Be An Amateur

I recently read this book called “Show Your Work” by Austin Kleon. Thank you, my beautiful girlfriend, for giving me this amazing gift.

There were a few things Austin Kleon said that I never knew before. Or maybe I know but never had the heart to admit it.

Kleon spoke about how important it is to show what you’re working on. People are interested in the process of the actual doing as well as the end results. And you don’t have to be an expert in those areas to broadcast what you do.

I guess for someone who suffers from intellectual self-doubt, who thinks that everything I do isn’t good enough; this book really comes around. I still question it every day, that if I’m not good, who would want to see my work or hear what I have to say. I’d rather keep it to myself than to show it and receive negative feedbacks.

I started playing the piano when I was about 5 years old. It was hard but exciting at the same time. Mind you, I was not a natural, “born to play” pianist who can play every classic song in the book. In fact, I normally took a longer time to perfect a piece compared to others. But I loved it. Because after all the hard work, I know I can do it in the end.

I remembered at one point, I told my parents I wanted to play music for a living. They were surprised and I guess a little bit taken back. For Asian parents, it is not okay to want to earn money from playing an instruments. At age 10, my parents told me to quit because they wanted me to focus more on academic school work.

I used to regret not being able to learn more and play the piano for 10 years. However, I picked it up again and now I have a chance to be better at it.

I will have to learn that it’s okay to constantly be learning. It’s okay to be an amateur at something. And it’s okay to let people see your weakness and see how you’ve grown.

So I will keep telling myself to learn more, play music more, read more, write more, and to know that this is living.

My recent original piano piece: https://soundcloud.com/tammy-ple/moon-piano-original

t.l.