Today’s human being has become deeply enslaved to others’ opinions and praise. When someone writes a poem or creates anything, they measure its worth based on whether others like it or not. They are not satisfied with their art until a big publisher publishes it or it starts selling well.

I want to ask such people—Is your conscience not the greatest judge to decide whether your art is good or not? Isn’t it enough for you that your own soul appreciates your art?

If you are truly a free being, you will judge your art through your own inner voice. Otherwise, no matter how much praise you receive or how much success you achieve, you will remain a slave.

Today, the world is full of such slaves—people who write only to please others, who become puppets in the hands of editors and twist their thoughts according to others’ convenience.

They may gain material success, but they will never attain the spiritual freedom or inner greatness that thinkers like Baruch Spinoza, Socrates, and Henry David Thoreau attained.

“Every artist must face this dilemma—will they sell their voice, or will they turn it into a sword of truth and write only what their soul tells them?”

I do not know about others, but I will never sell my soul or my voice.