Lately, writing and drawing have been at the forefront of my goals. However actually getting myself to sit down and write out my next novel or learn a new coloring technique on my drawing tablet has proven to be far more difficult than I expected. I figured there must be a problem with how I’m approaching this as time was never an issue. There have been so many days where I’d spend hours wasted on YouTube queuing video after video. While some of those videos have been helpful (digital art tutorials mostly) I’ve found myself in the trap of watching and studying more than actually practicing.
I realized that the issue was with my own motivation to improve my writing and digital art. My productivity in terms of being creative only came from days I felt inspired and motivated to create something, to learn something new. At first I thought I needed to figure out how to force myself to feel more inspired to better myself, but then I stumbled on a video post by Burnie Burns of Rooster Teeth regarding motivation:
The video got me thinking about how discipline really does produce more results in comparison to motivation. I’ve been trying that for the past few weeks, forcing myself to sit down and just write, draw, color or brainstorm as opposed to waiting to feel the motivation I felt was required.
And then something amazing happened.
As I wrote more, drew more or colored more, I found myself creating that motivation myself rather than waiting for it to happen. More and more ideas and plot lines formed in my mind. The simple act of forcing myself to write helped to spur my creativity and further the progress on my novels. It feels like I’ve made more progress in the past 3 weeks than I have in the past year after having forced myself to get work done.
I highly recommend watching the video for anyone else struggling to make progress on anything, not just personal projects.
– Raphael
Raph's Cozy Musings 