familiarity breeds contempt

That's a phrase that has been around awhile, the first recorded expression of it being Chaucer's Tale of Melibee in 1386.  It's usually used to explain why we like people less the more we get to know them.  I experience something like that in my creative pursuits. The more I work at honing the skills I'm trying to acquire the more mundane and crude they seem.  Here's an example: Since I retired I'm learning to cook, and although Dorothy likes the dinners I serve her, I never really know when to quit.  I usually go by a recipe, but  I like to make my own sauces.  When I make spaghetti sauce I add all the spices and then make adjustments while it simmers. Sometimes I think it needs more oregano, or maybe some basil. I keep tasting and adjusting until it tastes like spaghetti sauce.  Dorothy says she likes to eat other people's cooking, and I always wondered why since she is an excellent cook. Now I understand.  When you're too close to the process it's difficult to enjoy the result.  I have the same problem in the landscapes I paint. I never know when I'm done. I keep applying paint until I think the painting just can't accept any more. In my efforts to get a balanced composition, correct light and shade, hue, and perspective I lose the ability to appreciate the final result. It's impossible  to look at it with a fresh eye, to be surprised or delighted by the first sight of it like I am when I go to a gallery and view the works of others. I'm also learning to play the piano. I use online tutorials. It's really a monkey see monkey do enterprise.  I learn each part of a song, the left hand chords, the right hand melody, the riffs and base lines that give style to a musical piece, then  put it all together.  I takes lots of practice. By the time I can play a song proficiently it sounds mechanical to my ear.  I haven't played much in public so it remains to be seen if I am able to maintain a song's integrity and yet lend to it my own style.

So I wonder if chefs, artists, and musicians actually see the art in their own creations or if they depend on the feedback of others.  Some creative people have problems with depression and maybe this is why.