What does it mean to be original? Well, if you ask me - it's kind of hard to be truly original - without taking any inspiration from any other source for inspiration or anything from someone, or somewhere else. I read something the other day that really struck me and stuck with me. It was about creativity and originality:

“If you can start to look at authenticity, rather than originality, you will become more creative.” - Scott Bourne 

Scott Bourne is a photographer, specializing in wildlife photography. I think, a blogger and definitely as an artist, there is always a struggle to remain original in our work, but in trying to always remain original - we also close ourselves off from new opportunities, new ideas, and new adventures. If you can somehow block out all the inspiration out there - then maybe you can remain original - but without any inspiration at all...what then?

  “Inspiration is for amateurs — the rest of us just show up and get to work.” - Chuck Close

That's a quote from one of my favorite living iconic artist, Chuck Close - you can read more about what he had to say on this here. Maybe it's that you open yourself up to inspiration by just doing and not waiting for it to happen, for inspiration to find you. Basically just go out and do - and don't worry about the rest of it. Like Scott Bourne says: 

  “To sum up- if you want to be more creative, start loving yourself enough to give yourself permission to fail. In fact better yet, don't even worry about wining or losing. Just DO...Don't focus on NEW- focus on authentic. Being original isn't being new, it's being you.”

So, I think I will do just that - watch out 2013 - I'm just going to be me, can't fail too much at that now, can I? 
But I'll be open to it ;)

What about you guys - any new years resolutions you'd like to share?