Quotes: Eckhart Tolle

"When you become comfortable with uncertainty, infinite possibilities open up in your life." 

–– Eckhart Tolle (b. 1948), German spiritual teacher and writer 

via: Commonplace Book 2024, 2025, p. 59.

Quotes: Graham Greene

"When we are not sure, we are alive." 

–– Graham Greene (1904-1991), British writer, playwright, literary critic

via: Sketchbook M 13, 2024, 2025, p. 19.

Quote: Aatish Taseer

"And this is what we tend to forget: In the careers of certain artists, those who make big, varied bodies of work in which different strands of their experience are subsumed, the business of beginning, and beginning again, never ceases. Each new beginning brings with it all the uncertainty and blankness of the first. Experience might protect such an artist from forcing what's clearly not working, but that core anxiety of not knowing if one will create again always remains. "Do not worry," Hemingway would console himself, "you have always written before and you will write now." 

–– Aatish Taseer (b. 1980), British-born American writer and journalist 

Source: Aatish Taseer. 'The First Stroke.' New York Times T Style Magazine, Sunday April 21, 2024, p. 53.

via: Art Alternatives Knapsack Sketchbook L 2024, p. 15. 

Quotes: Richard Diebenkorn

Notes to myself on beginning a painting by Richard Diebenkorn

1. Attempt what is not certain. Certainty may or may not come later. It may then be a valuable delusion.

2. The pretty, initial position which falls short of completeness is not to be valued – except as a stimulus for further moves.

3. Do search. But in order to find other than what is searched for.

4. Use and respond to the initial fresh qualities but consider them expendable.

5. Don't "discover" a subject – of any kind.

6. Somehow don't be bored but if you must, use it in action. Use its destructive potential.

7. Mistakes can't be erased but they move you from your present position.

8. Keep thinking about Pollyanna.

9. Tolerate chaos.

10. Be careful only in a perverse way. 

–– Richard Diebenkorn (1922-1993), American painter and printmaker

Source: Lari Washburn, Instagram, Thursday February 8, 2024.

via: Sketchbook 33, 2024, p. 146.

Quotes: Lynda Barry

"The phone gives us a lot but it takes away three key elements of discovery: loneliness, uncertainty and boredom. Those have always been where creative ideas come from." 

–– Lynda Barry (b. 1956), American cartoonist, author, educator 

Source: Austin Kleon tumblr, June 13, 2016. 

via: Striped notebook, 2016, p. 30.

Quotes: Gerhard Richter

"I do not obey any intention, system or trend; I have no program, style or pretention. I love uncertainty, infinity and permanent insecurity."

–– Gerhard Richter (b. 1932) German visual artist 

via: Art Alternatives Knapsack Sketchbook 2017-2018 d, 2018, p. 36.

Women's quotes: Ursula K. Le Guin

"The only thing that makes life possible is permanent, intolerable uncertainty: not knowing what comes next." 

–– Ursula K. Le Guin (1929-2018), American author 

via: Sketchbook 29, 2016, p. 135.

Quotes: Sandra Brownlee

"You have to be comfortable with uncertainty. You keep going and it becomes clear." 

–– Sandra Brownlee (b. 1948), Canadian visual artist, educator, and winner of the Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts, 2014

via: Sketchbook 23, 2014, p. 44.

Quotes: Saul Leiter

"I like it when one is not certain what one sees. When we do not know why the photographer has taken a picture and when we do not know why we are looking at it, all of a sudden we discover something. We start seeing." 

–– Saul Leiter (1923-2013) American photographer and painter

Creativity quotes: Keri Smith

"when it gets right down to it the individuals that are really doing interesting things and changing the world don't seem to [be] paying much attention to the cutting edge technologies. they're too busy conducting experiments, spending time alone, making mistakes, dreaming up new ideas, sitting in the midst of uncertainty...embracing mystery." 

–– Keri Smith (b. 1975), Canadian author, illustrator and Conceptual artist

Via: from her August 5, 2009 blog post 

Creativity quotes: Erich Fromm

"Creativity requires the courage to let go of uncertainties." 

–– Erich Fromm (1900-1980), German social psychologist, sociologist, psychoanalyst, philosopher and author

Women's quotes: Rebecca Solnit

"Leave the door open for the unknown, the door into the dark. That's where the most important things come from, where you yourself came from, and where you will go." 

–– Rebecca Solnit (b. 1961), American author 

Quotes 279: Michaela Coel

"Write the tale that scares you. That makes you feel uncertain. That isn't comfortable. I dare you. In a world that entices us to browse through the lives of others, and to in turn feel the need to be constantly visible –– for visibility these days seems to somehow equate to success –– don't be afraid to disappear from it, from us, for a while and see what comes to you in the silence." 

–– Michaela Coel (b. 1987), Ghanaian-British actress, screenwriter, and director

via Austin Kleon

Quotes: Agnes de Mille

"Living is a form of not being sure, not knowing what next or how. The moment you know how, you begin to die a little. The artist never entirely knows. We guess. We may be wrong, but we take leap after leap in the dark." 

–– Agnes de Mille (1905-1993), American dancer and choreographer