10 Things I Have Learned,

I just ran across this earlier this morning, but I wanted to make mention of it. These are some pieces of wisdom from Milton Glaser, the designer/illustrator who, among other things, came up with the original 'I [heart] NY" logo.

All I ever wanted to do was to make images and create form. This instinct for form-making seems to be something that is very characteristic of our entire species. It's one of the things that almost defines humankind. I like the idea of cultures that do not have an idea of art as a separate activity from their daily life, such as many African groups, where there isn't a word that approaches the idea of art. They are very interested in containing magic but that is another thing. Among the Balinese, there is no word for art. They just say 'we do things the best that we can.' Which is a nice way to think about what we all do. I am going to tell you everything that I know about the practice of design. It is a sort of collage of bits and pieces that I have assembled over 50 years. It includes a lot of things I've said before but I've repackaged them rather attractively. This is what I've learned.

Now, the obvious followup, from a designer, would seem to be things like, "Don't mix stripes and plaid" or "Day-glo is evil, except when it isn't." But that isn't what Glaser's talking about. In fact, most of what he says applies as much to the art of living as to the specifically visual arts.

I think his piece of advice that struck me the most was, "Doubt is better than certainty."

Everyone always talks about confidence and believing in what you do. I remember once going to a class in Kundalini yoga where the teacher said that, spirituality speaking, if you believed that you had achieved enlightenment you have merely arrived at your limitation. I think that is also true in a more practical sense. Deeply held beliefs of any kind prevent you from being open to experience, which is why I find all firmly held ideological positions questionable. It makes me nervous when someone believes too deeply or too much. I think that being sceptical and questioning all deeply held beliefs is essential. Of course we must know the difference between scepticism and cynicism because cynicism is as much a restriction of one's openness to the world as passionate belief is. They are sort of twins.

That line between skepticism and cynicism is often vanishingly thin. And cynicism has a way of shading into contempt. Gods know I've crossed that line more often than I'd like. Curiosity doesn't necessarily kill the cat physically; jadedness and apathy can be real soul-killers.