How Austin Kleon Retains it Fun and Bizarre

It’s my birthday this week!

For the previous few years, I’ve shared a favourite creator from my youth to rejoice. This yr, I’m sharing a favourite creator who has simply written about child-like issues—in probably the most ebullient approach.

I can’t inform you how excited I’m to function none aside from Austin Kleon!

Here’s what I’ve at all times appreciated about Austin’s work: He takes advanced concepts, boils them right down to their essences, and makes them actually enjoyable and approachable.

For instance, in Steal Like an Artist, he consolidates the inventive power implicit in commonplace books right into a deceptively easy message. He does the identical factor in his new guide—out June 2nd—Don’t Call It Art—this time he captures the imaginative genius of childhood.

Reading something Austin has written appears like a shot of inventive power.

The purpose why? He’s having enjoyable. It’s so apparent that Austin enjoys making artwork and sharing concepts with us. My favourite a part of Don’t Call It Art is the part titled “Who’s Having Fun?” Being inventive must be enjoyable. It is enjoyable. But then we weigh it down with all these grownup issues.

When I believe again to what I did for enjoyable as a child, it included lots of notebooks—writing in my diary, sketching foolish photos, or inventing ridiculous tales in regards to the tooth fairy.

I had a lot enjoyable with notebooks—and I proceed to have lots of enjoyable with them. They stay one in all our greatest instruments of creativeness.

If you’re feeling like your notebooks might use a jolt of inventive power, look no additional than this visitor put up. I dare you to examine Austin’s notebooks and never come away with an concept to steal (to make use of Austin’s language).

And now I’ll hand it over to Austin, who has graciously supplied to provide us a tour of 4 of his notebooks! I hope you like this put up as a lot as I do!

Because I’m insane, I hold 4 completely different notebooks: a diary, a pocket pocket book, a logbook, and a commonplace guide. Each of them serves a distinct perform.

I hold my diary the way in which many writers do: Every morning, I sit down with a cup of espresso and a bit of toast, and I fill 3+ pages. I’ve executed this since 2017, once I fell in love with Thoreau’s journals and wished to maintain my very own.

A couple of years in the past, a buddy of mine requested me to element how I hold my diary, so I wrote these two pages in my diary for him:

What’s not-so-normal about my diaries is that they’re filled with drawings and collages and newspaper clippings. I additionally like to jot down in it with a brush a la my hero, Lynda Barry:

When I’m writing a guide, my diary will get terribly boring as a result of it’s principally me whining about how onerous writing is mixed with little pep talks to myself to get off my ass and into the studio and get to work. Here’s a enjoyable unfold about my long-suffering editor:

I’ve a bunch of what I name “silly rituals” round retaining my diary. First, I at all times assign “guardian spirits” to the within flaps — individuals to observe over issues and supply an aspirational vibe. For instance, my summer time diary from June 2022 options Dee Dee Ramone by the pool:

I believe silliness is basically underrated in inventive work. Being foolish makes you playful, and while you’re playful, you’re extra prone to get good concepts and make great things.

More silliness: I weigh the diary earlier than I begin utilizing it, after which I weigh it once I’m completed. Here is a video of me performing this silly ritual.

People at all times ask in regards to the date stamps: they aren’t uncommon! You can get a date stamp at any workplace provide retailer.

I additionally glue a library card pocket at the back of the diary and hold little paper scraps and souvenirs in there:

I attempt to have my pocket pocket book close by on a regular basis, whether or not I’m in the home, within the studio, or out and about on the planet. It’s mainly only a ”waste book” for scribbling and doodling concepts.

I like the way in which my pocket pocket book mixes the mundane and the profound, like this unfold that has a to-do listing on one web page and a newspaper clipping about Margaret Fuller on the opposite web page:

Here’s a variety that exhibits me engaged on (self-rejected) cowl designs for Don’t Call It Art — in case you can learn my handwriting, you’ll discover that these have been executed again when the guide had a distinct subtitle:

Because I fuss over my pocket pocket book the least out of all my notebooks, I normally discover it probably the most attention-grabbing to flip by.

I believe on a regular basis about how we emphasize the significance of retaining notebooks and sketchbooks however we virtually by no means discuss the importance of revisiting them and re-reading them. I’ve discovered a weekly evaluate vastly useful: simply as soon as per week, sit down and re-read your notebooks and see if there’s something you need to use.

My logbook is only a listing of what I do day by day. It’s like an appointment guide in reverse. I attempt to hold it because the day progresses, however I at all times make sure that over espresso that yesterday is logged earlier than the remainder of my morning begins.

The mundanity of this pocket book is essential. It is the place to place every little thing — together with the stuff that I’d really feel silly about or bored by recording in my diary.

Here’s what I wrote in regards to the logbook in my guide Steal Like an Artist:

A logbook isn’t essentially a diary or a journal, it’s just a bit guide through which you listing the belongings you do day by day. What undertaking you labored on, the place you went to lunch, what film you noticed. It’s a lot simpler than retaining an in depth diary, and also you’d be amazed at how useful having a every day document like this may be, particularly over a number of years. The small particulars will aid you bear in mind the massive particulars.

In the outdated days, a logbook was a spot for sailors to maintain monitor of how far they’d traveled, and that’s precisely what you’re doing—retaining monitor of how far your ship has sailed.

Here are two pages from my logbook from 2009, a weekend off from my day job earlier than I’d printed any books or had any youngsters:

I’ve a horrible reminiscence for issues that occur to me, so that is probably the most helpful pocket book I hold. I can’t inform you how bizarre it’s to have a document like this going again seventeen years. For instance, I can actually inform you what I did on each single day of my sons’ lives. It’s simply weird to have this sort of index to your life. (I usually use the logbook to look one thing up, after which seek the advice of my diary to see if I wrote extra about it.)

Here is a peek inside my commonplace guide. This is a bizarre little 5-year-diary I saved from 2021-2025, however with quotes I learn as an alternative of issues that occurred to me.

For the primary two years, day by day I wrote down random quotes that I’d heard or saved, however within the third yr, I began constructing themes and riffing off of different quotes such as you’d do in an old style commonplace guide. (I hold an enormous Apple Notes file known as “QUOTES” that I dip into.)

You can see on this web page that generally I clipped issues out of print and pasted them into the guide:

I actually favored making this guide and I like flipping by it, however I truly didn’t begin one other one as soon as I completed. Keeping it — and a fully-searchable digital copy on my laptop — made me understand how useful and highly effective it will be to maintain a bonafide commonplace guide, organized by subject, digital and absolutely searchable. So that’s what I’m making an attempt to maintain now, however on the pc.

Of course, I’ve truly been doing this for years: I constructed virtually all my books off of blog and Tumblr tags and newsletter points. But it’s good to have a personal file that I can let get weirder and wilder and extra messy.

What’s attention-grabbing to me is that I by no means would’ve made the choice to maintain a digital commonplace guide with out the train of retaining an analog one.

I’m type of generally known as an analog man, however digital stuff is a big a part of my work. I usually consider my life as a type of analog/digital loop. Most of my concepts begin in my notebooks, on paper. Then I get them into the pc, manipulate them, and share them. Then, I head again to the notebooks to see if I can discover some extra concepts…

Hi, once more! It’s Jillian.

I can’t log out with out sharing my notes on Austin’s notes. This is what I’m holding onto from his put up.

Slightly bit of labor over time actually provides up: Austin is remarkably constant. And he’s an excellent instance of how creativity rewards those that present up many times. Not day by day goes to be an excellent inventive day, however the work compounds over time. This brings me to my second level…

Note-taking is a type of ritual: Note-taking tends to work finest when constructed into the construction of your days—when it’s one thing that occurs habitually, whether or not that’s the weekly evaluate, morning pages, or weighing your diaries. Austin is especially good at rituals, and he launched me to at least one that I’ve been training for practically two years. The “bookends approach” is straightforward—simply start and finish every day with a guide. Here’s Austin’s illustration of it:

Notebooks are nice containers: I like notebooks as a result of they bring about me again to the bodily world. And I like how Austin absolutely embraces the pocket book as a bodily object—with all its storage capability. When I take a look at Austin’s notebooks, I consider Joseph Cornell’s assemblages or Susan Sontag’s notebooks full of paper.

Austin’s printed books replicate the identical expansiveness of his notebooks. Don’t Call It Art is an element inventive information, half commonplace guide, half photo-album, and pure creativity. Reading it has made my writing days extra enjoyable. I believe it’s going to for you too!

Noted is fueled by you. Your ❤️s and feedback encourage me. As at all times, I’d like to know your ideas. Which of Austin’s note-taking instruments do you wish to steal?

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Yours in note-taking,