On Trying to Be an Honest Creator

My first semester in college I took an art class from a professor I really wanted to impress.  He gave us a worksheet of instructions to take home over the weekend and we were to come back with the completed project on Monday.  I spent the whole weekend constructing, painting, gluing and perfecting my sphere-like, colorful paper sculpture.  When I got to class everyone else had a set of pencil drawings in front of them.  My teacher was perplexed and perhaps a little bit pleased with my project, but to this day, I wonder how I really and truly thought that I was creating something just the way everyone else was, when in reality, we were miles apart.  I've lived in this space for much of my life.  I both adore and despise it.  The one thing it has made me is honest.  Sometimes I think that's the only thing I've got going for me.  I hardly have a business right now.  I have boxes of books.  Lots of art.  Lots of ideas.  No capital. No space. And a good part of the time, little confidence in my ability.  But through it all, I can say that I've been honest, and I believe that anything that might eventually be successful must start from that deep, shy cave in your heart where everything is dark and no one gives you their approval.  That place where you have to feel your way around until you find a match, strike it on the rocks and light the pile of sticks on the dirt floor.  In the hard earned illumination you will see shadows on the walls, sparks flying up toward the ceiling.  You will hear crackles in the silence, and here, in this place in the deepest part of your heart, you forget about everything else and ask yourself, what is it that I can be most honest about.  What makes me tick?  What do I care about?  You may spend much time here ruminating, or just staring into the flames.  You may come back every night for weeks or months, but before you start anything, find out what you want to be honest about.  It won't be the same for everyone, and it doesn't have to come in the form of anything epic or earth changing, but you do have to care about what you do.