“My theory is that this lack of “starting” is attributed to two stupid things: perfectionism and fear.”
Emily Henderson
As I was doing some research this morning I stumbled upon a blog of Emily Henderson (LA based interior stylist, for those of you who like myself haven’t heard of her until this morning) and got sooooo carried away watching her styling videos. You can check them out on your own here (there are some great decorating tips in them, just FYI ), however, this post is about a specific article Emily wrote not too long ago which resonates with two other books I am currently reading – “Big Magic” by Elizabeth Gilbert and “Show you work” by Austin Kleon.
How do you start a creative career, any creative career? From my own experience I know it is a change, a challenge and my answer is “Just start” and once you start you follow Nike’s slogan “Just do it”. For more elaborate discussion on the topic you can first read “Big Magic” and then “Show your work” but key points are:
A) you need to overcome your fear, and
B) you need to be breaking out of your comfort zone daily and showing what you do, even if your work is far from being perfect.
Elizabeth Gilbert in her “Big Magic” talks about how fear becomes a glass wall many people never manage to destroy to start doing what they have been wanting to do for years, sometimes their whole lives. She has an interesting way of talking about ideas as energy life-forms which come to a person waiting for the person to materialize them and if the person does not act on it, the idea picks itself up and goes to someone else who is more willing and ready to collaborate. I can totally relate to this because I have learnt for myself that if I have a recurring idea visiting me over and over, it just means that the idea is nagging to come to this material world through me. I have also seen how an idea that came to me and I never followed it through was implemented by someone else.
“Show your work” by Austin Kleon is about getting your work out there (still focusing on your work and not necessarily joining the glamorous world of La Boheme) and showing what you do using social media, taking your audience behind the scenes, sharing the process of creating, telling the stories behind the work because each step is influenced by something that we hear, read, see, try, fail, try again, fail again, try until you get it. Important point to remember is what needs to be shared is work or things related to work – not cats, dogs, lunches, babies, sunsets, selfies, but WORK!
Here is a full post “My four cents on starting a successful creative career” by Emily Henderson which sums up key points for getting started.