For the longest time, I’ve been stuck wondering why the quality of my drabbles (literary doodles) and sketches have been disappointing. Early this afternoon, I found out why.
While I was re-watching the documentary on Jiro Ono, the world’s greatest sushi chef, he went on to explain.
“In order to make delicious food, you need to eat delicious food. The quality of ingredients is important, but one must develop a palate capable of discerning good and bad food.
Without good taste, you can’t make good food.”
-Jiro Ono, Jiro Dreams of Sushi
Genius, right?
The thing is, I’ve actually been hearing advice like that before. We all have. Except I always had a number of excuses lined up—most of them revolved around my worrying that I’d be considered a cheat for riding on the ideas of greater writers.
The point really only sunk in today
… that I was dead wrong, since that’s not what reading does, is, or happens to be about.
Too often have I spent my time churning out work that didn’t satisfy me because I’d forgone the joy of reading to go and “focus on creation”. But I was running low on fuel and I see now how my work didn’t grow as a result. I could have kept going, writing, and drawing but practice doesn’t make perfect, said Larry Gelwix, practice makes permanent.
So I’m changing course.
Tonight, I’ll do what one of my closest friend’s been poking me to do for (Ponch knows how many) years now: I’ll be attacking my reading lists. Yep, plural (including all 42 Web Comics You Need To Read by Buzzfeed), starting with Homestuck, which I’ve procrastinated with for too long now.
Cheers!