According to Agnes de Mille:

“The greatest thing [Martha Graham] ever said to me was in 1943 after the opening of Oklahoma!, when I suddenly had unexpected, flamboyant success for a work I thought was only fairly good, after years of neglect for work I thought was fine. I was bewildered and worried that my entire scale of values was untrustworthy. I talked to Martha. I remember the conversation well. It was in a Schrafft’s restaurant over a soda. I confessed that I had a burning desire to be excellent, but no faith that I could be. Martha said to me, very quietly: “There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all of time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is nor how valuable nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep yourself open and aware to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open… No artist is pleased. [There is] no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a queer divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others.””

INSPIRATION
How is literary success defined?
Moonshots: how to make them
16 uncomfortable feelings that actually indicate you’re on the right path
Ira Glass on taste and the creative process
How should one read a book? by Virginia Woolf
Why the pressure to be happy is driving people mad

SLACKS
First episode of TAKE MY WIFE, the new FAN-FUCKING-TASTIC show by Cameron Esposito and Rhea Butcher
Vintage photos of lesbians
Baroness Von Sketch video of hilarity
More vintage photos of lesbians
FUCK YEAH androgynous girls

BE CONCERNED
The CIA is lying to the President and functioning as its own wing of government outside the purview of the Constitution

LA MUSICA
Soy yo
Luchin
Rhiannon Giddens wins the Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in Banjo and Bluegrass

SCIENCE
Dolphins recorded having a conversation for the first time
Great diagrams in anthropology, linguistics, and social theory
NASA photos

Image Credit and link to more sexy Rhea Butcher and Cameron Esposito
Pro-tip: email subscribers, click title for badass pic of Rhea Butcher