Steal Like You Mean It: A Thief’s Guide to Creating on Empty
“Good artists copy, great artists steal…”
— Pablo Picasso
The best thieves don’t wear masks — they wear turtlenecks.
Steve Jobs knew it. In a moment of candor, he explained: “It comes down to trying to expose yourself to the best things that humans have done and then try to bring those things into what you’re doing.”
Then the truth: “Picasso’s saying — ‘Good artists copy, great artists steal’ — we have always been shameless about stealing great ideas.”
Jobs didn’t just build computers. He assembled musicians, poets, and artists who happened to be brilliant engineers. They borrowed from diverse fields and transformed that inspiration into revolutionary products.
That’s what creators eventually learn: true innovation isn’t born in isolation — it comes from recognizing valuable ideas and reshaping them into something new.
The Originality Myth
Picasso said it first. Maybe. “Good artists copy, great artists steal.”
Words to get tattooed on your forearm when the blank page has been staring back at you for hours. Mocking you. Daring you to make something worth a damn.
Here’s the truth nobody wants to admit: there’s no such thing as original. None. Zero. Nada. Zilch. Everything’s been done before by some forgotten soul who probably died broke and unappreciated.
And that’s the most liberating news you’ll hear all day — especially when that cursor won’t stop its relentless blinking.
The Cursor That Won’t Stop Blinking
You know that feeling.
The empty document. The cursor pulsing like a headache. Blink. Blink. Blink. Each flash a tiny little taunt reminding you that the well’s run dry.
Austin Kleon sat there once — a writer with nothing to write. The cursor taunting him while a stack of newspapers sat in his recycle bin. “Here I am without any words,” he thought, “and right next to me are thousands of them, delivered to my doorstep every day.”
So he grabbed a marker and started blacking out newspaper articles. Left a few choice words visible. Made poetry from the spaces between.
Turns out his so called “original” idea had a 250-year history.
Didn’t stop him. Don’t let it stop you.
Your Heritage of Borrowed Inspiration
You’ve got two family trees. One you’re born with — full of titas who bring balikbayan boxes to every gathering and titos who challenge everyone to videoke competitions after too many San Miguel beers. (Titas, Titos = Aunts & Uncles in Filipino)
The other? You build it yourself.
Your influences. Your heroes. The magic that makes your heart beat faster. The dog-eared paperbacks you stole from your older brother. The vinyl records you play until the grooves wear thin. The films that taught you how to kiss, how to fight, how to cry without shame.
“You are a mashup of what you let into your life,” Kleon says.
Unlike your actual family, you get to choose this one. Choose wisely.
The Remix Manifesto: Legends Edition
Stravinsky — yep, the classical music genius — wasn’t above grand larceny. He’d pull out other composers’ manuscripts and red-line ’em with a red pen like they were his homework to correct. Borrowed the bass lines. Stole the melodies. Added his own twist.
Critics lost their minds. “How dare you do this to the classics? Leave them alone!”
His response? “You ‘respect,’ but I love.”
Damn. That’s the difference between a tourist and a thief who knows what he’s after.
How to Rob a Bank (of Ideas)
Every great heist needs a plan. Here’s yours:
1. Case the Joint
Hoarders grab everything. Artists only take what makes their fingers itch.
Look around. Ask yourself: “What’s worth stealing?” Not the shiny stuff. The meaningful stuff. The things that won’t let you sleep.
Build a collection that feels like you, even before you touch it. Like a bank robber who knows exactly which vault holds the real treasure.
2. The Cleaners
T.S. Eliot knew the score: “Immature poets imitate, great poets steal.”
But there’s stealing and there’s steeling. “Bad poets take what they steal and deface it. Good poets turn it into something better, or at least something different.”
Don’t just wear the clothes you stole. Cut them up. Sew them into something new. Something that could only have come from your hands.
The greatest thieves don’t display their loot — they melt down the gold and reshape it until its origin is just a ghost of a memory.
3. Mixology (But Know Your Recipe)
One influence is just copying. Two is a comparison. Three or more? Now you’re cooking something nobody’s tasted before.
Draw one line. Draw another beside it. What do you get? Two lines, sure. But also the space between them. One plus one equals three.
That’s where the magic hides — in the collision between your stolen goods. Like how Tarantino steals from kung fu flicks, spaghetti westerns, and blaxploitation films to make something that screams his name from every frame.
The mixture is the message. And the mixture is all yours.
Getting Past the Mental Barriers
Your mind’s got more security systems than Fort Knox. Here’s how to break through them:
The “Nothing New” Fear
“This has all been done before.” Yeah, no shit. Of course it has.
But not by you. Not with your scars and your particular way of seeing the world through cracked glass.
Original doesn’t mean creating from nothing. It means creating from everything, filtered through you.
The “Not Good Enough” Curse
That voice telling you you’re a copycat, a fake, a phony? It’s got everybody’s number. Even the greats hear it.
Here’s the secret: if all of us are borrowing, then what matters isn’t whether you stole — it’s how you transform the stolen goods into contraband that has your fingerprints all over it.
When Hemingway stole from Gertrude Stein, he didn’t become Stein. He became more Hemingway.
The “Empty Well” Drought
Don’t wait for inspiration to find you. It ain’t come’ng to your door with flowers and chocolate.
Go out and GET it. Like Kleon with his newspapers — sometimes the words you need are already written. They just need you to find them and cut away everything that isn’t yours.
“Absorb what is useful, discard what is not, add what is uniquely your own…”
—Bruce Lee
Creativity isn’t about waiting for permission. It’s about breaking and entering.
The “Success Panic” Attack
Success scares some folks more than failure. What if I can’t do it again? What if this is as good as it gets? What if…?
Stop thinking of creativity as lightning strikes and start seeing it as a conversation that’s been going on since the first cave paintings. You’re just adding your verse. Then another. Then another.
The bank of ideas never runs dry. There’s always another vault to crack.
Your Creative Heist Playbook
Here’s how you start robbing banks tomorrow:
Build your lookbook. Collect everything that makes your soul vibrate. Not digital bookmarks that you’ll never see again. Physical stuff. Pages torn from magazines. Notes scribbled on bar napkins. Lines stolen from books you love. A real thief’s catalog of potential scores.
(Physical collections of inspiration stay visible — digital ones get forgotten.)Play mad scientist. Take something from column A, something from column B. Bukowski’s grit with Austen’s social commentary. Delta blues with Japanese minimalism. Neon signs with ancient prayers. Create collisions no one saw coming.
(Mix and match unexpected influences to create something fresh and inspiring.)Transform until it’s unrecognizable. The work isn’t done until it has your DNA all over it. Push it until your influences are like bourbon in cookie dough — present but transformed. Keep working until what you’ve stolen no longer belongs to anyone but you.
(Rework borrowed elements until they become uniquely yours.)Box yourself in. Freedom isn’t helpful when you’re stuck. Give yourself rules. Three chords. Black and white film. Six-word stories. The tighter the box, the more creative the escape. Houdini was never more impressive than when the chains seemed impossible.
(Constraints force creative solutions — limitations are catalysts, not obstacles.)Tip your hat. Don’t hide your influences. Celebrate them. Thanking the people you steal from isn’t just good karma — it’s how you find your people. Your fellow thieves. Your crew for the next heist.
(Acknowledge influences — it builds connections and shows respect.)
Takes What’s Yours — And Own It
This isn’t about plagiarism. That’s for hacks who need training wheels.
This is about having the guts to see something beautiful in the world— and say, “I need that. I’m taking it home. I’m going to live with it until it becomes part of me.”
Your voice isn’t something you find like a seashell on the beach. it’s a blade forged in the fire of every artist, thief, and rebel who ever shook the world before you.
Next time you’re stuck — when the words won’t come and the ideas seem tapped out — remember: you’re just one good heist away from breaking through. Look around at all the raw material just waiting for your hands. Take what speaks to you. Mix it with your own masterful recipe. Make something that could only exist because you of you.
Then, place it on a park bench, a note attached: “For the next tormented visionary questioning their life’s choices.”
Honestly, if we’re not plagiarizing, are we even trying? Or just lying to ourselves?
📝 A Brief Note:
These are just my observations, not universal truths. I share ideas that have worked for me — take what resonates, leave what doesn’t. As Bruce Lee 🐉said,
“Life is your Teacher and you are in the state of constant learning…
Absorb what is useful; discard what is not; add what is uniquely your own.”
