Mental illness and motivating myself

It should be no surprise that I deal with a differently wired brain. I named my business “Bats in the Belfry” after all. I've been diagnosed a few different illnesses at different points throughout my life. Some didn't stick because it was based on what I was dealing with externally at the time. Also being hard of hearing causes me to act in certain ways that may mirror the autistic spectrum. I am currently holding onto my ADD diagnosis because it fits the best for my symptoms and the symptoms have lasted the longest.

ADD is attention deficit disorder. You are likely aware of ADHD, it's like that but without the “hyper” part.

I am aware of a tendency I have to procrastinate on projects until it's 24 hours to go to the deadline. And then I create this panicked state of mind, and in a whirlwind I get the art done and I feel elated after. Buuut it's not a good working plan for the long term. That spike in stress starts to really affect you as you get over 35.

Tricks I've found that help me to work away on projects slowly:

-working a little bit on art every day, even if it's for ten minutes, adds up. If you start a painting on Sunday, and paint a little bit of it every day, by the following Sunday you will have painted at least an hour's worth or more of accumulated painting over the course of a week.

And maybe this next week you will feel more motivated to finish it. Or maybe not and maybe it takes another week of short painting bursts. But every painting session adds up. Think short goals and get to the finish line like a turtle instead of a rabbit.

And I promise you once you've finished something while stressed or depressed, because you mindfully picked away at it over a course of days,… you will feel invincible and able to do anything.

I know how heavy the pile of unfinished work feels. Especially when you're super depressed and the world is hanging over your head. You must narrow your focus. Put a sheet overtop of the pile of wips. Focus only on the one piece in front of you. When one is done, get the next out. Put a cover back over the other unfinished art.

It does you no good to see piles of things that need doing. That easily overwhelms anyone and makes you want to retreat.

Another tip I have is, be honest with yourself and what you feel like working on right now. If your head says you should get to a commission, but your heart really wants to start a new painting-

Start that new painting.

If you don't, your brain will nag you until you do so you better just get it over with.

Sometimes it just means you splash some gesso down and rudely lay out a composition. But now your heart is happy and life goes on.

If your heart doesn't feel like doing strenuous details, block out colors instead. If you don't want to paint, and you feel like you really want to draw with ink, do it. Draw with the ink.

See the pattern? Identify what will work for you today for your drawing session.

If you have a pile of owed commissions, you can always start picking away at it, but reward yourself in between with drawing or painting what YOU want.

So this morning I woke up and I felt unmotivated. I knew I should start painting, but I just had some really heavy life stuff happening. I sat back and determined that I didn't feel like working hard. Or working on details at all. Making this preferred decision narrowed my work in progress choices down.

I had two paintings in similar stages that I felt drawn to. So I pulled them both to work on simultaneously.

They both were using similar greens and other colors that it made sense as I blocked out colors, I would do for both.

I mean, nothing ground breaking happened here but I did progress a little on both paintings. My heart is happy because it did some of what it wanted to do. And I'm not in any stressed panick mode because, there's no hard deadlines I'm facing.

It's all about building a practise where you work efficiently, without killing yourself.