ADVICE, EFFORT, GOAL

Self-Savagery no7: Elevate your worst ideas and bury the good ones. Never try.

Self-Savagery no88: Avoid acts of humility or bravery. Giving up your own life to save another is no act of courage. It is an admission of defeat. Only those who acknowledge their own inferiority can be selfless.

The following is an exchange I had with a caring and desperate young soul unblemished by failure and tarnished by ambition:
‘You must write truthfully,’ she said, admonishing some of my more pricarious and fantastical prose.
‘I do.' I replied. 'Truthful and true aren’t the same thing.’
She rolled her eyes at what she believed to be wordplay.
‘Get angry.' she said. 'Get passionate. Write from the heart. That's what the greats do.'
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,' I replied. 'You will insist on talking in this meaningless way. Besides, my heart would produce particularly drab writing. It’s only when I try to be heartless that there is a flicker.’

Self-Savagery 45: Write about what you don't know. Start with yourself.