In my first semester of college I had a design class that royally messed up my creative process. I was already out of my element with making large scale 3D projects, but the conditions we had for the class was atrocious. Our teacher spent the whole 16 week course on a power trip and turned what were supposed to be helpful critiques to improve our ideas into a ridicule hour, he had us form huge a circle and made us present in the center and he just mocked us the whole time.
I have always struggled with presentations and asked to have a few moments to collect myself before presenting so I wouldn’t pass out, I was granted permission to wait until the next class to present which had me relieved as there were other presentations that day as well (we had a big class and couldn’t fit them all into one class). But it was a shock to me when receiving my grade as he had taken a massive chunk of points off my grade for “Incompletion” and being “Late” as I did not present when initially prompted (If I had I would have passed out as I was insanely light headed. This was just one of the many horrible things that happened in the class, every assignment turned into constant stress to the point where when I woke up on Tuesdays or Thursdays I immediately felt sick to my stomach in dread for that days class.
My ability to create crumbled as I could only associate creating something to going to that class. It took me one FULL year before I wanted to make something again that wasn’t school related, and up until last year I always had a sense of dread when I came up with a drawing idea. I tried just about everything people recommended for burn out but nothing really ended up working as I kept associating creating something 2d or 3d to stress.
Until last year when I decided I wanted to completely start over, it took a bit of figuring out but I put away all old sketchbooks and opened one of the many blank ones I had horded. And then I froze… I figured Id make a list of drawing and craft goals I wanted to complete by the end of the year, with no regard for my social or school life.It took a while but I had to step back in order to make a series of small lists of short term, mid term, and long term goals that I could pick and choose from as I pleased. I went from saying “I wanted to make 15 full illustrations by the end of the year” (yes this was one of my goals that I had no way of accomplishing as a full time college student who is going for a creative field) to “I want to make a one point perspective drawing”. This allowed me to have a goal that was easily accomplishable and didn’t require months of time to complete. While long term goals are absolutely amazing for some they can also be a nightmare for those who cant progress through them at a consistent enough rate; whether that’s due to lifestyle, school, work, home life or even other hobbies, everyone has different obligations that need to be accounted for when goal planning.
After setting my collage of goals lists I created the “artist contract”, it was a small way to remind myself of why I needed to reassess my creative process. I started out by separately listing a bunch of my art related insecurities from not having an “aesthetic enough” sketchbook, to my fear of failing to make something nice. I recently noticed a lot of my insecurities stem from the fact that as humans we have been taught for years that our worth to ourselves and society is our ability to accomplish things. As someone who always set too many extreme or difficult goals it always made me feel like a failure. Hence why I wrote my contract the way I did with the failure to complete the goals listed had no impact on my worth as a person or artist/designer.
I’m not too sure I 100% believe it, but its a nice visual representation that one small failure doesn’t change anything in my career or life. the other ‘terms’ for the contract all stemmed form some other insecurities I have that I wont go into detail with. I also wanted some small reminders in there too that I could look back at.
If you make your own contract it really is helpful to attempt to make it in a way that suits you, mine was meant to be a reminder that grown takes time, and to reconnect with creating something in a low to no stress way. My drawings don’t have to be “perfect” for me to like them anymore and I can still enjoy making and viewing them mistakes and all.
And so this year I started my new sketchbook, I wrote out my first draft of my artist contract (I have made MANY edits since) and wrote out a list of goals I would someday like to complete, there is no timer only things to aspire towards making or attempting. And you know what? I’ve only made 2 drawings this year that weren’t school related, but that’s 2 more than the last 2 years. Progress takes time, and while it was only 2 drawings I enjoyed every minute of making and viewing them.
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