"The Meaning in the Making" by Sean Tucker is a thoughtful exploration of the creative process, not just as a means to an end, but as a journey of self-discovery. It's not a technical manual on how to be more creative, but rather a philosophical reflection on why we create and the deeper significance it holds in our lives.

“Making” and life are about growth

Tucker's writing is easy to understand and introspective, inviting the reader to examine their own motivations for engaging in creative pursuits and, on a broader scale, for living the way they live. He skillfully weaves together personal anecdotes, philosophical insights, and practical advice, creating a compelling narrative that resonates with anyone, regardless if they create something or not. He doesn't shy away from the struggles, acknowledging the frustration, self-doubt, and even pain that can accompany it. However, he reframes these challenges not as obstacles, but as integral parts of the journey, opportunities for growth and self-understanding.

One of the book's strengths is its emphasis on the importance of intention. Tucker argues that true meaning in making comes not simply from the finished product, but from the conscious choices we make throughout the creative process. He encourages readers to ask themselves why they are creating something, what they hope to express, and what impact they want to have on the world. This focus on intention elevates the act of creation from a mere technical exercise to a deeply personal and meaningful endeavor.

Who is this book for

I don’t think this book is aimed only at artists and creatives for its message transcends any specific discipline. The core ideas about finding meaning, embracing vulnerability, and connecting with something larger than oneself are relevant to anyone seeking a more fulfilling life. Tucker's writing is accessible and engaging, making complex philosophical concepts very easy to grasp.

A few passages that got my attention

I’ll present a few passages, along with the respective section’s title, that either resonated with me, or people I know, or were somehow illuminating.

Order

in our most awake and aware moments, we are in equal measure wonderstruck and terrified by the way things seem to just work, without our assistance, and often without our understanding.

we make because we are constantly trying to pull Order from Chaos

Logos

Art isn’t concerned with neat answers. Art is neither careful nor certain. It isn’t trying to prove anything, and it isn’t certain of much. It usually isn’t trying to work things out; instead, it contents itself with describing the way things are.

There’s a word theologians use for this idea of speaking Order out of Chaos: “Logos”. And we get to participate in this idea through the things we make.

Breath

There is a kind of borderless free-thinking that happens when we create that empty mental space for ourselves, and I think the reason it generates ideas and gives us inspiration it that we aren’t thinking within the narrow confines we usually do when we are more actively directing our thoughts.

I want to be an interesting, interested, awake, and aware human being for my own sake, and taking in the works of other “makers of things” has contributed to who I am in ways I will likely never fully understand.

Voice

In a very real sense, taking images of the things I was drawn to, helped me realise that I was actually taking images of myself. I was using my creative voice to offer images reflecting my own experience of life in the city I live in.

I’m not naive enough to assume that everyone would read this in the images I make. After all, it’s taken me years to realise it myself. Most just enjoy the aesthetics, but for those willing to dig a little deeper, they might pick up on the capital “T” Truth I’m sharing.

Ego

I needed my Ego. Sitting on my bed, close to tears, I resolved not to leave and to stick it out because the kind of individual I wanted to be would put himself in difficult situations if it would ultimately help others.

I found his [Ricky Gervais] unassuming confidence impressive. […] “Just because you’re offended doesn’t mean you’re right. Some people are offended by interracial marriage”. […] “If you do what you do, for you alone, the way you think it should be done, you’re bulletproof”. […] What he was saying was that if you are going to put yourself out there, you have to back yourself.

Control

You see, I’m a perfectionist. It’s one of the biggest obstacles holding me back from making and then sharing the things I make. […] “I wish I was a perfectionist”. If you knew what it really is you wouldn’t wish it on your worst enemy. The reality is that perfectionism is often crippling because it’s based in fear.

From Epictetus: “The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are matters not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control.”

Here’s the tough truth: even if I work tirelessly at my relationships, my jobs, or my creative pursuits, there is no guarantee that my efforts will produce the outcomes I want or believe I deserve.

Life isn’t fair, and the minute we get that through our heads and stop trying to control things we can’t, we can shed the fear and guilt that kills our motivation.

From Seneca: “The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today. You are arranging what is in Fortune’s control and abandoning what lies in yours”.

“Success” isn’t your responsibility, but doing the very best job you can is.

Attention

I want the people who really know about photography to think I’m doing good work, and I want photographers who are better than I am to think that I’m doing something worthwhile. […] stop chasing online attention. Focus instead on being the best you can possibly can at what you do.

This is one of the things that impresses me about van Gogh; although he lost his battles at the end, it seems that he refused to change his work to become more “palatable” and “salable” for the art market because he believed in what he was doing […]. The lack of affirmation his work received may have contributed to his eventual loss of hope, but it never caused him to compromise his work - another important lesson I take from his life.

What if the very best that happens is that your work touches the lives of a precious few, but that ends up giving you a deep and abiding sense of fulfilment? Well, that seems like a great way to spend a life.

Envy

The truth is that a negative emotion in us, more often than not, is pointing to something about ourselves that needs to change, and it won’t go away until we deal with it. […] overly negative emotions are often about something within ourselves that we need to address and it’s always worth taking the time to look inward and ask some tough questions.

We are fearful. We get jealous. When the stage comes, it’s a sign that participation in this art form means something to us now. It’s become important. […] But when envy comes knocking, remember this: true masters blinker themselves and run their own race.

Critique

Trust yourself. You’ll know a genuinely constructive critique when you hear it because it has a different tone. It’s polite and respectful. It has useful information in it or suggestions for change, and it has some humility in its tone.

You have to provide your chosen travel companion with a sense of safety, trust, and freedom to say anything, because if you give them a justification, or an excuse, or an “annoyed” response, they will soon decide it’s not worth being honest with you. […] You also have to commit to being honest in your criticism of your partner. This is especially hard for those who fear conflict.

Feel

All human psyches are made up of a mix of both rational and emotional. We all think and we all feel, and if we want to be better-integrated individuals and better-rounded artists, the trick is to identify which realm we operate in more intuitively and make an effort to incorporate more of our weaker side and balance ourselves out.

There is always something you can do to move in a positive direction, even if all you can manage today is one tiny step.

If we take the inner journey to discover what that feeling in us really means, beyond first assumptions, and we choose to bravely travel that road to its redemptive conclusion by facing our fears, we stand a chance of making the good and necessary changes our subconscious is clamouring for. We’ll then find that those same emotions no longer hold the same confusion or dread when they reoccur, which means that we can create out of those emotional spaces and offer others the beneficial lessons of our inward journey.

Shadows

“Grieve humanity” […] That simple two-word phrase made me realise for the first time that people’s hurtful actions are almost always about their fear and brokenness. Most attacks are actually defence.

I was able to see the problems but also have compassion for everyone involved, which let me off my own emotional hook, while helping me approach the problem in a much more constructive way. […] Those two words, “grieve humanity”, also helped me see and acknowledge my own shadow for the first time. Getting honest with myself, I realised that by spending so much energy trying to appear perfect and not letting anyone see the chinks in my armour, I might be hurting others in this pointless pursuit. I had wounds I was protecting. I had impulses I was ashamed of. I had deep fears about how I was perceived by those around me.

From childhood onward, we are taught to quash our darker impulses in order to fit in. Our families direct our actions early on, and the society sanctions us if we don’t fall in with accepted norms, so we repress the sides of ourselves that we aren’t sure about. However, trying desperately to impress and working to hide significant parts of our nature usually means that we are denying broad areas of our authentic self that need integrating.

[…] there is a huge difference between honestly looking our own darkness in the face and lovingly accepting ourselves anyway, and allowing those darker impulses to cause pain in the real world because we selfishly refuse to change.

Ironically, I think it’s those who repress their Shadows who end up doing the most harm because, just as they don’t own their Shadow self, they also don’t take responsibility for the actions and destructive tendencies that originate there.

[…] when things get tough, we are forced to question, adapt, change, and expand. It’s not the good times in our lives that shape us; it’s the hardships we face. We are forged in the shadows. […] So I’m slowly learning to be more present to the troubles of my life. Yes, they are and always will be painful. I can’t avoid that, but mentally “checking out” of the situation will ensure that I miss the lessons that these particularly painful episodes have to give me.

Psychologists have known for a long time that the human mind has a negativity bias. That means that negative ideas, thoughts, and feelings mentally imprint on us much easier than positive ones do. The reason is a simple evolutionary one. […] our brains evolved to be “crisis identifiers” and “problem-solving machines” and evolutionarily, it’s served us well. […] Neurologically speaking, the negative can always cut into the positive, but the positive can’t override the negative without great effort.

Meaning

Ask yourself: when was the last time you were making something, and you completely lost track of time? Right there and then, when your unconscious mind takes over, that will be you creative voice in full flow, and it’s worth coming back to what you were doing in those moments to explore it more.

Time

Are we becoming the human being we really want to be? It’s usually a time of difficult questioning, which, if we have the humility, often leads us to admit that we got some things wrong in the morning and we don’t entirely believe in the person we’ve built for ourselves. Perhaps we’ve been so caught up in trying to hack the system and get ahead that we’ve spent our energies constructing the most expedient version of ourselves, instead of the most honest.

What does the “afternoon” look like? Well, Jung summed it up like this: “The first half of life is devoted to forming a healthy ego, the second half is going inward and letting go of it”. […] We start to let go of our compulsion for control, and we begin to accept where our influence begins and ends.

Those who make it to the “afternoon” of life - and remember, not everyone does - […] are the ones who have cultivated that calm and unthreatened temperament because they let go of their need to impress a long time ago. Now they are able to be there for others in profound ways because their primary drive is no longer limited to their own individual success but has expanded to include the well-being of all.

Conclusions

Overall, "The Meaning in the Making" is a beautifully written and thought-provoking book that will stay with you long after you finish reading it, prompting reflection and inspiring a more intentional approach to creativity and life itself.

I think this is another one of these books that has the potential to change your life. It’s not as immediate as books like “Mindset” or “The courage to be disliked” but most of the messages are very similar.

It’s not a coincidence that the chapter on “Shadows” is the one I pulled the most quotes from. It’s no doubt the one that resonated the most with me. Sadly I understood it a bit late. I had to read the book three times to actually really understand what Sean was talking about. Maybe the third time I was able to understand everything because in the meantime I had to face my shadows and underwent some really challenging times. I had reached the afternoon of life.

If you read this book I hope you understand the message before reality hits you in the face, because that’s a sure way to learn although not as enjoyable as reading Sean’s words.

Good luck.

If you want to buy it and support me you can get it from Amazon here. It won’t cost you anything extra but through this affiliated link I will get a small percentage that will help me a great deal. Thank you!