Number one has sketched selfies, the second one shows my sketches of celebs, the third one has portraits of my friends and the fourth one is about illustrating for a style-blog.
Today I show you: Doodling. Fantasy. Freestyle.
I find it not easy to get rid of my inner censor. It’s really hard to free myself from rules and concepts about “what is a good drawing” and from self-criticism. It’s a struggle to stop sketching with a judging audience in my head. Which is ridiculous, of course. After all, I am just sketching for myself, right?
I know that I’m not alone in this and that in fact most people are bothered by these kind of restricting thoughts.
One of the reasons that e.g. the book The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron is such a hit amongst the creatives.
I am sure it has tons of good stuff, but it is not the book for me. The tone bugs and annoys me.
There are other books, tools and advices that work better for me. Like e.g. An Illustrated Life: Drawing Inspiration from the Private Sketchbooks of Artists, Illustrators and Designers.
At the moment I am trying to ‘liberate’ myself by ‘sketching away’ without thinking, without a plan, without an expectation. Sketching as if no one will ever see the result but me, so who cares….catch my drift?
I have to admit: it’s not easy. The internal critic pops up again and again. I just try to ‘let that voice go’ as many times as it appears;-).
I must say that Paper53 helps a lot with this process, because of it’s digital nature. It’s easy to start over or to erase. You don’t waste any paper or other material, it does not cost you a penny. So what do you have to loose but your time and energy? Excactly!
I am not there yet, but I am happy with the process. Paper53 makes sketching light, fun and liberating!
Are you familiar with an internalized critic that bugs you while creating something? (Wether it is while sketching, writing a book or blogpost or whatever creative process.)
How do you deal with these restricting thoughts and ideas? How do you stay authentic, true to yourself and how do you enable yourself to use your full potential? Any tips to share?
You can really see you were just having fun here. The enthusiasm comes through. I love the one of Tin Tin aging! LOL Also your use of colour is fantastic. So joyful.
I find my internal critic is worse once I look at someone else’s work. Funny enough I had a dream last night that I was in art class and trying to replicate a painting and really felt inadequate that I wouldn’t be able to do it properly. I had so much anxiety over it. This may go back to when I had been out of school for quite some time and decided that maybe I wanted to try to go back to school and get a fine art degree. I tried to get into the University of Victoria’s art program by submitting works I’d done over the years. I was turned down. That was devastating for me. Just devastating since I had been enrolled in a fine art program when I was fresh out of high school. Of course I didn’t need to show my work at that time to get accepted. Maybe I haven’t gotten over that failure. I’m not sure.
I do know that once I start comparing my work with anyone else’s that I lose the joy I found when creating it. If I create from my heart, and only for myself, without looking and comparing my work, then I am happiest. It is hard to do that though. Especially online.
I empathize with you. It is hard to retain the creative drive when you don’t feel you are good enough.
bisous
Suzanne
Comparisons are indeed very tricky things! In general and also in this context. I know.
I can imagine how devastating that must have been. And too bad too…. Are you still sad about it, or do you feel more that your life and creativity went their brilliant ways anyway and despite of that rejection?