[Get your free subscription to the International Association of Creative and Performing Artists newsletter here.]
His book had received glowing reviews, had landed on several bestseller lists, and was generating invitations to speak and teach. Friends congratulated him. Readers wrote heartfelt letters. For years he had imagined what this moment would feel like. Yet when we spoke, there was little excitement in his voice. Instead, there was confusion.
“I thought I’d feel different,” he said. “I thought I’d finally believe I’d made it. Instead, I’m already worrying about the next book.” He paused before adding something that surprised even him. “Part of me actually misses the years when I was struggling.”
His confession was more common than he realized. We spend so much of our lives imagining success that we rarely stop to imagine what follows it. We assume that recognition will quiet our doubts, that accomplishment will settle our restless minds, and that reaching an important milestone will finally allow us to relax into the life we have been trying to build.
Certainly, there are moments of genuine satisfaction. There is deep pleasure in seeing years of work come to fruition, in knowing that something you cared about has found its way into the lives of other people. Those moments deserve to be celebrated. Yet they are almost never as permanent as we expect. Before long, the applause fades, the reviews stop appearing, the exhibition closes, the tour ends, or the book quietly takes its place among thousands of others. The artist, meanwhile, wakes up the next morning facing exactly what he or she faced before: another blank page, another empty canvas, another rehearsal room, another beginning.
For many artists, this comes as a profound surprise because we have quietly constructed a story about success long before it arrives. We imagine it as a destination rather than an event. We picture ourselves crossing an invisible finish line beyond which uncertainty will finally disappear. But creative work has no such finish line.
Every completed project simply introduces a new set of questions. Can I do it again? Was that success a fortunate accident? Will anyone care about the next piece? The doubts that accompanied us before success often return almost unchanged, except that they now wear different clothes.
Before recognition, we worry that no one will ever notice us. After recognition, we worry that people will expect more than we can deliver. The anxiety changes its subject, but rarely its essential character.
I sometimes think that artists unintentionally make success carry far more responsibility than it can possibly bear. We ask it to confirm our talent, justify our sacrifices, reassure us about the future, and settle longstanding questions about our worth. No professional accomplishment can do all of that. Success is real, but it is not magical. It cannot remove the ordinary vulnerabilities of being a creative human being. If anything, success often makes those vulnerabilities more visible because there is now something to lose.
An unknown novelist can dream about being discovered. A successful novelist may quietly worry about disappointing readers. An emerging painter hopes for an important exhibition. A well-established painter may fear that the next exhibition will not measure up to the last one. Success enlarges opportunities, but it can also enlarge expectations, both our own and those of others.
Over the years I have noticed that the artists who navigate success most gracefully are rarely the ones who become the most famous. They are the ones who gradually understand that success is not the purpose of a creative life but one of its occasional companions. Their deepest commitment remains directed toward the work itself rather than toward the rewards that sometimes accompany it.
They celebrate recognition when it comes, but they do not build their identity upon it. They understand that every career unfolds in seasons. Some years bring extraordinary visibility. Other years are quieter. Some projects attract wide attention. Others seem to speak only to a small circle of readers, listeners, or viewers. Yet the work continues. The conversation between artist and craft continues. That ongoing relationship becomes more dependable than the shifting fortunes of the marketplace.
I think back often to that writer who wondered why success had left him feeling strangely unsettled. As our conversation continued, he eventually said something that seemed closer to the heart of the matter. “I thought success would tell me who I was.” It was an honest sentence, and perhaps one that many artists could quietly claim as their own.
We all hope that recognition will settle certain questions once and for all. Yet identity has never been something that awards, reviews, sales figures, or standing ovations can permanently establish. Those things may acknowledge our work, but they cannot define us. That quieter task belongs to us alone, and it is accomplished not in moments of public recognition but in the private rhythm of returning to the work day after day.
If success has recently visited your creative life, I hope you will welcome it with gratitude. Celebrate it. Share it with the people who helped make it possible. Allow yourself to enjoy what you have earned. But when the excitement begins to fade, as it inevitably will, remember that nothing essential has changed. You are still the person who must sit down tomorrow and begin again. That is not a disappointment. It is one of the great privileges of the artistic life. Success may visit from time to time, but the work itself remains your truest companion. In the end, that enduring relationship—not any particular triumph—is what sustains a lifetime of creating.
Learn more about the International Association of Creative and Performing Artists here.
Eric Maisel, President
International Association of Creative and Performing Artists
Our fundamental belief is that creativity knows no bounds. While we enthusiastically embrace performers like musicians, actors, and dancers, we are equally dedicated to all writers, visual artists, and every creative spirit. Our community extends to anyone who imagines and creates in any domain, from architecture to physics, and from education to business.
iStock image
