My 3 tips on focus

Disclaimer: I have a two year old and am about 8 months pregnant as I write this post. So if it comes off as a little snarky, blame the children.

1)   You are what you consume.

        How many of you can relate to this? You wake up and BAM instagram has now informed you that so and so went to a café (insert mandatory coffee picture here), that one person has made their living room identical to a Pinterest post, and last someone went out to dun dun dun…. brunch. I don’t know about you, but with all that in my head before I’ve even had a chance to drink my morning tea, I end up spending the rest of my day bogged down with thoughts like “ Maybe I should go to a café today…do something different!” or “ This living room looks NOTHING like Pinterest!” (commence frantic trolling of vintage stores and maybe later on a disastrous stint at Ikea); worst of all…."I need to go and stand in line for two hours so I can have BRUNCH!”. Rant aside, my point here is that the images you consume, frivolous or not, are heavily weighted. Without ever realizing it you might end up at Ikea, instead of at your desk working. So my first tip is to be mindful of what you allow into your mind cave.

2)   Brunch can wait!

So I’m just going to say it.  That omelet that took about two hours to get into my belly, I could have made it at home. And here’s the kicker, while I’m making small talk with the folks that convinced me to join them in the torture of waiting in line for brunch, I could have been sitting at my desk drawing. I don’t mean to say that it’s not important to spend time with friends or family, not at all.  However, how you choose to spend your time greatly changes how long it will take you to reach your goal.  So fellow makers my point is this, brunch can wait. Go and draw. 

3)   Time spent in pursuit of my goal, is always time perfectly spent.

It can be frustrating as an illustrator to find that your work isn’t quite at the level that you want it to be.  Rather than losing steam when you’ve spent hours creating something hideous (we’ve all been there), try to view that time as time perfectly spent. Look at that piece, the one that screams “ YOU FAILED! You’ll never be good at this!” and instead give yourself a pat on the back for spending your time with purpose.  Go ahead and have a good breakdown if you must, chocolate might be involved, and then get back to spending your hours purposefully.  Repaint that nightmare piece, rework that awful story, because time spent in pursuit of your goal is always time perfectly spent.