Welcome to Art Confidence: Your Six Week Boost Week 3. Below you will find all of the information for week three.
Week 3 Changing Habits Changing States of Mind
Last week we looked at how the words others use about our art can have a positive impact on our confidence. This week we are going to focus on our habits and how they impact our work.
Sometimes without fully realising we can get locked into a way of thinking and experiencing, or we find that a particular mood is difficult to shift and that gets in the way of our creativity and art practice. What can be useful to our artistic practice is to develop our skill in noticing when particular states of mind or practice that are not serving us are becoming habitual so that we can change them if it is beneficial to do so.
What can we do if we have realised that we may have established an unhelpful habit or mindset?
One way to change a habit is quite simply to do something completely different. This may sound obvious and simple, but some habits can be deeply ingrained and may take some shifting. Change can also feel risky as we may be taking ourselves out of our comfort zone. What I have found can be useful is to begin a change with something that is low risk, to acclimatise ourselves with the experience of making change. So this might be something as simple as having a different choice of drink in the morning with breakfast. Then build up to more challenging changes with a greater risk associated with them.
A similar process applies to changing our mood. The action of doing something different to break out of an unhelpful mindset is a very useful one for artists as it can help us when we find ourselves in a place where we are being critical of our work or getting stuck. Another simple example would be I find myself feeling bored in the mornings taking my dogs on their morning walk. I will choose a different route I’ve not done for a while and I always find that I experience the walk differently. I’m always struck by how such a simple thing can bring a different experience and change in mood. So when you are locked into an unhelpful place with a piece of creative work doing something as simple as taking walk around the block can make a tremendous difference in your energy.
Task 3
With this in mind, this week’s task is to change things up a little. Here are some simple examples you might like to try as you set on this experiment.
You could go outside for a few days. Meet up with a fellow artist and share studio space for a day or so. Completely rearrange your working space to give it a new feel or use some unfamiliar working materials. Often when we give ourselves a new experience the old patterns of thinking can be disturbed and shift. I have only made a couple of suggestions. You may want to take some to think about what will serve you in this week’s task. You might like to start with something small and build up to the larger more significant habit or mindset that you want to shift.
As you do this see what you notice. Is this an easier experience for you? Do you feel liberated if so in what way? How can you recreate this in your usual approach? Play with this idea for yourself and experiment with changing some of the things you do that you recognise as habitual.
Your Question/Task for the Art Boost Bonanza Prize this Week
Tell me about one of the ways you made a change and what you noticed as a result. As I’ll be looking out for the most creative or impactful change it doesn’t have to be something life-changing! It can be a small but significant change.
The Boost Bonanza Prize for this week is a free one-to-one hour with me to discuss techniques, mindset, art practice process, and the business of art. In fact, anything relating to your art. If you haven’t posted your answer yet, do drop into the Facebook group it would be great to have you join us.
As in the previous two weeks, you will find the question for this week live from Friday in the Facebook group search #artconfidenceweek3.
And again I will be live on Friday afternoon with my regular weekly spot Art to End the Week where I will review the week and chat about this week’s task.
Do let me know how you get on and if you have questions you can drop me a message through the website, hit reply to this email or post your query in the free Facebook group Art Fluency Community.