When you're on your own, you have all the self-censorship that everybody has when they try and write. All the little voices that say, 'No, you can't write that, what will they think of that?'
Interpretation
Self-censorship can hinder creativity, especially when writing alone.
In this quote, Nick Cave highlights the struggle of self-censorship that many writers face when they lack external validation. When alone, writers can become overly critical of their thoughts, worrying about how others might perceive their ideas, which can stifle genuine expression and creativity.
In practice
This quote can inspire aspiring writers at a workshop to embrace their unique voices.
The idea of songwriting is a transformative thing, and what I do with songwriting is take situations that are quite ordinary and transform them in some way. Apart from things like the murder ballads, the songs I write, at their core, are quite ordinary human concerns, but the process of writing about them transforms them into something else.
The writer who refuses to explore the darker regions of the heart will never be able to write convincingly about the wonder, the magic and the joy of love for just as goodness cannot be trusted unless it has breathed the same air as evil.
But if you're gonna dine with them cannibals Sooner or later, darling, you're gonna get eaten . . .
Music is storming, driving, relentless, devotional, slinky, subtle, heartbreakingly-beautiful sounds that, lyrically, switch from the cynical to the sanguine, the defeated to the defiant, dealing in love, war, beauty, children, romance, rejection, Pethedine, poetry, panties, God, Auden, Johnny Cash, cold potatoes, too-much-money, not enough money, writer’s block, flowers, animals and more flowers. But maybe I’m projecting here.
Who knows their own story? It certainly makes no sense when you’re in the middle of it
And I wish that I was made of stone So that I would not have to see A beauty impossible to define A beauty impossible to believe A beauty impossible to endure The blood imparted in little sips The smell of you still on my hands As I bring the cup up to my lips No God up in the sky No devil beneath the sea Could do the job that you did, baby Of bringing me to my knees
To be pleased with one's limits is a wretched state.
The fault finder will find faults even in paradise and thereby miss the joys that recognition of the positives bring.
The busy man is never wise and the wise man is never busy.
The cow knows not what her tail is worth till she has lost it.
I think imperfections are important, just as mistakes are important. You only get to be good by making mistakes, and you only get to be real by being imperfect.
I learned a long time ago that I can't control the challenges the creator sends my way, but I can control the way I think about them and deal with them
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.