What is character?
Sometimes we appreciate greatness of some people. We admire them. We try to follow them. We will make them as our heroes.
Why we admire them like that?
Because they had some qualities, traits, which made them as heroes, legends and all time greats.
Character means having these qualities, traits. A person has character means he is selfless, ready to sacrifice to achieve his dreams, ready to lose anything to reach his destination.
That is character.
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| A Small Pond Artist : Magunta Dayakar |
After learning basic principles of art or any other subject, one should go with applications. That means execution. Knowing is different from doing. When you start doing things they won’t happen as you planned. They go haywire.
Then depression starts. You may be reluctant to continue. Here most of the learners would stop their attempts to experiment and stop their struggle. That means they are not having the character required to be a true artist.
A person who has character never turns back, whatever happens. He is like a warrior. A true warrior never thinks about death, he thinks only about how to conquer the enemy.
To me every artist is a warrior.
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| A Small Streak of Water Artist:Magunta Dayakar |
Warriors and artists are alike. Otherwise how do they become famous? How will they be admired? But to be a warrior how are they trained? They learn strategies of war, they practice and understand fighting skills.
To become an artist we need to understand the character of a warrior. We should try to become like that. In history only Warriors and Artists will be remembered more than anyone . Perhaps the reason is, they are the creators and they are also the destroyers. By conquering other kingdoms warriors will create new states. To achieve this they will destroy the existing states where as artists will lose themselves in the process of creation. That is the greatness of the artist.
To create a new world on two dimensional canvas they are ready to destroy so many canvases. In this process so much suffering, pain and agony they have to experience. Great things never come to you cheaply. The entire world, irrespective of races, countries talk about Leonardo da Vinci’s Monalisa. Why?
Alexander the Great, Napoleon, Lenin, Abraham Lincoln and Gandhi, Einstein and many greats…. Monalisa is always more in the news than them. Why? Think about it! You may find the answer.
The answer is … It is the character of all time great Leonardo da Vinci. History says ‘ The world had not seen such a extraordinary genius till this day.’
People love that kind of character, they admire those who have that character. Not only warriors, or artists, If anybody wants to become the best they must have character.
Character demands continuous learning, courage to sacrifice, and risk taking. We can ask ourselves sincerely …’ how many artists are having this character?
Continuous learning will help you to get this character. We should continue our learning till our last breath if we want to achieve the Character of a Creator.
(Excerpt from my book …’ If You Love Your Work It Will Lead To Failure?’)