Creative Wisdom from Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Springsteen still plays four-hour concerts at age 75 because his creative passion burns bright. Photo courtesy of Disney/Hulu.
Why does Bruce Springsteen, now 75, still play epic, four-hour-long concerts? Because he can.
"I plan on continuing until the wheels fall off, and for as long as the audience will follow me,” he said in his new documentary, Road Diary.
May we all embrace that attitude — or at least respect it. Springsteen has had one of the most successful creative careers of all time — his touring alone has brought in more than $2 billion in all-time concert revenue. And his words and wisdom have had a profound impact on people all over the world. For many, he is the only “boss” they actually respect.
Here are 10 bits of creative wisdom from Springsteen on how to live a fulfilling life, the way we should keep pursuing the craft when times turn hard, and why artists must be dreamers.
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1. “First, you write for yourself... always, to make sense of experience and the world around you. It’s one of the ways I stay sane. Our stories, our books, our films are how we cope with the random trauma-inducing chaos of life as it plays.”
2. “People always asked me how the band played like it did night after night, almost murderously consistent, NEVER stagnant and always full balls to the wall. There are two answers. One is they loved and respected their jobs, one another, their leader and their audience. The other is…because I MADE them!”
3. “I would spend my life on the road logging hundreds of thousands of miles and my story was always the same. . . man comes to town, detonates; man leaves town and drives off into the evening; fade to black. Just the way I like it.”
4. “Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass, but learning to dance in the rain.”
5. “In the real world, ninety-nine cents will not get you into New York City. You will need the full dollar.”
6. “All I do know is that as we age, the weight of our unsorted baggage becomes heavier...much heavier. With each passing year, the price of our refusing to do that sorting rises higher and higher.”
7. “The primary math of the real world is one and one equals two. The layman (as, often, do I) swings that every day. He goes to the job, does his work, pays his bills and comes home. One plus one equals two. It keeps the world spinning. But artists, musicians, con men, poets, mystics and such are paid to turn that math on its head, to rub two sticks together and bring forth fire. Everybody performs this alchemy somewhere in their life, but it’s hard to hold on to and easy to forget.
8. People don’t come to rock shows to learn something. They come to be reminded of something they already know and feel deep down in their gut. That's when the world is at its best, when we are at our best, when life feels fullest, one and one equals three. It’s the essential equation of love, art, rock ’n’ roll and rock ’n’ roll bands. It’s the reason the universe will never be fully comprehensible, love will continue to be ecstatic, confounding, and true rock ’n’ roll will never die.”
9. “If you want to burn bright, hard, and long, you will need to depend upon more than your initial instincts. You will need to develop some craft and a creative intelligence that will lead you farther when things get dicey. That’s what'll help you make crucial sense and powerful music as time passes, giving you the skills that may also keep you alive, creatively and physically.”
10. “Youth and death have always been an intoxicating combination for the myth makers left amongst the living… The high tension between those two forces often makes a performer fascinating and fun to watch, but also a white-cross highway marker. Here, many who’ve come this way have burned out hard or died. The rock death cult is well loved and chronicled in literature and music, but in practice, there ain't much in it for the singer and his song, except a good life unlived, lovers and children left behind, and a six-foot-deep hole in the ground. The exit in a blaze of glory is bullsh*t.”
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