, it felt natural to think about how the visitors might see it.
With each new angel that people liked, the craving became stronger. And then came a terrible fear—what if he created a sculpture that people wouldn’t like anymore? He was getting so used to the experience of being seen and understood, the thought of losing that became intolerable.
Yet another force made its presence known. One so afraid of even thinking about losing his new position, it became fixated on doing only the thing that had been working. It would not do anything that might risk the Unbearable Outcome. Stay focused on following the crowds, watching them take photos and marvel at the statues, figure out exactly what it was that they liked, do more of that.
As that force became dominant, it wasn’t just the original creative impulse that quietly dropped away. The sculptor became so obsessed with repeating the kinds of actions that would make him feel seen, he didn’t even notice he hadn’t been feeling seen for a long time.
I’d also add something like “make sure your audience isn’t the only way you are getting your needs met”. If your art is the only source of validation in your life, then the more validation you get from it, the scarier it will feel to lose. The scarier it feels to lose, the less courage you’ll have to experiment doing something else.