On the enjoyment and creation of beauty

“Enjoying or creating beauty is free and something all human beings have access to.”

~ From Ikigai by Héctor García and Francesc Miralles

While reading Ikigai, I came across the above, which stopped me in my tracks. It’s the perfect encapsulation of something I’ve been thinking about lately. The act of making, of creating, of making good (or bad) art is available to all of us, as is the enjoyment of that art.

AI, for example, is going to change a lot of things. It’s understandably stressful, But while it’s too early to say if they’ll be able to share in this enjoyment, one thing is clear: AI won’t take away our ability to create and enjoy for ourselves. I’ve been using it to explore ideas, help visualize my writing, and play. Simply playing around with it is enjoyable, and I find the random, unpredictable nature more entertaining than frustrating. Though I’ll admit, it can be frustrating when you can’t get the prompts to do what you want.

There’s beauty in the doing, in the sharing, and in the receiving.