How do you deepen your practice (skills)?
I have to tell ya, I’m a gal who loves the idea and results of a daily practice. The actual practice (of the daily practice) can be challenging. I’m a bit like Goldilocks and the 3 Bears… finding just the right combination of excitement, simplicity of engagement, and ease of achievement is critical for me.
Lately, I’ve been delighted to gain skills in a new drawing style that has checked all three boxes—or to be a bit more imaginative, it’s the right recipe/combination of elements. I have been drawing Tiny People.
- I’m excited to make more tiny people every day.
- All I need is my sketchbook, marker, and subjects.
- It’s fast!
I learned of Nishant Jain’s very special style of drawing people from a colleague in the graphic memoir course I am taking through Sequential Artists Workshop. As soon as I saw them I was smitten!
Over the past year, I’ve learned Sashiko, (literally, “little stabs,” is a form of decorative reinforcement stitching/functional embroidery from Japan). It too has all the ingredients I desire:
- Simple materials, “portable”
- Easy to start and put aside when needed
- Immediate results
and, of course, each of these practices is practically daily. I’m creating conscious, consistent practices to fine-tune and burnish my skills.
What about you?
How do you deepen in your practice—
whether it’s drawing, painting, meditation, a sport, a process or …?
Honestly, I’ve also had a few epic fails, well, that would be a bit of an overstatement, perhaps just learning opportunities. I have started projects that I thought were the right mix of elements to discover that I was incorrect. At the beginning of the year, I started doing a stitching journal, which I believed would require perhaps 15 or 20 minutes of my time daily—for a year. The designs I was choosing were fun yet proved to be too time-consuming (there is more to do than stitch for over an hour every evening). While I finished the month and I like it, I don’t have the same sense of satisfaction or belief that it’s the best way to devote my precious time to skill building.
Last year I also started a watercolor course that is self-paced, and I thought that would be good for a daily practice. What I found is that it required more learning than I anticipated. While I enjoyed it, it was not what I was seeking at the end of my day for feelings of relaxation and achievement. I am continuing with it yet it is not a daily practice as it too takes too much time each time.
Happily, I am quite philosophical about all this. It’s all learning, and I feel great when I am able to recognize what isn’t working, and step away from it to look at something new.
Have you ever made the active decision to let go of a daily practice?
What did that feel like? What did you learn from the experience?
I’d love to know!
I am surrounded by books and have a zillion tabs open (okay, I am exaggerating a wee bit). For the past few weeks, I have been sussing out resources for the graphic memoir writing course I am enrolled in. It’s both a blessing and a curse when the folks taking the course are as avid as I am about sharing book titles, podcasts, and videos. Granted, I don’t HAVE to track them all down, yet… Happily, the county in which I live has a robust collection of graphic memoirs and resources for writers. (Oh! I didn’t even share the book titles on my Kindle!)
I’m also starting to work as a teaching artist at an agency that serves survivors of human trafficking. While I devoted more than twenty years to volunteering and then directing programs for survivors of sexual violence (and their families), the world has changed and the two fields are related yet different. There is much for me to learn. I am delighted to be stepping back into this work and using art and craft to support creativity and healing. (Have you read about “craftivism”? It’s fascinating!)