It takes a lot to become a successful artist. Numerous sacrifices need to be made to live from the arts as so many artists want. Therefore this job is not for everyone. The struggle artists have to go through can be too much. There are magical success stories of the artists that are bold enough to take the leap. But then you have the creatives who want to, but don’t. Singer Bo van den Berg gave up her dream, while Liam Skye took the plunge and thrived.
Bo van den Berg is a 21 year old singer from the Netherlands, who always dreamt of a career in the music industry. She is in a rock band and is currently studying Communication – International Event Music and Entertainment studies in Tilburg. “I used to dream of being a singer, but over time that changed. Now I love that I can sing as a hobby and to make some money. My main focus is my studies.”
But what changed? Why are so many artists so afraid to follow their heart? Bo explains her reasons. “Financial stability has always been on my mind, but it has never been the most important reason to not go for it. I guess you can say that my interests changed. I have always wanted to be a professional singer and make my living out of it, but in the past years I found out that I like other things as well. My whole life I have worked towards my goal of becoming a singer and I have had multiple educations in it as well. I felt some kind of pressure from my environment to pursue the singing career, so that made me doubt myself. In my band I handled the booking and discovered I really liked that as well. I decided to follow another path and find meaning to new interests.”
For Bo financial stability was just a small part of her decision to let go of her dream. For other artists this reason may be the most crucial. Liam Skye, one of the Skye Brothers, agrees with that statement. This abstract artist duo has become successful in sharing their artworks all over the world, with a past of eight years of struggling. “If you start something like I did with my brother, you need money. It is as simple as that. A lot of people are not comfortable with taking that leap”. Liam explains that there are much more reasons that scare artists. Your social environment is in many cases not so supportive. “If you have the courage to share what you hold inside, people will bury you, unconsciously. It’s not that they don’t love you or anything or they don’t want you to succeed, it’s just that many people have been on that crossroad. Everyone has a dream, multiple ones, at some point. You just must have huge balls in today’s world to go for it”.
The reason to not disappoint your environment, is exactly what the Skye Brothers have struggled with in their careers. When they started making art they wanted to please the consumers. “We made art for our family and friends, which was an utter disappointment. We started making artworks for other people to inspire them, to wake them up. We wanted them to find the courage to take the leap and to just do the impossible, like we did at the time. We discovered that people just don’t want to wake up when they are not ready. It’s not our job to drag the world, kicking and screaming, into a new awareness. Those with eyes to see and ears to listen, they will respond and buy our art”.
The Skye Brothers found a new way of inspiring other people. They do this by focussing on themselves and it works. They took the leap, worked hard and found their way to success. In the next video, one of the Skye Brothers, Liam Skye, shares his process to become a successful artist. He opened his studio to the public to share his story.
https://youtu.be/hUqaC5BeZD0
