I talk about art, design, and creativity
For freelancers, social media isn’t about showing off what you can do and letting people know about all your accomplishments to boost your own sense of self worth.
Instead, social media is a place for creators to show value and teach/entertain/perform/inspire their audience.
When you do the latter enough times, people will intentionally look for you to solve their problems.
The key to keeping a blog isn’t dependent on the host you use, how much you spend on your website plan, or even the amount of expertise you have in your field.
The key to keeping a blog is being the type of person who keeps blogs.
That means you write and publish things frequently.
It means you show up with an idea and you make it come to life.
If you want to start a blog, become the type of person who keeps blogs.
Normalize years in the making.
Not overnight success.
I’m 25 now but I started drawing religiously since I was 9.
When I posted my art on Instagram last week, the comments said I was talented.
I don’t see it that way.
It took me 16 years and a lot of ugly sketches to get to that level of “talent”
I’d imagine the process will be the same for you and whatever your thing is.
I’d imagine your hard earned success to have taken a lot of grit and time and effort.
So if you’re just starting out, please be patient and continue to put in the work.
It’s always a good time to work on something meaningful.
And if your startup is important enough to somebody else, the answer will always be yes.
You are your biggest critic.
Go figure.
And so?
If you want to flip the script, read on.
We have 2 choices.
1. We stay being the critic of our own lives, robbing ourselves of any self-kindness we could offer
Or,
2. We can learn to be our own biggest fans. Learn how to be okay with our shortcomings, be aware of our strengths and weaknesses, and offer ourselves words of encouragement every now and then
Let’s be real.
Living a life through criticism is hard.
Learning to flip the script and choose the latter option is also hard.
But when you are in your 20’s and see 70+ years ahead of you, becoming your own biggest fan suddenly seems like a no-brainer.
It’s not uncommon to hear creatives talk smack about their own work.
“It’s so ugly”
“I hate it”
“It’s not that good”
Sound familiar?
While that is the mindset norm for many designers and artists, tormenting yourself and your own work isn’t the healthiest way to succeed as a creative.
I admit, I used to tell myself all these things too.
“I suck at this”
“This looks so bad”
“Everyone’s going to hate it”
But one day, I realized I was actually making myself feel bad for trying something I had interest in.
In fact, I realized that negative voice in my head was actually the opinions from someone else who had previously made me feel insecure about my own work.
Here’s how I flipped my script.
I asked myself 3 simple questions:
For example,
By asking these 3 simple questions, we slow down our thinking process and dissect what is truly going on.
Try this out every day for 15 minutes and you’ll start to change the way you think too.
I love writing content and marketing
I love it so much that I wonder, why didn’t I start earlier?
And that’s the magic question.
I couldn’t have started earlier, because I didn’t know I loved it till I tried.
And that goes for every 20-something year old reading this.
There’s so much more out there in the world—more than you could ever imagine.
Try new things. Experiment.
Have fun.
Get out of your rut.
Look for inspiration elsewhere.
Go for a walk.
Cut out your phone.
Sure these things can help, but for how much longer are you going to look at inspo for?
How many walks do I really want to take? (Sorry mom).
And my phone. The very tool I need to use on a constant basis. Isn’t there a way to do great creative work while being self-disciplined enough to cut out distraction enough of the time?
My personal solution to get out of creative ruts is to make unperfect work.
(Yes, I know the opposite of perfect is spelled ‘imperfect’ but perfect spelling is besides the point. Unperfect is just that. Unperfect. Let that little red squiggly spellcheck indicator do it’s thing)
Unperfect yourself and stop falling for the promise of “if it’s not perfect, it won’t be any good.”
Get out of your rut.
I was on lunch at the restaurant when a customer of ours came by to chat. He told me an interesting story of a man who used to sell egg waffles by a local plaza.
He told me that this man’s egg waffles were the best he’s ever had, even across several countries, and they used to be right in our city.
They must have been really good. So good, that someone offered to pay $50,000 for the recipe when he retired.
Cool. But instead of selling his recipe and sharing it with the people around him, he chose to keep the recipe to himself (apparently it’s going with him to the grave with nobody in his family picking the craft up).
I’ll never get to try those incredible egg waffles. Neither will 99.99% of people in Toronto.
Why? Because this artist was unwilling to share his art. It’s not right nor wrong to hoard what we have, but great ideas with lots of potential die because we don’t allow them to live beyond just ourselves.
As a kid I used to attend Tae Kwon Do classes with my brother. Every once in a while, there would be a huge test for all students in the academy. If you wanted to advance to the next coloured belt, you had to pass the test.
Of course, since the school was also a business, it was in the master’s best interest to advance as many students as possible to keep them paying for classes.
Everyone would be in the same room on test day. If you didn’t put in enough time and effort into training, it would show in your form and everybody could see it. The same goes true for everything else we do as designers. Sure, we can earn a designer’s title when we go through design school. However, that doesn’t mean all designers produce work at the same quality. It doesn’t mean that all designers share the same level of skill and passion either.
Just because you hold a title for something prestigious or in-demand, you might fool a few people. But once you begin to show your work and how you move, that’s when bad players lose the game.
Anna's Blog 