You’re too coherent. So read this wrong.
Last time in Quarantine at The Art Spirit, I was asked to talk about my favorite books. The ones that fuel this beast from the inside. Like an invisible furnace, always ablaze.
And I accepted.
Then I sat down and thought... where the hell do I even start?
The list? It's long. Real long.
Because even though Quarantine isn’t about theory, there’s more theory in our shadows than at an insomniac conspiracy convention.
So here’s the plan:
Every now and then, I’ll drop a book.
But only if it hits hard.
Only if it’s worth it.
Heads up, though: DON’T EXPECT ART BOOKS.
Not because I don’t like them—but we’ve already bored each other to death passing around the same old titles. We need some fresh air here.
So I’ll give you something else.
Books from strange corners. Books with teeth.
Ideas you didn’t know you were starving for.
Alright?
Let’s start with one that cracked my skull wide open and rearranged all the furniture in my mind.
This one cut straight through me.
It’s by a physicist. Yeah—a damn physicist. David Bohm.
It’s called On Dialogue. And no, it’s not about sounding clever in conversation.
It’s about letting go of your precious ideas.
Listening without trying to win.
Unlearning.
Thinking without digging trenches.
Creating without echoing your ego’s noise.
I’ve recommended it so often people are starting to give me looks.
Aaand…
Wanna hear something nuts? —I take notes when I read.
But with this book…
I ended up with 74.7 pages of ideas. Seventy-four.
The book itself? Just 148 pages.
Here, look—screenshot from the notes folder. Just so you know the kind of maniac you’re dealing with.
See? Certified maniac.
Here’s a handful of quotes I pulled out of that black hole.
Pure cognitive caviar.
Each one like a drop of poison for unconscious habits. A crack-opener. A reminder that creativity isn’t safe.
“If you don’t pay attention to something, you won’t perceive it—and to you, it won’t exist.”
“If we know or sense that something is true, it will genuinely affect us.”
“The observer is the observed.”
“Our beliefs act like a kind of observer that deeply influences what’s being observed—and gets influenced right back.”
“The very ‘error’ we need to observe is in the observer, because that’s the safest place to hide. Hide in the observer and you’ll never be found.”
“It’s not about solving a problem—it’s about realizing that thought itself is the problem.”
“Our beliefs and interests infect everything, acting like malware that can hijack even our best intentions.”
“Forcing coherence creates incoherence.”
“An artist who only meets others’ needs will always be mediocre.”
Boiling it down:
Perception shapes reality. But perception’s infected by the observer.
And the observer’s wired with beliefs.
So…
If an artist tries to fit into external logic—coherence, demand, resolution—they lose their edge.
They betray themselves.
They fail.
The only place from where you can really create is that weird edge no one talks about. Where the observer stops calling the shots, and the “mistake” isn’t fixed—it’s used.
That’s where the good stuff lives.
You change what you observe.
Be present, not perfect.
And don’t forget what David Bohm taught us:
“The error hides in the observer.”
Thanks, Bohm. Damn you.
—
If you’ve never been in Quarantine, maybe all this sounds weird.
Maybe you thought we run painting workshops and chill in our spare time…
Spoiler: nope.
- Quarantine’s a radical experiment. It dismantles what you’ve been taught, so you can start creating from someplace new. Translation: we take off the handbrake.
- Free time? LOL. Twelve hours a day. Seven days a week. Quarantine is to vacation what military music is to normal music.
The next round kicks off in October. If any of this hits home, you know what to do:
P.S. — I’ll be dropping more books and thoughts soon. Strange ones. Bold ones. All aimed straight at your head. Want to apply? Apply it all? It’s up there, in the red link.
Something we said lit a spark?
Good. Follow it.
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Including the one that’s helped hundreds “Overcoming Impostor Syndrome.”