My parents are both college professors, and it made me want to question authority, standards and traditions.
Maya LinRead
Sometimes you have to stop thinking. Sometimes you shut down completely. I think that's true in any creative field.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Creative work often requires periods of rest and mental pause.
Maya Lin suggests that in the creative process, there are moments when the mind must step back and disengage from constant thinking. This pause can lead to rejuvenation and inspire new ideas, reflecting the essential balance between active thought and necessary downtime in any creative endeavor.
Themes
CreativityPauseRestThinkingInspiration
In practice
Example use cases
In a workshop on creativity, you can use this quote to emphasize the importance of taking breaks.
More from Maya Lin
All quotes βI try to give people a different way of looking at their surroundings. That's art to me.
Maya LinRead
How we are using up our home, how we are living and polluting the planet is frightening. It was evident when I was a child. It's more evident now.
Maya LinRead
A lot of my works deal with a passage, which is about time. I don't see anything that I do as a static object in space. It has to exist as a journey in time.
Maya LinRead
When I was building the Vietnam Memorial, I never once asked the veterans what it was like in the war, because from my point of view, you don't pry into other people's business.
Maya LinRead
I though about what death is, what a loss is. A sharp pain that lessens with time, but can never quite heal over. A scar. The idea occurred to me there on the site. Take a knife and cut open the earth, and with time the grass would heal it. As if you cut open the rock and polished it.
Maya LinRead
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(Talking about his first computer) Like all kids we not only fooled around with our toys, we changed them. If you've ever watched a child with a cardboard carton and a box of crayons create a spaceship with cool control panels, or listened to their improvised rules, such as "Red cars can jump all others," then you know that this impulse to make a toy do more is at the heart of innovative childhood play. It is also the essence of creativity.
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Everything that happens in my day is a transaction between the external world and my internal world. Everything is raw material. Everything is relevant. Everything is usable. Everything feeds into my creativity. But without proper preparation, I cannot see it, retain it, and use it. Without the time and effort invested in getting ready to create, you can be hit by a thunderbolt and it'll just leave you stunned.
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It is the lava of the imagination whose eruption prevents an earthquake.
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Whatever the creative industry, when you're confronted with the challenge of coming up with a Big Idea, always work with the most talented, innovative mind available. Hopefully... that's you.
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