Undiscovered Nuggets of Gold
One time when I was in the car with my daughter, she played clips of songs from Disney movies. I couldn’t see her phone; I could only hear the music. It sounded incredible—only I was surprised to learn they weren’t the professional singers. They were YouTubers, who’d recorded their own versions, and they sounded just as good. I’d never heard their names before, but I was reminded about the tunnel vision we often get when it comes to the arts.
We admire the professionals—actors, musicians, artists, writers—and rightly so. They work hard with their talent to get where they are, but we often forget they’re not the only ones. Actors, musicians, artists and writers who aren’t household names also have the same drive, ambition and talent. But if they’re “amateurs”, we often dismiss them—oh, they’re not as good. And absolutely, there are not-good amateurs out there, but “amateur” isn’t the same as inept. It simply means they’re not (yet) getting paid for their creativity.
Pick up a story that hasn’t yet been published, and you could be holding onto a nugget of writing gold.
Which means, whether you’re published or not, you could be creating that very nugget of gold.
I look forward to reading it. 🙂