I think the thing you're seeing now with the music industry is that the people who have tight-knit communities are now able to really hold each other up because of the internet tools. And the really top-down pyramid scheme of major labels and typical superstars isn't sustainable anymore because the system has collapsed.

Amanda Palmer

Categorized in : Thinking Top Down Pyramid Schemes

When we really see each other, we want to help each other.

Amanda Palmer

helping-each-other want helping

You're not going to be perfect, you're not going to stop berating yourself, you're not going to stop the comparisons, you're not going to stop the judgment, but you can become evermore mindful of it, and that has to be good enough.

Amanda Palmer

judgment good-enough perfect

There’s no “correct path” to becoming a real artist. You might think you’ll gain legitimacy by going to university, getting published, getting signed to a record label. But it’s all bullshit, and it’s all in your head. You’re an artist when you say you are. And you’re a good artist when you make somebody else experience or feel something deep or unexpected.

Amanda Palmer

artist real thinking

In both the art and the business worlds, the difference between the amateurs and the professionals is simple: The professionals know they're winging it. The amateurs pretend they're not.

Amanda Palmer

differences simple art

I don't think of myself as particularly cursed or blessed. I think I got dealt a set of cards, and I'm playing with them, sometimes in heels, sometimes in combat boots.

Amanda Palmer

blessed cards thinking

When you're afraid of someone's judgment, you can't connect with them. You're too preoccupied with the task of impressing them.

Amanda Palmer

impress judgment tasks

The challenge is to just focus on what's actually happening, focus on the people who get it, and focus on the people who are listening.

Amanda Palmer

focus challenges people

I think I can define my entire life, virtuosity and business philosophy down to the core fundamental that I absolutely hate being told what to do. But like any artist or any human being out there, I desperately want to be loved, and I spend my entire life trying to balance those two facts.

Amanda Palmer

hate artist philosophy

You know what’s really cool? Wake up every morning, decide what you feel like doing, and do it.

Amanda Palmer

really-cool wake-up morning

Collecting the dots. Then connecting them. And then sharing the connections with those around you. This is how a creative human works. Collecting, connecting, sharing.

Amanda Palmer

dots connections creative

I had a real come-to-Jesus a couple of years ago when I started to see the direct line between feminism and everything else - feminism and climate change, feminism and poverty, feminism and hunger - and it was almost like I was born again and started walking down the street and was like, "Oh, my God, there are women everywhere! They're just everywhere you look. There's women all over the place!"

Amanda Palmer

couple real jesus

In other words, let's give our young women the right weapons to fight with as they charge naked into battle, instead of ordering them to get back in the house and put some goddamn clothes on.

Amanda Palmer

clothes fighting giving

American culture in particular has instilled in us the bizarre notion that to ask for help amounts to an admission of failure. But some of the most powerful, successful, admired people in the world seem, to me, to have something in common: they ask constantly, creatively, compassionately, and gracefully. And to be sure: when you ask, there's always the possibility of a no on the other side of the request. If we don't allow for that no, we're not actually asking, we're either begging or demanding. But it is the fear of the no that keeps so many of our mouths sewn tightly shut.

Amanda Palmer

powerful successful people

Art is food for the soul, and an artistic climate is a healthy climate because it breeds empathy.

Amanda Palmer

empathy healthy art

I think people have been obsessed with the wrong question, which is how do we make people pay for music? What if we started asking, how do we let people pay for music?

Amanda Palmer

motivation inspiration thinking

The world needs actual excitement and emotion more than it needs cool people.

Amanda Palmer

people world needs

For most of human history, musicians, artists, they've been part of the community — connectors and openers, not untouchable stars.

Amanda Palmer

motivation stars inspiration

I crave intimacy to the same burning degree that I detest commitment.

Amanda Palmer

burning degrees commitment

When you trust people to help you, they often do.

Amanda Palmer

helping people

I still get laughed at but it doesn't bother me,

Amanda Palmer

laughter bother glad