One for Me

There's this unwritten rule in creative circles: "one for them, one for you."

What does that mean exactly?

It's the tension between art that serves others and art that serves you. Between what sells and what challenges. Between what they expect and what you need.

A friend called me about a presentation he was recycling. Same audience, similar content. He wasn't excited. We spent an hour finding ways to inject his newest thinking into the framework they expected.

Dave Chappelle once revealed he writes jokes backward - starting with the punchline, then crafting a seemingly unrelated story that somehow, miraculously, arrives at that exact line. The audience delights in the surprise connection.

But that's Dave's "one for me." It's arguably the hardest way to write comedy, not the most crowd-pleasing approach. He's challenging himself because it's interesting to him.

My friend called back this week saying “it worked” and that he was energized leaving the conference with new material already forming from the audience response.

Rick Rubin famously says "the audience comes last." This sounds backward until you realize that serving yourself first often creates the spark that ultimately serves others better.

When was the last time you created just for you?

What did it teach you?

That space - the gap between "for them" and "for you" - might be exactly where your next breakthrough is hiding.