The Key to Conquering Anything

What do you think of when you think of an artist? What kind of traits come to mind? 

Creative, flowing with the feelings, carried with the wind, whimsical, daydreaming, eccentric, lost in thought?

Or somebody who’s organised, methodical, in control? Who’s day is well, planned, predictable and logical?

See I never had a background in art or knew much about the art world before I started painting in 2018. So I didn’t come in with any preconceived stereotypes. In some ways. It has been a blessing in disguise.

Over the course of the last few years, I’ve had the privilege and benefit of working with emerging and established artists. I’ve also had opportunity to observe the habits of successful artists.

Often, I found that there was a good mix of order and creativity in every successful artist's life.

And it’s so much easier to create disorder than order. It’s much easier to throw things around than painstakingly gather them back up and arrange them properly. Because, as much as creativity includes breaking norms and thinking outside the box, it has to stand on the firm foundation of an orderly day. 

If left to myself, I’d always be creating and never take the time to tell anyone about it! We tell people about art by showing it in galleries, social media and various exhibitions. These things have definite timetables and methods of operation to them. And so the need for order. I can’t just rock up to an art exhibition one morning and ask if they’d like to hang my art that day!!!

So I have been focusing on how to achieve order in the last few months. I’ve been listening to a success coach called Terri Savelle-Foy. I like listening to her because she studies other famous and successful people and distilled at all into bite-size messages in her videos.

This brings me to what I want to talk about in this blog – accomplishing the unaccomplishable. 

Before I start, my aim is to just share what I’m learning, in the hope that there will be nuggets that bless you and will help make your life better too.

The nature of creativity means that to create something that stands out, is both exciting and scary. If you think too much about it, it tends to overwhelm you.

How would you ever undertake something that’s bigger than you, if you repeatedly fell into the cycle of overwhelm and inactivity? It’s a question to myself too.

The key, it seems, is to break it down.

It’s simple but effective.

And it applies to practically anything.

 

Take a big, colossal, challenging stretching goal, for example.

Rather than try and do it all over the course of a week, allotting  an hour each day over the course of 6 to 8 weeks makes it manageable and gives time for reflection. Of course this depends on how quickly it needs to be done.

Or, what about that room that needs sorting out? Rather than wait for a day that may never come, Terri recommends setting aside 20 minutes on the clock every day towards that task.

Believe me, it really works!

The second thing that I found to be a great help, is to write things down. 

Even before I came across Terri, I recognised the power of writing. I knew when I started to lose sleep in the night that there were too many things that my brain needed to remember.

As a result, I remember waking up in the early hours of the morning, thinking, “Oh I forgot to do that or this”. 

I noticed that the days when I had written all those things down on paper or on my phone, I slept much better. That’s when my journey with lists began.

I am by no means an organised person. But I will do everything I need to do to lead a stress free life.

And it’s that attitude that saved me. I’d had enough of being that person who double-booked, forgot and searched in a hundred places before finding anything!

Do you see what I’m saying?!

We all have the capacity to change on the inside, but some of us don’t want to. Or don’t believe we can.

 

Deciding that I needed to change was key for me.

And I believe it’s key for you too, if you want life to look different five years from now.

There are plenty of success books out there, and what I’m saying is not new. If you wanted to, you could go out and get many manuals on how to succeed. Because everybody can do that, doesn’t mean everybody does.

Deciding that you’ve had enough of your old way of life is a very personal decision and one that only you and I can make.

That kind of decision is not a one time decision. There have been many times in life when I’ve settled into a pattern. Many times I’ve had to make the decision that I needed to change and grow.

Sometimes they’ve been in the area of family. Sometimes in art, sometimes in business, but the biggest and latest has been in the area of personal growth.

If I want to become a confident and successful woman, it’s not going to happen by watching TV for eight hours a day. 

I need to invest in myself and train myself to have the traits, abilities and character that would be present in a woman like that.

That’s what I’m talking about.

That woman would be trustworthy, efficient, good at what she does, an effective communicator and valuer of people. 

This is what it looks like for me. What does it look like for you?

How do you want yourself to be known in 5 years? That journey of change needs to start today though!

Would you do that for yourself today? The change of heart, change of direction…you’re not the only one. Many have done it before you and I. And succeeded.

 

So to recap, there are plenty of tips to become orderly and accomplish things. Writing things down and breaks down goals are only a couple of them. But the starting point and the sustaining principle has to be a heart change on the inside. You’ve got to WANT TO live differently.

I take heart from the fact that others have done just what I’m aiming to do, successfully and continue to grow. Join me on this amazing journey. 

Please let me know your thoughts below!

 

Photo credits:

1. Photo by Dan DeAlmeida on Unsplash

2.  Photo by Tim Johnson on Unsplash

3,  Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash