Death-defying Stunts of Everyday Life

A characteristic of artistic education is for people to tell you that you’re a genius. […] So everybody gets this idea, if you go to art school, that you’re really a genius. Sadly, it isn’t true. Genius occurs very rarely. So the real embarrassing issue about failure is your own acknowledgement that you’re not a genius, that you’re not as good as you thought you were. […] There’s only one solution: You must embrace failure. You must admit what is. You must find out what you’re capable of doing, and what you’re not capable of doing. That is the only way to deal with the issue of success and failure because otherwise you simply would never subject yourself to the possibility that you’re not as good as you want to be, hope to be, or as others think you are.

Anchorage. The desire to hold on to time as it passes, like trying to keep your grip on a rock in the middle of a river. Feeling the weight of the current press against your chest while your elders float on downstream calling over the roar of the rapids, ‘Just let go—it’s okay—let go.’