Pressure to be a success

Last week was the week of the big Lance Armstrong interview with Oprah. I only want to say that is didn't have any surprises, but the sublayer was interesting. With that I mean, how he said things and which thing he didn't say. He hasn't come fully clean, specially on the involvement of others in the cycling world.
Anyway, I wrote a blogpost about cycling and banking. Funnily, a lot of cycling teams have been sponsored by banks in the past. The biggest were Banesto and Rabobank. Both gone. A Dutch journalist wrote an excellent piece about Rabobank cycling team (in Dutch):

http://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2013/01/21/teruglezen-een-ploeg-als-zovele-over-gebruik-doping-bij-raboploeg/

One of the interesting bits is the development of the pressure to perform. Fuelled by a bonus culture, status and a strong negative impact when not having success. These things will always lead to freaky situations. The opposite extremity is total freedom and being mildly rewarded whatever you do. Strangely both can lead to special results, negative or positive and gives an insight how to motivate people or yourself.

I find this particularly interesting because they say that really special art will be created in the most difficult situations and I wonder whether that is triggered by pressure to perform or total freedom. What creates this freaky situation where we can do special things?
One of the examples is the people behind the bands that defined the music industry in the UK in the 80's. Was this a sense of freedom, finding out that their future would be crap and they might as well make something special without thinking about earning anything?

The reason I started making sculptures is partly caused by not being able to get a proper job, but I wasn't completely hopeless in finding a job. I could have done that. I didn't have the 'nothing to loose' mentality. Well, didn't have a regular salary to loose anyway, but I am sure I could have been able to find a reasonable full time job. This last bit puts more pressure to perform, because I am weighing this adventure against a boring life in an office with a lot more pay. Now I have....uhh had... a job with even less responsibility so my mind is more free to create sculptures. I would love to ditch those type of jobs too, but that would again be pressure to make great artwork.
How do I keep the freedom to make challenging art that has a big risk of not being liked, not sold, with a small chance of it to become a success? Difficult. For real freedom to create new stuff you need to feel as if you have all the time and money in the world. To realising them you need a bit of pressure. I  don't have the time and money, just the pressure. From time to time I try not to think about it and just make the weird stuff.
I find it hard to not go mainstream sometimes and this is often triggered by seeing less challenging art that sells a lot better. Yes, it makes me jealous and sometimes frustrated. It almost feels like you have to show, show and show your weirder work to your potential audience for them to get used to it in order for them to eventually buying a sculpture.

People have always said I have a lot of patience, well I am seriously putting it to the test!

.....is there EPO for artists?