Mike Winkelmann, aka Beeple, has recounted the road to his unprecedented sale of NFTs for $69m (warning: some images definitely NSFW), making him the third-highest earning artist alive. While the sale (and his very existence!) came as a surprise to much of the art world and beyond, he was no “overnight success.”

No surprise, the road to success involved a lot of unglamorous grinding away at his craft, day in and day out. For 13 years. On average, his art required approximately 2 hours every day, on top of his “day job.”

I remember at SXSW last year, as I woke up extra early to keep up my daily blogging practice, I saw a flurry of missed late-night text messages from my fellow conference goers. My first thought was “Man, I missed a lot!” My next thought, was, “I wonder how many parties Beeple missed?” which immediately provided valuable perspective.

Beeple, just putting in the work. How many parties did he miss in those 13 years? I wonder if he regrets them now?

Not unlike Kobe Bryant, who was widely known across the NBA to be found in the gym, no matter which city the Lakers were visiting, or where his teammates happened to be partying. Not unlike Michael Phelps, who, when an interviewer asked, “Why’d you make so many sacrifices?” said simply, “I wanted to do something special.”

Not unlike Jerry Seinfeld, who said, “No one’s really that great. You know who’s great? The people that just put tremendous amount of hours into it. It’s a game of tonnage.”

And so, when I got up to take a crack at another daily blog post — which tally into the several hundreds, now — and I was tempted to feel a tinge of regret, I remembered Kobe, and Michael, and Seinfeld… and unexpectedly, Beeple.

I want to do something special, too.

Related: Daily Rituals
Related: Put In The Work

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