Rule no.0029 - Confront your Fear.
From the unpublished manuscript: The 4,040 Rules of Art Conduct
Rule no.0029 - Confront your Fear.
When it comes to being an artist: What do you fear? Are you afraid of failure, what others will think, that you will not measure up, of revealing yourself, self-criticism, of losing your inspiration or your purpose? Perhaps investing your time with no pay off, of giving up?
We often maintain our fears through justifying them to ourselves. We come up with excuses for why it is rational for us to maintain them.
Fear is a phantom with no substance. It is an internal barrier, a thing we try to ignore. While it is something we resist, it is best to examine our fears, bring them out into the open where they cannot sustain themselves. Fears live in the dark places from our indulging in them.
We can start by acknowledging them, accepting that they are there. Try to pull them out one at a time and look closely. Name your fear. Ask yourself what it is about and why it is there. Then ask yourself what you can do to overcome it. Often it can be overcome just by examination and then realizing that you needn’t fear that thing after all.
Another thing one can do is build a defense against it. Figure out another way to think. Often our fears come from an ingrained pattern of thinking and acting based on some event from long ago. Perhaps it is time to restructure how we are thinking and feeling about something we fear.
Fears remain because we accept them and honor them through our behavior toward them, allowing them to hold sway over our actions. But they don’t have to. Consider it a creative problem to solve just like you would in a painting. Reduce its emotional importance and preciousness. Because it is not important nor precious except in the overcoming of it.
‘Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.’ Marie Curie
From the unpublished manuscript: The 4,040 rules of Art Conduct
My secret plan is to eventually make the posts in the Touchonian a book about the Creative Lifestyle for Artists. You, my favorite readers, are privy to the book in it’s formation. I would really appreciate your help by making comments, asking questions and suggesting topics I should explore and write about. It is hard for me to dream up what artists need and want to know to keep going and keep creating. I have fifty years of figuring out all of the details I needed to keep going and become self-sustaining as an artist and want to share enough insight to smooth the path for others facing this complicated, daunting task of being a self-sustaining artist. I know from experience it can feel overwhelming, unreachable and even depressing. So feel free to say or ask something! Thanks in advance.