I’m not a singer, or an artist of any kind, but in my own little realm of work I’ve tried to follow this principle: work at the edge of your range. A couple of times in my career I’ve tried to make myself write books based on what I already knew, and I just couldn’t do it. I have to be discovering something, trying something I haven’t tried before – finding out where my range as a thinker and writer stops. The downside of this habit is that sometimes I have written (and even published) things I didn’t know enough about. That has been embarrassing. But I really can’t seem to do things any other way, and in general I think it’s a good principle – at the edge of your range
I think this is not just a good principle but a wonderful one to follow. And (though perhaps not directly relatable) I will try to bear it in mind when writing about a topic I have an interest in, like technology, but not much grounding. It might quieten that voice I hear asking, “Who do you think you are?”
