Whose Permission Do You Need?

I have several current students I’ve been encouraging to share their art with the world. Start a Youtube channel, I say. Form a band, put on a play, make short films, start a poetry blog.

So far, none has.

What are you waiting for? Whose permission do you need to start?

Do you want to be perfect before you share your art? If so, you’d better find a different dream, because it will never happen.

High school students are blithely sharing so much of themselves – instagram snap chat twitter facebook myspace etc. – but will not share their beautiful, imperfect, new art.

When I was in high school, the only way to publish a poem was in the school literary journal; the only way to have people hear you sing was to be in the same room with them.

Now it’s free and easy to make art the entire world can experience; it’s time to start sharing yours. Turn off comments, share anonymously, whatever it takes to enable you to keep creating and learning.

But don’t hide anymore.