Daily Inspiration Quote by Agnes de Mille

De Mille’s line treats creativity less like a gift and more like an infestation: a “demon” that doesn’t politely clock out when the show ends. Coming from a dancer and choreographer, that metaphor lands with muscle memory. Dance is an art where the body tattles instantly; there’s no hiding behind a clever footnote or a rewritten paragraph. If the work is “second rate,” it shows up as wobble, hesitation, a beat missed. The demon is the inner critic, but it’s also the internal engine that keeps you drilling the same phrase until it stops being “good enough” and becomes inevitable.

The specific intent is disciplinary, almost parental: stop romanticizing inspiration and start respecting the compulsion that follows it. De Mille isn’t praising suffering for its own sake; she’s naming the bargain artists often make with their own standards. You don’t choose the intensity, you choose whether to meet it with craft or with excuses. “Will not accept” makes the urge sound non-negotiable, as if mediocrity is an insult the psyche refuses to live with.

The subtext is sharper: settling isn’t just a professional failure, it’s a kind of self-betrayal. In the mid-century world de Mille worked in, with ballet and Broadway demanding polish while undervaluing the labor (especially from women), the quote reads like a covert manifesto. Ambition, reframed as necessity. Not ego, but survival: if the demon is in you, you either feed it quality or it feeds on you.