Make it harder on yourself

A short treatise on the value of a cumbersome life

I’ve been asked this question 356,459 times¹:

How do you make your work when you have kids?

I understand why people ask this. Because to my mind, you could also ask the question this way:

How do you make your work when you have a day job? A full semester? A sick loved one? A feeling in the pit of your stomach that you’re missing the best years of your life to the act of scrolling?

Because LIFE (not just with kids) is messy and cumbersome. And the creative process does not make the day-to-day events easier… (unhinged laugh) …it is, in fact, also a mess!

But here’s the weird thing I have found in my own practice:

My creative process doesn’t need to be easy.

In fact, sometimes when it’s awfully cumbersome, fantastic things happen. Odd things. Serendipitous, wild things. Things that make me go, oooohh.

Because I have kids, I am often thinking about when to save them from challenges and when to confront them with challenges.

After all, how do we create resilience if we don’t have something to push against?

For 21st Century artists, complication isn’t a bug, it’s a feature

It’s a doorway to a path no one else could take, because no one else could have the exact composition of challenges, messes, and obstacles as you. And please don’t misunderstand me, I’m not romanticizing hardship. The System should be fair and equitable and it’s not.

But what I am saying is that given the cards we have in the moment we’re in, we won’t get closer to where we want to go without using up the full content of our circumstances. As cumbersome and difficult as they may be.

The ugliest, most unhinged creative practice is still pretty transformative

Each time I accept how exceptionally limited my time is, I get more done.

Each time I allow my creative process to be as unkempt and unrecognizable as the bedhead I get after passing out from singing karaoke and smoking cigarettes until 6am², I start understanding its implicit logic.

Each time I quit trying to create what I think people expect me to create, some kind of dam inside me breaks and suddenly I get access to something unexpected.

And that unexpected thing unlocks a door,

which leads to a hallway,

which reveals a key,

which I twist to the right until it clicks,

and then I enter a room with a brand new set of possibilities.

It’s really great.

Why does this work?

I have no idea. I mean, I have theories.

I think our subconscious, our collective unconscious, and the General Mystery of Being Alive all have something to do with it.

And while I won’t romanticize systemic hardship, I will romanticize the everyday moves we make to dance with our limitations. I will romanticize the way the creative process confronts us and the way we get fluent in ourselves by engaging with it.

The creative process is transformative. And cumbersome. Both/and.

Here’s what mine looks like right now:

via Are.na

via Are.na

Let us all aspire to this kind of greatness.

by David Inshaw

What my Notion currently looks like.

Pinterest via Gary Hilborn

Pinterest via Emille Andrade

Pinterest via Open East

Pinterest via Sleepy

Pinterest via tumbler via juncst

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‼️ ALERT ALERT FUN STUFF ALERT ‼️

Magnetic Marketing & Release Methods in the Time of Inbox Overwhelm: A 🆓 Workshop for Indie Artists

There’s so much boring marketing out there.

SO MUCH.

And also, so much potential for indie artists to use ~*~magnetic marketing methods~*~ to capture attention and create a real scene around their work.

🧐 Once you understand how the attention economy is changing and the many strategies to make marketing cool again, you’ll go from engagement-level: echo echo echooooo, to a buzzing scene that would make Black Flag jealous.

I’m teaching a free one hour class on Monday April 28th at 6pm EST called Magnetic Marketing & Release Methods in the Time of Inbox Overwhelm.

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What class will cover:

• The 4 major mistakes indie artists usually make in their marketing

• What you need to know about the emerging ways to capture attention

• The 4 styles of magnetic marketing (with prompts!) to help you build your own unique campaign

• A sample 6-month marketing campaign you can steal and use to your heart’s content!

If you can’t make it, you can still get the recording if you RSVP. Hope to see you there!

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Tell me in the comments: What does your creative process feel like?

1. Actually had a very interesting conversation about this here. One of my favorite podcast experiences ever.

2. 2014 was a wild year for me