For actors, filmmakers, artists, writers and other creative masters, fame and recognition can become a form of passive slavery. Fearless experimentation, exploration and being an amateur are what keep a master alive as a creative being. But once you are recognized as a master, legend or celebrity, you are forced to perform the template you created to impress your audience or sustain your success.
This happens because the possibility of your peers seeing your experimentation or exploration as a failure or judging you, might affect your fame, wealth and more. But if you trace back the foundation of their mastery, you’ll discover that it is rooted in fearless exploration.
Only a few are blessed with this privilege of being masters, yet they still have the space to experiment freely like a curious kid for eternity.
This privilege cannot be understood by aspirers who feel pity for their masters and want them to be famous. Most followers want their master to be at the top of the world. Not entirely for the master's sake. It gives them pride and identity to say they follow greatness. It validates their own choices. It makes their association feel like proof of their own good judgment. In doing so, they unknowingly place a ceiling on the very person they admire. Their love becomes a leash.
A master who experiments and fails privately will always create more than a legend who performs safely for applause.
— SCD Balaji
