Starting off as an artist or as a creative in general can be very hard. I myself still feel as though I'm starting off and I have already completed my study at college, have a full-time job, worked on different projects and have checked off many things that I had wished to do when I first arrived at my college university. There's a lot of uncertainty when it comes to your work. I remember when I first started out, I originally wanted to be an animator in college, all I had known at that point in time was that I liked to draw, I liked making little doodles and illustrations that made friends laugh or I thought were cool. But I wanted to, or maybe just felt that I needed to, create something bigger than myself. I had a lot of conflicting ideas.
I didn't think that on the scale of what I had been doing, making doodles or short clips, was really something that was "worth time" even though it had made me happy, I didn't feel like it lived up to expectations, that there was always some other thing that I should be doing instead in order to further my career or goals. I think that's one of the things that I struggle with a lot.
Eventually these doodles didn't become good enough in my eyes, I really just
stopped showing them to friends, even though I had encouragement from my teachers and colleagues I still didn't feel like I was living up to what they had said previously about my work. I wanted to create, but I didn't feel confident in what I was creating. I constantly compared myself to others that I looked up to and the work that they were producing not really thinking at just how long they had actually been working for. I entered into the most frustrating of dances with social media. I'd get things that I'd be sure I wanted to share and then make a billion drafts only to never post any of my work at all. I still do that, but I'm think I'm getting better.
My wonderful girlfriend had loaned me a book by Austin Kleon called, "Show You Work!" probably over a year ago (don't worry Gillian you will be getting this back I promise) and I just now have finally been able to open it and read through its pages. It has really been relieving to read, and now I think this book, or at least the ideas within it, need to be heard by any creative at least once in their life and highly recommend reading it for yourself. In the book Austin Kleon goes over different approaches that you should have and as the title shows, pushes you into actually sharing your work!!! I feel like it really helps for beginning artists, especially if you've been in a similar boat as me and have been probably a little too hypercritical of your work.
Key takeaways from this book for me were that there is always a balance you need to have between making art and sharing it. There are always things that you can share, whether it's the artists that inspire you, the process behind your work and the things that you are actually working daily. You should also always document what you are doing because it is insanely helpful, at least to me, for keeping track of all the thoughts that you have throughout the days. Just remember, it doesn't need to be perfect, but it is something that is worth being shown.
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