“No one needs the things that I do. No one needs my music or my art or my creativity. No one needs or wants my skills and my talents. No one will pay me for what I have to offer the world. — My Brain
As of February 28th, 2025 there are approximately 8.2 billion people living on planet earth.
That’s a lot of people.
According to Kevin Kelly it takes 1000 true fans to earn a living doing that thing that you do. Whatever that thing is.
8 billion, 200 million people on the planet. 1000 is such a small percent of 8.2 billion that the Google calculator answer is formatted in some crazy way that uses letters: 1.21833103e-7%. I have no idea what 1.21833103e-7% means and I’m certainly no math guy, but that seems like a super small number.
That thing that you do is exactly the thing that at least 1000 people on this planet are looking for. They’re waiting for your talent and your creativity. They’re hungry for it.
We live in a time where it’s possible to reach those 1000 people. The planet is interconnected in a way that’s never existed before. You can communicate instantly with a person on the other side of the world just as easily as you can connect with the person right next door. The distribution channels are there waiting for you. The opportunity to put yourself and your work out into the world is there in a way that it’s never been before in all of human history.
This is what I say to myself. These are the voices I hear in my head every day. I know that I must make things and I know that I must put those things out into the world, but I am always confounded by the question: ‘What things?’ What are the things that I should do? Where should I put my energy and my time in this all too brief life? Words like ‘sunk cost fallacy’ rumble around in my brain. I forget about the forest.
Then I remember to breathe. Always with the breathing. Breathing brings me back.
It’s true that I’m not one hundred percent sure what my work is at the moment. I don’t know what the thing is that my 1000 true fans won’t be able to get enough of. That’s ok. I just need to make something. Every day ‘make something’ has to be the new motto. Do something. Even if sometimes that something feels like a step backwards.
I can’t control whether or not my work is accepted or liked by the public. The only thing that I can control is the amount of work that I put into the world. It’s a numbers game. The more work that I release, the greater the possibility that my work will connect someone who enjoys it and will in turn pay me to make more of it.
My 1000 true fans are out there. I just have to have the courage to make something and the courage to show those ‘somethings’ to the world.