kaidomac in the post "People who didn't have fun drawing bad stuff for the 50% rule, did you start to find drawing fun after you got good?"
2022-02-16 17:57
It's hard because with ADHD, our brains operate off the Mooch Circuit:
Below the foundation of what we see & experience in life is this truth:
- Everything is a checklist!
We learn & make progress one step at a time. The problem is, sometimes the tasks are super boring & sometimes we're a little bit too tired to care, so it's a major drag. With ADHD, it's a HUGE drag because we don't get any dopamine from rote work!
The ability to consistently execute simple tasks is the bottom line for success. This means finding coping strategies for pushing through the internal barrier of low mental energy in order to get today's tasks done. Not easy in practice!!
kaidomac in the post "People who didn't have fun drawing bad stuff for the 50% rule, did you start to find drawing fun after you got good?"
2022-02-16 16:42
part 2/2
Some days it's easy, some days it's not! Which is exactly what you've run into:
I don't feel any particular amount of dopamine when drawing
So for starters, it really just boils down to:
-
Realizing that true progression happens when we stick with doing things despite resistance, aka "engaging in consistent, daily novel iteration to harness the power of compounding interest", in order to let the whole "effort counts twice" formula get put to work!
-
Remembering that work is work, and it's really more dependent on (1) how good we're feeling that day, and (2) if we have any personal dopamine problems. For me, I'm often tired after a long day at work, and then my ADHD kicks in & doesn't want to supply the dopamine to make practicing & learning enjoyable, so then I'm stuck there feeling like Atlas holding up the weight of the world, just to get a simple task done. The emotional dysregulation is REAL haha!
Every single famous artist had to go through this process, unfortunately! Nobody feels awesome 24/7/365/forever, which mean that for famous artists to get good at what they do & produce multiple works of art, they had to push through. To quote Michelangelo:
- "If people knew how hard I worked to get my mastery, it wouldn't seem so wonderful at all."
The ability to master our craft pretty much boils down to:
-
Pick something to master
-
Make a daily progression plan
-
Force yourself to do it every day (to harness the power of compounding interest)
I like to use the X-effect to follow a super-basic daily growth plan for my art projects:
So success pretty much just means working on the right things consistently, even when we don't feel like it & aren't in the mood!
2 - The Inspiration Engine, find our "why", and defining creativity
When starting new projects, sometimes I get stuck on coming up with ideas to get started. I have a little tool called "The Inspiration Engine", which helps me to quickly generate ideas. I don't always go with one of the ideas I sketched out, but this process essentially creates kindling for my creative fires to burn:
I also think it helps to define our personal reasons why we personally do art:
One tool that I use when I'm struggling in the moment is to define my "reasons why", which requires two things:
-
Logical reason why
-
Emotional reason why
They don't have to be GOOD reasons, they simply have to exist!
When we're not in the mood to plow through our creative work, we tend to get tunnel vision, so our job is to expand that tunnel vision & widen our field of view to help us remember why we're doing what we're doing.
Also, creativity is something that I've thought a lot about over the years & have started to clarify in my own mind as to exactly how it works:
So what we're really doing is using our ability & skill to pull existing levers in order to create new works of art, and to adopt & internalize drawing skills, art styles, etc. aka working! And how fun that is depends more or less on how we feel that day!
3 - The Energy Formula
A big part of how easy it is to immerse myself in work, especially boring work, depends on how good I feel that day. My formula for energy is basically:
-
Sleep
-
Diet
-
Exercise
I spent a good 20 years with insomnia, and BOY does poor sleep kill motivation! Eventually I came to realize just how crucial good sleep is on the ability to be able to enjoy sticking with projects, such as learning how to draw. Turns out I had sleep apnea, among other issues:
Food is also super duper important, as is hydration:
Plus, exercise releases endorphins, which makes us feel good. So getting great sleep, feeding our bodies with "race fuel", and working out daily (doesn't have to be much!) release all kinds of chemicals that help us feel good & happy & motivated!
Remember, all work - no matter how interested we are in the idea of it, such as artwork - boils down to boring, lonely, frustrating tasks...which we can reframe by enabling ourselves to have higher energy! Boring tasks like honing our art skills are always going to be just that - boring - but that's what enables progress, which then enables us to to create works of art!
We can also make it better by adding music, candles, working around other people (art classes, friends, Starbucks, FocusMate.com, etc.), doing it in the morning when we have more energy, reminding ourselves of our logical & emotional reasons why we're doing art, using great tools like the Inspiration Engine & X-Effect to help us get ideas & chip away on our projects, etc.!
But yeah, the bottom line is that learning can be a real slog. But it's like the frustration of learning how to tie your shoes as a kid, because once you master it, now you can tie your shoes & go play! Granted, art projects are still going to be dependent on interest levels, mood, energy, etc. because work is work, but it's also more fun to work on stuff when you know what you're doing & have confidence that you can execute your idea because you've put in the time to gain the skills to back it up!
kaidomac in the post "People who didn't have fun drawing bad stuff for the 50% rule, did you start to find drawing fun after you got good?"
2022-02-16 16:42
Maybe I am merely enamoured by the idea of drawing rather than the act of drawing itself?
I have ADHD & I struggle with this ALL the time! I love the idea of doing things, but quite often, the act of doing the discrete tasks is as irritating as nails on a chalkboard:
I constantly struggle with the motivation required to stick with stuff day after day, especially once that initial interest wears off & I'm stuck with the actual work of learning new things & doing new things. Preface: this is a big, long discussion for me, lol. For starters, my core definition of success is as follows:
- Doing things, even when I don't feel like it
This is the magic sauce for:
-
Learning new stuff
-
Getting good at new stuff
-
Doing new stuff
To paraphrase productivity author David Allen:
-
We can't actually "do" a project at all
-
We can only do individual action steps related to the project
-
When enough of those discrete steps are done, we mark our project off as "complete"
So really, our success in life boils down to the concept of "single-tasking": if we're willing to consistently engage in doing one job at a time, and then to be consistent at it (SUPER HARD IN PRACTICE!), magical things can happen! Which gets into the question of motivation:
-
Work is work. Work is inherently lonely, boring, and frustrating.
-
A task is just a task. Some tasks are inherently more fun than others.
-
Feelings-wise, what it really boils down to is (1) how much we like the task in question, and (2) how much PEM energy we have that day (physical/emotional/mental), because when we're fried, nothing is very much fun lol
For example, I like to cook, but only when I'm in the mood to do so, which mostly means when I have some energy available, haha! Cooking is work, but when I want some cookies & the dopamine kicks in, the work becomes a pleasure! Unfortunately, sometimes I want cookies & I'm in a low-energy state, in which cases the task of cooking falls because into its default "it's just work now" state, rather than being fun! So here's the bit of information:
- The ability to push past our feelings & work despite that internal resistance is basically what separates successful people from unsuccessful people.
The urge to quit is so incredibly strong at times, particularly in the creative fields where we really WANT to feel motivated & enjoy doing our creative work! Over the years, I've found some tricks to mitigating that:
-
Harnessing the power of compounding interest through novel iteration
-
The Inspiration Engine, find our "why", and defining creativity
-
The Energy Formula
1 - Harnessing the power of compounding interest through novel iteration:
For starters, it's important to realize the power of compounding interest:
Basically, consistent effort doesn't create linear growth, it creates exponential growth. This is due to how interest compounds interest. Basically, we start out on our learning journey & learn new things & do new things & hone our abilities, which then allows us to create a web of support that grows & grows & grows over time (through daily consistency, because otherwise we run out of rice lol).
The way to access the power of compounding interest is through consistent novel iteration. Novel iteration basically just means doing something new every day:
-
Recreating something
-
Honing a skill
-
Learning something new
-
Doing something new
Earlier, I said that my core definition of success was doing things, even when I don't feel like it, but really it should be:
- Doing things consistently day after day, even when I don't feel like it
This requires moving from an emotion-based approach to a commitment-based approach:
Basically:
-
We know that compounding interest is super-powerful for allowing us to get mega-good at things over time, and that it's achieved through "small bites" of work day after day
-
However, in the heat of the moment, when we're "riding the bull", it can be SUPER hard to stick with those simple (not easy!) tasks
-
By using our knowledge of how to get good at things, we can instead switch to a commitment-based approach, which is simply where we're (1) willing to do the work even when we don't feel like it, and (2) do that day after day after day
This ability to be persistent in the face of inner resistance & aversion to our daily assignments is called "grit":
She teaches that "effort counts twice", which is the formula for why sticking with stuff helps us get good at stuff (at least, when we persistently work on the right stuff!). First, some definitions:
-
Talent = the ability to do something
-
Skill = how good we are at it
-
Achievement = results or performances (products & services, ex. a finished artwork, a music recital, etc.)
So the formula for "effort counts twice" is:
-
Ability x Effort = Skill
-
Skill x Effort = Achievement
So the real magic lies in that daily discrete action to both make progress in our studies to 'row our talents (abilities) & on our projects (to finish them!).
part 1/2
kaidomac in the post "I've set out on a quest to rerecord the Drawabox video content - starting with Lesson 1's Lines section"
2021-02-13 20:58
Awesome, what a wonderful resource! Keep up the good work!!
kaidomac in the post "People who didn't have fun drawing bad stuff for the 50% rule, did you start to find drawing fun after you got good?"
2022-02-16 18:01
You're welcome! My brain tends to get caught up in the drama of life & always wants to swing for big home runs, rather than itty bitty atomic-sized sniper bites of work, which is where the real magic is!
I get such incredible tunnel vision that I'll talk myself out of doing simple exercises or assignments because the crushing weight of the feeling of "not wanting to do it" weighs so heavily on me lol. It's a stupid problem to have! And yet, mastery of this one single skill is essentially the universal key to success, whether it's having clean laundry all the time, getting good at art, getting a 6-pack, doing meal-prep, studying for school, you name it!