Ira Glass on Storytelling (and Creative Endeavours in General): the most important possible thing you could do, is do a LOT of work

This great video from Ira Glass backs up much of the teaching from Art and Fear and other books with themes of “keep producing art/produce art on a schedule/just get started/just do it”. Check it:

Partial transcript:

… your taste is good enough that you can tell that what you’re making is kind of a disappointment to you. You can tell that it’s still sort of crappy. A lot of people never get past that phase; a lot of people at that point, they quit.

And the thing that I would say to you with all my heart is that most everybody I know who does interesting creative work, they went through a phase of years where they had really good taste, and they could tell what they were making wasn’t as good as they wanted it to be. They knew it fell short … But we knew that it didn’t have the special thing that we wanted it to have. And the thing I would say to you is, everybody goes through that … it’s totally normal, and the most important possible thing you could do, is do a lot of work. Do a huge volume of work. Put yourself on a deadline, so that every week or every month you know you’re going to finish one story, whatever it’s going to be. You create the deadline. It’s best if you have somebody who’s waiting for work from you. Someone who’s expecting work from you. Even if it’s not someone that pays you, but that you’re in a situation where you have to turn up the work. It’s only by going through a volume of work that you’re going to catch up and close that gap. And the work you’re making will be as good as your ambitions.