Protect the Sandbox

Let me tell you about the most dangerous lie in the creative world.

It’s the one that says suffering is proof of seriousness. That real artists bleed, obsess, and collapse, all in the name of art. The romanticized myth of Van Gogh eating yellow paint and calling it “process.”

That myth is not protecting your art. It’s suffocating it.

Elizabeth Gilbert makes this point in Big Magic, and it’s one of the most underrated ideas in the book (Big Magic is also a top candidate for my next “Books That Matter” solo podcast).

Creativity should be treated as play, not performance. Not suffering. Play. The same energy you brought to building with LEGO blocks before anyone told you there was a right or wrong way to stack the bricks.

Gilbert’s framing is radically ordinary:

Let inspiration lead you wherever it wants to lead you. Keep in mind that for most of history, people just made things and they didn’t make such a big freaking deal out of it.

For most of human history, that was exactly true. The pottery. The cave paintings. The folk songs. Nobody was waiting for thousands of social media followers to validate any of them. Yet somewhere along the way, we turned creation into a performance review. We took a primal, joyful human impulse and shackled it to metrics and monetization.

I have interviewed dozens of photographers, artists, and writers for my podcast, and one pattern shows up consistently: the best creators stay in a relationship with their craft that doesn’t depend on what other people think. They operate from intrinsic motivation, and they protect it aggressively. That’s what Gilbert is referring to in the book. She’s not saying do not take your work seriously. She’s saying do not confuse seriousness with heaviness. You can care deeply and still hold the work lightly.

For photographers, like me, this hits close. The pressure to produce something portfolio-worthy on every single outing is real and it’s a creativity killer. When you look at the LCD display on the back of the camera, do you see possibilities or a mirror of your own anxieties and inadequacies?

The antidote is simple: go make something you have no intention of showing anyone. Shoot ugly. Experiment. Have fun. Play. Follow a shadow or line or splash of bright color simply because it has piqued your curiosity. Build a private folder on your desktop where your half-baked, messy ideas can live without the threat of judgment.

Protect the sandbox.

Fear needs outcomes to survive. Playfulness does not.

So strip away the demand for genius, and you make room for discovery. You do not owe the world a masterpiece every time you pick up your camera. Just go see what happens when you decide to play instead.

*****

• Episode 117. Isabella Tabacchi: Chasing Caravaggio Through the Shadows, The Tenebroso Landscape, and Creating Emotional Intensity

• Episode 116. Dr. Diane Boyd: A Woman Among Wolves

• Episode 115. David duChemin: Thinking Inside the Box for Transformative Creative Breakthroughs, the Virtue of Imperfection, and Finding Your Magic

• Episode 114. Books That Matter: John Szarcowski and ‘The Photographer’s Eye’ — The Thing Itself, The Detail, The Frame, Time, and Vantage Point

• Episode 113. Ami Vitale: National Geographic Explorer at Large on Przewalski’s Horses, Jane Goodall’s Legacy, and Finding Hope in the Face of Extinction

As I mentioned, all links are to Apple Podcasts but you can search for Beyond The Lens with Richard Bernabe on Spotify or any other podcast app.

You can follow here. I’ll be in Chile and The Galapagos for the next few weeks.

Here’s to Truth, Adventure, and Passion