Artist Hideout

As an artist, I find that there are times that I need to set aside particular time for projects. With my web responsibilities seemingly growing everyday and the fact that I suffer the artists curse of absolutely horrible time management skills, I’ve decided that I need to begin to take action on this particular area of life. I know what to do and I know what works for me, but I haven’t really set out a defined game plan to make it happen. I don’t really feel qualified to contribute to Jeremy’s life management series, but there are other things that are more preventive care types of things that can be done for the creative types of individuals prone to cluttering up their lives with junk and multiple things they should have said “no” to in the first place (not to mention nasty run-on sentences).

Cleaning out the crap.

Each year our church has a huge yard sale that usually benefits the youth group. Everyone in the church donates those things that have been wasting space over the last year sitting around the house. This year I am (we are) going to be a big contributer to this event. It’s spring and it’s time to do something about these horrible board games that are collecting dust in the closet. We’ll keep the “Apples to Apples” though cause that’s the only one we ever play anymore anyway.

Truth is until you treat some of the symptoms, you’ll never feel well enough to try to fix part of the cause. This builds into the next little suggestion.

Simplify your life.

I pretty much live a portion of my life on the computer. If it’s not web-based in some way, it’s probably not going to be used by me. Truth is, I don’t function well this way. Remember those pieces of paper that you hang on the wall and they tell you the date and holidays as well as have little boxes where you could write things in? Those boxes are not very big for a very good reason. There is really only so much that will fit in any one day. A web-based calendar usually has an unlimited amount of things you can add for each day, which isn’t really possible to navigate anyway without some serious manipulation to your thinking that will leave you more stressed than when you opened the freaking program in the first place.

Minimalism is more than just weird artwork with geometric shapes and singular lines on canvas. It’s a state of mind.

tip: Let the voice-mail on your cell phone take your calls like a secretary for awhile. You’ll find when you can think about something before you say “yes” you’ll probably budget your time better too

Relax.

This is probably one of the best uses of your time. This isn’t to say to be some kind of lazy, couch potato who asks their spouse to do everything for them. If this is you, you probably need a little more stress (called eustress or Euphoric Stress). Finding a balance is key here. But when you take those breaks, you will find creative juices you didn’t even know you had. You’ll have fresh perspectives that will come out it your artwork, your business, your relationships and ultimately help you be a better, healthier person overall.

Tags: stress, time management, Art, Artist, creativity, expression

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