Category: DIY Art School

Avoiding the Task

So often, I find myself avoiding tasks I don’t want to do. Most often, this is dealing with emails. Sometimes it’s writing a story or doing the dishes. Whatever it is, I can find lots of excuses not to do it.

It’s so easy to be busy. I own more books than I could read, and I have enough art supplies to keep me busy for months. On the internet, there is an endless supply of interesting articles to read and instructional videos to watch.

And yet, there are things that really should be done first. If I don’t assign different levels of importance to the items in my to do list, there are things that won’t get done at all. Setting deadlines for important tasks helps too.

Once, when I was struggling with feeling anxious and overwhelmed, I went more than a week without checking my email or phone messages. I felt like I just couldn’t deal with it, and felt like I deserved a break from the things that were stressing me out. It seemed harmless.

When I finally checked my messages and emails, I found out that a close friend had been trying to contact me. Her father had a stroke, and she needed my help. I called her right away, but she didn’t need me any more.

I still feel guilty about that.

I learned that even though I don’t want to do something, that doesn’t mean that I can completely abandon the task. At least not for that long. And I can’t ignore both my phone messages and my emails at the same time. Ever.

There are compromises and work-arounds. Often I can talk my husband into listening to the phone messages. I can skim over the subject lines of the emails so that I can make a note of what I need to read later.

And what if I’m avoiding doing creative work? The consequences for avoiding that seem less severe. It’s not like I’ll miss an important message or have a mountain of dirty clothes or dishes to face later.

However, there are consequences. Not only would I get out of practice, I would be missing out on the mental and health benefits that come from doing art. And I would miss it terribly. As a result, I try to keep creative work as one of the more important things on my schedule.

So, when I find myself avoiding writing or drawing or painting, I do my best to find a work-around or compromise. I tell myself that it doesn’t have to be very good, it just has to get done. I tell myself I only need to finish part of it or it can be smaller or shorter than I originally planned. Bribing myself works too. It is continuing the journey that matters most to me right now, not trying to make the work I do perfect.

Do you sometimes find yourself avoiding creative work? What do you do to keep going? What is one thing that you refuse to skip?

A First Attempt at Visual Note Taking

Recently, I have started seeing examples of visual note taking all over. As someone who likes to take notes and loves to learn new things, I was immediately interested. With conference weekend last weekend, I finally had a great chance to practice.

Conference weekend was ideal, because there was lots to take notes on (ten hours of broadcasts), and I won’t really need my notes to remember the material. All of the talks will be available soon in multiple formats. Perfect!

I still took my regular notes alongside my visual notes. This was nice as I was able to look back at them for points I missed. This was not nice, because by the end of the weekend, my hand really, really hurt.

I learned a lot in this first attempt. First, visual notes are wonderful for review. They are fun to look back at, and really condense the talk into a few key points. In that respect, they are a bit like a comic journal versus a regular journal. I may never reread my conference notes once I have the written copy of the talks in hand. I will most likely look at my visual notes, if only to remember quickly who said what.

Second, it’s easy to take note of something just because it makes a great visual image and miss the main point of the talk. Also, some things that you want to emphasize aren’t easy to make visually appealing. I will have to study this some more and see what other people do.

Third, I watched the women’s session at the church where the lights were dim, so I took regular notes and completed the visual notes later instead of at the same time. I think those notes are probably the best representation of the talks. Creating visual notes that are really useful might best be done after hearing the entire talk, so that it is a good representation of the main points of the talk and what I really want to remember.

I will definitely repeat this experiment. I think that visual notes are a great way to focus on the main points of a talk or lecture and have the information available for easy reference later. It’s also a good method to review what I’ve learned and think about it carefully.

Have you ever taken visual notes? Do you have any advice? Do you have any recommendations of great examples of visual notes for me to study? Please let me know!

Mini Holidays

“Happy Friday,” I tell my kids as they leave for school on Fridays. “Have fun. I love you.”

A few weeks ago, we had tacos for dinner on a Sunday. “It’s Taco Tuesday on a Sunday,” I said. The kids rolled their eyes.

We celebrate Pi Day and Star Wars Day and Banana Split Day and three day weekends (“It’s Friday on a Thursday,” I say. “No it’s not,” they reply. “It’s Thursday on a Thursday.”)

Sometimes it’s good to have something to celebrate, even if that means eating tacos for dinner or wishing each other a Happy Friday. Big holidays are far apart, and they take so much work and planning and expense. While I try to carry the spirit of Christmas in my heart year-round, I don’t think I want a Christmas celebration every day.

Today is a holiday for my family. It’s a little bigger than a mini holiday, but smaller than Christmas. This is Conference Weekend. Twice a year, the prophet and leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints broadcast messages of guidance and hope centered in Christ.

A sketch from a picture of President Russell M. Nelson

We sit and watch for hours and hours, like a movie marathon. We sing songs and eat snacks and feel inspired and uplifted. It’s one of my favorite holidays. Little expense or preparation or clean-up, lots of joy.

“It’s Conference Weekend!” I’ve said over and over. It feels like Happy Friday, but better. I love little holidays. Simple pleasures.

Does your family celebrate any mini holidays? How do you celebrate? What other simple pleasures do you enjoy?

When It Isn’t Fun

Somebody recently made the comment that “if people aren’t having fun, they’ll stop showing up.” They were talking about Toastmasters, but I’ve been thinking about it in other contexts. What should I do when things aren’t fun?

Obviously, there’s a lot of life that isn’t going to be fun. Dishes, laundry, sweeping, mopping, and cleaning toilets aren’t fun jobs. No matter what Mary Poppins says, some days there just isn’t a game to make the job fun, and I still need to get it done anyway.

But what about the the things I do in the time when I’m not doing the have-to jobs? Learning a new skill can often be un-fun. Training my fingers to play scales on the piano was frustrating. Just five minutes of meditation seemed impossible at first (and still does on some days). It took me weeks to mix up a skin tone that looked like it belonged on a human and not a tree frog.

And now, after years of piano lessons and meditation and painting, I still am very much a beginner. I have a lot of bad days where things seem to be more mistakes than anything else. Mistakes aren’t really fun. So, why do I keep showing up?

I think that it’s a matter of expectations and intentions. If I was watching a television show for entertainment, and I was completely bored, I’d turn it off or watch something else. If I was watching a painting workshop to learn more about painting and the presenter was talking about mixing paints and it wasn’t really interesting to me, I’d continue to watch hoping to learn something new anyway.

I’m not painting or playing piano to entertain myself. I’m still learning, and I’m expecting mistakes as part of the learning process. I have hope that as I improve, there will be less mistakes and more times when things go well.

When things go well, or I get lost in the practice and lose track of time, that’s fun. Seeing improvement, that’s fun too. Finishing my practice for the day, knowing I didn’t skip a day, can be fun in its own way too, regardless of how well I did during practice.

In the past, when I had less time and more stress, I wasn’t consistent with what I did when I had time for not-have-to things. Not doing any art at all felt a lot worse than doing art poorly. Entertainment didn’t fill the need to create something.

There are sometimes days when I ask myself, “Why am I even doing this? I’ll never be as good as this or that professional artist. Why even try? I’m not having fun.”

And then I remember how it felt to not do any art. And I remember that I’m not doing art to have fun or to be famous or amazing or better than other artists. I’m doing art because I’m an artist and that’s what I do. I’m improving, I’m creating, and that is good enough.

Is art sometimes not fun for you? Why do you continue when something isn’t fun? Have you ever stopped showing up for your art? How did you feel?

Counting Down

I have six weeks or so left until my website anniversary. I like to try new things each year, to help myself grow. This year, I added another day of comics,

watercolor illustrations to my stories,

these blog posts,

and for six months I tried putting together a simple graphic novel.

The following six months, I added the Friday flashback posts. Last year, I added comics, a watercolor, and a continuing story that lasted all year.

It’s an exciting time for me. I love feeling like so many possibilities are open. I have a lot of ideas for next year. There are so many things to learn and practice and explore!

I hope that my readers have liked what I’ve chosen to do so far. I am so grateful for everyone who has been kind enough to give me some feedback. Thank you so much!

While I think I have a pretty good idea of what I want to try, I am willing to listen to suggestions. How can I improve? What should I keep doing? What do you not like as well? Is there anything you’d like to see that I’m not already doing?

What goals are you working on? How do you keep yourself accountable? Do you enjoy the planning and research leading up to goal setting?

Back to the Past

This is a time of year where I really feel aware of the passing of time. Back to school (where did the summer go?), the approaching holidays, and the shorter days all leave me feeling like time is moving too fast. I get nostalgic for time when days seemed simpler and longer.

So, here is a list of 15 things you can do when you miss your childhood. Please feel free to add to it.

  1. Watch a childhood favorite movie. If you happen to choose Tommy Tricker and the Stamp Traveller, then your childhood was especially awesome.
  2. Eat finger food for lunch. I like cheese cut into squares with crackers and grapes. Get crumbs all over.
  3. Read your favorite fairy tale. Act it out. You get bonus points if you wear a costume. Scarves and bathrobes count.
  4. Draw a picture of your imaginary friend. No one will know how accurate it looks except you. Make sure to give them a treat for holding so still for you while you were drawing. If they let you eat it, so much the better.
  5. Buy your own school supplies. You can get the fancy notebook and pencil case if you want. I won’t tell.
  6. Blanket fort. That is all.
  7. Read comic strips. Calvin and Hobbes is an excellent choice. Laugh out loud at the funny parts. Show someone else and make them read it too.
  8. Listen to the songs you used to dance to. Dance! If you feel like you look a little silly, then you’re doing it right.
  9. Call your mom, or someone else that makes you happy. Tell them all your favorite memories with them.
  10. Make a homemade card for someone. Construction paper and crayons would be my materials of choice for this one.
  11. Draw a picture of the food you hated in childhood. Crumple up the picture and stomp on it. If you want to burn it or tear it to bits, that’s good too.
  12. Go outside and blow bubbles. Chase them and try to catch them. Or pop them.
  13. Find a dandelion that’s gone to seed and blow the seeds away in one breath to make a wish. Or wish on a falling star. Or catch a leaf as it falls and make a wish. If all of these fail, light an unbirthday candle and make a wish as you blow it out. I’m sure it counts.
  14. Read in bed under the covers with a flashlight. It doesn’t matter if it’s the middle of the day.
  15. Give all of your loved ones who live close a hug and tell them you love them.

Do you feel nostalgic this time of year? What do you miss from your childhood? Do you have anything to add to my list?