We recently connected with Zach Knapp and have shared our conversation below.

Zach, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What do you think it takes to be successful?

[[[ Normally I would put myself in the Visual Arts/Performing Arts category, but I liked this question better, ;) ]]]

Being successful is relatively simple, though certainly not easy. This is just my opinion, but many other people smarter and more successful than me have had similar things to say. This also assumes your definition of success is based on some kind of achievement or growth-oriented experience. 3 steps…

1) Find your fun. This is imperative. Maybe you don’t resonate with the word “fun,” but whatever you call it, it is vital. Passionate about; compelled by; resonate with; understand; enjoy; find purpose/meaning in; get turned on by, etc. Once you find this, nurture it and explore it and dissect it like a mad scientist trying to take over the world.

2) Consistency – Persistency – Insistency.

Consistency – just show up for the thing. Every day. It is 100% true and accurate that anything that anybody ever did well, was because they did it consistently, and probably not so well for a long time before hand. Human beings are born with the built-in capacity to POTENTIALLY do anything – walk, talk, ride a bike, solve quadratic formulas and invent peanut butter. These are all complex, multi-layered skills that required consistent effort to achieve.

Persistency – If consistency is just doing a thing with regularity, persistency is showing up and doing a thing with tenacity. You remain consistent, no matter how uncomfortable, painful, frightening or uncertain things feel. Everybody has a super power and it is connected with where you find your fun. Your super power is being able to keep doing that thing, when 99% of everyone else would give up out of boredom, frustration, or pain; but for you the enjoyment of it greatly diminishes much of the resistance you would otherwise feel.

Insistency – This is the belief that through your consistent, and persistent effort, you will inevitably reach your desired outcome, and find the success you are seeking. The idea of “manifestation” as the psychic ability to mentally create and acquire whatever you wish is patently absurd. HOWEVER, much like the placebo effect, the power of positive self-delusion is a documented scientific fact; if you have already made up your mind that you ARE going to get what you seek, you are much less likely to give up, you will be able to maintain consistency better, and you will start to frame every experience as another possible opportunity and open door towards you destination.

3) So you’ve found your fun and consistently showed up for it. Let’s call it (x), whatever that is for you. You’ve gained considerable skill and understanding about (x). This is also the pivotal moment when how you’ve defined succses for yourself is going to guide what your actions are at this point.

Now what?

You’ve got to connect with other people and forget for just a moment your personal, hyper-focused perspective about (x), and all the challenges and setbacks you’ve been enveloped in on your way there.

Try to answer this question, or better yet, ask someone else: “Why would anyone care about (x) and how I’m doing it? What is appealling/desirable/exciting/special about (x) to anyone else?” How is it experienced ‘on the other side’ so to speak. This isn’t supposed to be some kind of self-deprecating exercise – how do you turn (x), which was important to you, into something of value to someone else? Often times this question is organically answered at some point during the process of learning and trying new things, and some kinds of (x) lend themselves to a more direct or clear route from a personal experience to something of social value.

Don’t depair! Despite how esoteric, specific, niche, or downright strange your (x) is, if you’ve found satisfaction and meaning in striving towards it, then this all the evidence you need that there is a massive artery connecting the way you care about (x) to the way many other people care, or can care, about (x).

Zach, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Who Is Birthday Cake?

I am a visual artist and creative problem solver. I focus mainly on painting, illustration and design, but I am currently expanding more into animation, motion graphics, VFX and 3D.

There is a story I have in my head that I will get to creating someday soon, and the main protagonists go by the moniker Birthday Cake. That is the short answer about where my handle/pseudonym stems from but to delve a little deeper into the flavor…

I create images and visuals meant to inspire and take people out of the ordinary into new experiences. Put another way, I aim to reawaken people to the truth that everything, everywhere, always is the Big Bang happening right now in the present moment. We forget because our senses filter out most of the activity around us and we are habituated to see the world through the small pinhole of our senses. Ultimately I want my work to make the mundane and repetitive seem vibrant and unique again. WhoIsBirthdayCake is the paradoxical acknowledgement that we live in a universe of cycles, repeating patterns, and regularity, while simultaneously being a place of unique, individual moments, infinite complexity, and unbounded possibility.

Grammatically and conceptually it seems to be slightly nonsensical, and intentionally so, to hopefully jar people into a different headspace when they say it. By asking WHO rather than WHAT, I want people to be conscious of the subjective, perceptual experience we all have, and the unique privilege we have as conscious, active agents in constantly and intentionally creating the way the world is.

The experience I want to create is as if everyday is a birthday celebration – a celebration of existence, with full knowledge of our mortality, and to experience life fully and as unfiltered as possible, all the way, with full conscious involvement and engagement.

I think that is where my strengths and purpose lie as an artist – many people create amazing images and visuals, but so much of it hits the eyeball and the experience ends there. I want people to FEEL what they see, those images to reflect on them, and create meaning beyond mere attention grabbing. I believe this is what sets my professional work apart from many others.

To continue to get more literal and pragmatic: I have, and continue to do work in the visual arts industry for every conceivable function that visuals are required or desired, including but not limited to: print and digital illustration, graphic design, fine art, infographics, concept art, schematics, video games, motion design, set painting and design, murals, animation and apparel.

I guess the name WhoIsBirthdayCake is really me asking YOU, who am I? What are your searching for? Where do you find meaning? What would you like to see? What do you imagine is possible, and how can we create it together?

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

I’m not sure this is necessarily resilience, reckless coping, or a bit of both, but my life changed very drastically a few years ago, during COVID, like so many others. I didn’t always believe in the definition of success I gave earlier – I was lost, and it all seemed like luck and secret sauces and resources I would never have.

In 2019 I was finally starting to get my head above the waters of depression and listlessness I had been feeling for almost a decade. My art career was only part-time, and in truth, hadn’t been a legitimate endeavor for me for most of that time.

In March of 2020 I lost my full-time job as Chicago came to a screeching halt. In April, my father passed away. Shortly after, painfully realizing we no longer shared common goals and values, my long-term romantic relationship was over.

Most of 2021 I spent with my brother actualizing a desire I had for a long time – he helped me outfit an ambulance into an RV, complete with solar panels, water tanks, futon and refrigeration – so I could travel and live as meanly as possible. In the fall, I got rid of most of my belongings and I left Connecticut and spent the next 9 months traveling and living in a van on my way across the country, finding myself in Arizona by the time my engine broke down.

I ate more consistently and healthily; I went to the gym 3-5 times a week to shower and work out and felt more physically fit than ever; I read books and woke up with the sunrise; I enrolled in an art mentorship and completed more freelance work in that 9 months than in the previous 10 years; I met amazing people and learned about places I never would have seen otherwise. It was truly life-changing and that was the goal.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying this to brag. I would have much rather had a life I was enjoying and proud of than one that I felt I needed to escape somehow and start fresh from. Clearly it isn’t true that everyone who is having difficulty should drop their lives and live in a car, or would want to, or that it would necessarily help at all. I was still dealing with depression and now my recent break-up, and it was extremely lonely virtually the entire time. It was an amazing privilege to have an opportunity to do something like that, and the resources and space to execute it. But for me, it was exactly what I needed. I needed to change the way I saw myself, and the way I treated myself and others, get a fresh perspective on what my life could be, and find some control and power over my environment and my actions. It isn’t the only way I could have accomplished such an endeavor, but it’s the method I chose, and it worked.

My experiences don’t necessarily translate directly to what anyone else is going through, or how they should handle it. But if there is a moral to the story here that the average person could walk away with, I think it is this: We are only ever capable of what we let ourselves be, and sometimes the only way through a challenge is more challenge, but the key ingredient being agency and a sense of purpose.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

I think the thing I enjoy most about being a creative is the experience of getting out what I put in, and seeing it right in front of my face. My work is not subsumed into a shapeless list of deliverables of which I will never really see the direct benefit. Even during group projects and collaborations, I still can feel and see that the thing wouldn’t exist without my input. I enjoy personal accountability, and being a freelance creative is about as direct as it gets. If I fail or succeed, there are only a handful of variables I need to examine to redress or recreate the results.

I also get excited about a lot of different things and like following an idea into unfamiliar territory and experiences. If I want to pivot my business or practice into something new, I do it. Most organizations consisting of a few people or more don’t really enjoy or exercise this privilege, and it can mean the stagnation and death of an enterprise.

Contact Info:

• Website: zachknapp.net
• Instagram: instagram.com/whoisbirthdaycake
• Youtube: youtube.com/@whoisbirthdaycake