Everyone starts by copying. Originality is what shows up in the parts you couldn’t copy right.

Imitation is the normal entry point to any craft, and nobody arrives with a voice already formed. What makes your work yours is the accumulation of places where your hand and your limitations refused to reproduce the model exactly. Style is the residue of failed copying.

Copy something you admire closely and on purpose, then look hard at where your version diverged. Keep the divergences that felt like you rather than like mistakes. Doing that ten times will teach you more about your own direction than any amount of trying to be original.