Friday, March 2, 2012
6:30 AM. I must remember the idea that came yesterday. Another book – yet another book! – of TGU material could be centered on what we need to do, and what we can do, to live our lives more fully. There is a lot of useful practical stuff that could/should be compiled and put into comprehensible form. I don’t quite know where I’d start, though.
And – should this necessarily be the next thing to do? And for that matter should I necessarily tie the information to book form?
You could look at it this way: You have a platform, you have the ability to get your material into view; the information itself will attract people. So – why print it? Put it into a bite-sized form and troll it. It will lead people to previous work.
A little cynical, that.
Not cynical at all, merely descriptive of the process. What will actually happen, as opposed to what might be supposed.
I get that you could give me a simple strategy for getting the visibility I need my work to get.
You want visibility but privacy.
That’s right.
Most people have that. You don’t want rock-star status and you don’t want total anonymity. You are content being a small-time big-shot, just as you have always said.
Part of me is, part of me isn’t.
Good. Good to let yourself know what you really want. Or, more, good to feel the inner contending strands. So – can they be reconciled to each other and to a harmonious pattern?
I have assumed that authorship would provide that. But I’m hearing now that other parts of fame are involved, and I hadn’t thought of that. Access to other thinkers and artists, for example.
Yes, it is easier when you have displayed your own accomplishments. It brings you entrée.
Well, I want that. I might as well be in my own proper circle. Except – is there a proper circle?
The way to find your proper circle is to demonstrate what and who you are; they will be drawn to you as you to them.
It’s an interesting view on fame. I hadn’t considered it that way.
Your author friends came to you as editor and publisher but stayed with you because you were one with them.
Yes, and people I have met at TMI, say, became friends because something clicked between us, not because I or they were famous or even known.
So, you see, fame is more about the doors it opens than it is about those who will be drawn as fans. Some fans may become friends, as you to Colin Wilson, if you and they have something in common – but mostly achievement is for its own sake and for entrée into the community of other achievers, not for the bubble that is a name, or the less-than-bubble that his popularity.
So putting out the word may be done in different ways depending on your aim. And that aim could include :
– establishing a reputation
– creating an income stream
– establishing specific bona fides.
None of these has anything to do with ego. That’s very interesting.
And this, note, is irrespective of the material itself. Getting out the material, or displaying product, or performing, or whatever – exercising a skill – all those are primary reasons for engaging in whatever activity enthralls you. But everyone needs community. Some like Thoreau need few, but everyone needs community. By your demonstrated effect of living you draw that community to you over and above family and neighbors or fellow workers or whatever cadre comes from your living rather than what comes from the result of creativity.
And if you don’t produce, you have nothing to attract with.
Not necessarily talking here about some external production like a piece of sculpture or a painting or a book or – or anything material. A natural teacher or entertainer may create an audience to something entirely ephemeral.
But I see. To draw our community, we have to express what we are.
How else can it be? Except – that word “express” seems to imply, again, external manifestation. Your being can be expressed as much by what you are as what you do. More so, perhaps.
10:15 AM. It is true that in thinking about fame we usually think about someone who is famous in relation to fans, groupies, admirers, etc., rather than peers. It is because our view is a bit misdirected. Instead of looking at the result, we should look at the process. Why did the person become famous, and what did the fame get him and cost them, or her? The wrong kind of fame (celebrity) is harmful because irrelevant. The right kind of fame (recognition of achievement) may be helpful or may not, depending on what accompanies it.