Practical Delusion

September 7, 2025


Every artist begins here. Before technique, before voice, before any sense of mastery, there’s a kind of necessary distortion in perception. A subtle lie you tell yourself over and over, not because you want to be deceived, but because without it, you’d never even start. You have to believe you’re capable of greatness long before you actually are. This is not ego in the traditional sense, it’s survival instinct for the creative spirit.

Call it what you will: faith, optimism, insanity. But the truth is that practical delusion is what fuels the first sketch that doesn't quite resemble what you imagined. It whispers, “Keep going. This is good. Or it will be.” That voice doesn’t come from experience, it comes from that irrational but essential place where confidence is born before it’s earned.

This delusion is not permanent. It matures as the artist matures. But in the beginning, it acts as a kind of scaffolding. Without it, the structure can’t rise. No one starts as a master. Most don’t even start as good. But many stop because the distance between what they want to create and what they can currently create feels unbearable. Those who don’t stop? They are the ones who manage, in some alchemical way, to suspend disbelief about themselves long enough to become better.

Practical delusion is not about ignoring the gap between ambition and ability, it’s about refusing to let that gap be a reason to quit. It’s the strange engine that says, “I can do this,” even when the work says otherwise. It’s not delusion in the sense of complete detachment from reality, but a bending of it, just enough to allow room for growth.

And the irony is, the more you lean into it, the less delusional it becomes. Eventually, the belief that once seemed absurd shifts into the realm of the possible. Then the probable. Then the real. The scaffolding comes down, and the structure stands.

No one talks much about this stage. We prefer the story of talent, the myth of the prodigy. But the truth is that behind every “overnight success” is someone who, for months or years, operated on belief alone. Someone who looked at their own unfinished, unimpressive work and said, “Yes. This is going somewhere.” And then kept showing up, over and over, until they were right.

So if you’re in that early place, wobbly, unsure, a little overconfident in ways you can't quite explain, good. That’s where you’re supposed to be. That unearned belief in yourself? It’s not a flaw. It’s the first tool in your artist’s kit. Wield it. Protect it. Let it propel you forward.

Because it will take you further than talent alone ever could.