About a year ago I stumbled across a speech Neil Gaiman gave at a commencement ceremony and the speech is something I find myself coming back to again and again. He opens his speech with saying, whoever you are, whatever you do, “you have the ability to make art.” When life gets rough, “make good art.” As a creative writers, as an artist, and as a human, this one motto, this one task is inspiration. When I have a blank document on my computer screen, the curser blinking at me endlessly, the knowledge that I have the ability, the hidden potential, to make good art is enough reason for me to at least begin to look for that potential.

Of course, its helpful that Neil Gaiman is also one of my favorite writers.