Below you’ll find seven amazing things that Amanda Palmer said during her keynote at The Muse and The Marketplace Conference in 2013. Want to see these moments for yourself? Check out the timestamps of each nugget of inspiration and watch below!

1) “The formats are infinite. If you’re using words to connect the dots, you’re a writer.” (3:49)

2) “Where does validation come from? Who used to do it and who does it now? And maybe, does it have to come from above or can it come from each other?” (5:11)

3) “Finding your people, your listeners, your readers, and making art for and with them, and not for the masses, not for the marketplace, not for the critics, but for your hopefully ever-widening circle of friends.” (12:16)

4) “I asked, ‘What makes you feel like an actual writer?’ and I looked for themes. Some people said when I first got published, when I got my first review, but the biggest theme that I saw was people saying, ‘When somebody told me that my writing moved them.'” (15:30)

5) “To erase the possibility of empathy is to erase the act of making art.” (21:03)

6) “We can only write about what we see, and we can only connect the dots that we collect, which makes everything you write about you.” (24:14)

7) “Because anything you change in any format, anything you write in any format, can change somebody, can change an opinion, can scratch an opening in a scarred-up heart of a human being, and it doesn’t matter how you do it. If your writing is good, if it resonates, if it connects the dots for anyone out there, the lovers will come, the haters will come, the support will come, and it balances.” (30:57)