The article is from Lesley Riley, The Artist Success Expert, is the creative founder of Artist Success, Solutions for the Struggling Artist. I like Lesley’s casual way of speaking. Hope you enjoy.
What I Wish I’d Known Then
How many times have you said, “I wish I’d known then what I know now?” I say it (to myself) a lot, because I feel that I wasted half a lifetime waiting until I knew more before I took any action. I wanted to know everything there was to know so that I would save time and save face by doing it right the first time.
Turns out there is only one thing that I know now that I needed to know back then – you find the know-how you are seeking purely by taking action. Really. It is just that simple. In fact, it’s so simple we disregard it.
And here’s the golden nugget, an even greater bit of wisdom that I have acquired – when something comes easy to you, when it feels very natural to you, you try to complicate things by thinking that it should be harder than it is or that you’re missing something because, well, it can’t really be that easy, can it?
Yes it can.
Let’s take making art for example. It comes naturally. God forbid a toddler should get her hands on a mark-making device because, turn your back and, before you know it, her mark will be on every surface below 36 inches. We call it scribbling – this joy in making marks. It’s innate. It doesn’t have to mean anything, it doesn’t have to be good, it just has to be.
But what’s the first thing we hear in the midst of all this happy mark making?
“No!”
For sanity’s sake, our mothers, and later our teachers, reign us in and allow us to create only at the appropriate time on the appropriate surface in the appropriate location. What came naturally and easily now has rules. Add in several years of school and another innate need, to compare ourselves to others, and what came so free and easily to us gets tied and bound in rules, self-doubt and the need to know more. For many, most probably, the joy of mark-making never surfaces again.
If you are reading this most likely you have found the courage to make your mark again. Congratulations brave soul! But I’m also guessing that all that baggage tied to mark making is still attached. Perhaps you have even turned into your mother, allowing your self-expression only at the appropriate time on the appropriate surface in the appropriate location.
I don’t know about you, but I look longingly at photos of painters studios and breathe in the air of freedom that exists in these spaces. There’s paint on the floor, paint on their pants, paint in their hair and on doorknobs and chairs. That’s the ultimate in mark-making in my book. They are the mistresses of their spaces. It is a kingdom where mark-making reigns, where it is as natural and free as that day they took that first crayon in hand. For them it is still that simple.
Somewhere in between is the space you and I reserve for making our mark – be it on the kitchen table, bed or in dedicated studio space. The physical space, yes, but also the mental space. Where are you? Are you still in your head trying to think the art? What more do you need to know?
I had a conversation with one of my private coaching clients this morning. In our last call, I advised her to just play, to create, with no agenda in mind – no need to be perfect or saleable, clean or neat – and most importantly to not over think.
“It’s amazing what I can accomplish when I get out of my own way,” she said to me today. It doesn’t yet happen for her every time, but she’s had a taste of the child again and she knows she can get back to that sweet spot. Not by thinking about it, by reading more or by taking another class, but by doing. Spontaneous, joyful mark-making for no reason.
Add that to her years of experience and all of the other beneficial rules of art making that she has accumulated, and before she knows it, she’ll find her way to the sweet spot again and will create what she’s been looking for all along – making her mark on the world.
Here’s a playful exercise to help get you to that point:
The Sweet Spot
Materials:
Box of crayons
Piece of newspaper
1 sheet of copy paper (scrap is OK)
Scissors
1. Open the newspaper to its largest size.
2. Open the box of crayons. Smell them. Remember your first box.
3. Scribble all over the paper. Change colors or use one color. You’re in charge. Do this for a full minute or more.
4. Take your sheet of paper and cut 2 large Ls to make a viewfinder (see photo).
5. Using your viewfinder, find a nice little composition on your scribble page. This is your sweet spot. It’s OK to slide the Ls to enlarge or decrease your view until you find it. When you find it, trace it and cut it out.
6. Now click here to find the lesson in all of this.
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Lesley Riley, The Artist Success Expert, is the creative founder of Artist Success, Solutions for the Struggling Artist. To receive her bi-weekly articles on creating your own success as an artist, visit www.ArtistSuccess.com.
