Some ways to understand your vision and reach it.
How many of us have had clear artistic goals since childhood?
I’m one of those kids who decided out loud and in front of relatives at age three that she was going to be an artist when she grew up.
Okay before I wanted to be an artist, I aspired to be an archaeologist, a missionary, a writer.
The point is that beyond canvases and brushes, no one tells you how to become an artist.
It’s not a specific profession like being a doctor, engineer, biologist, astronomer, teacher.
Dreams and goals are a big magma within which you imagine you want to be an artist.
What is Vision.
The point is that your vision, that is, the set of values, aspirations and ideals that will accompany you in life until you reach your goal, is a constant and continuous work that you have to focus on as you understand who you are, what you want and where you want to go.
How to define your Vision.
Get a journal and start writing down the top goals you’d like to achieve.
Let me give you an example.
I wanted to be an artist.
But if that was the end goal, I began to wonder what kind of artist I wanted to be.
Sculptor?
Over the years I’ve learned different sculpting techniques and I’ve come to the conclusion that I like modeling synthetic pastes or clay better than sculpting wood.
Watercolorist?
In high school I wasn’t good at it, I hated those glazes of color. Then I discovered watercolor pencils and gave myself a chance.
This is to say:
- You figure out intermediate goals often by discarding what you don’t like.
- You have to give yourself time to figure out what you really like.
- You must always look for new ways to enrich your choice.
Actions toward the Vision.
Actions toward the Vision.
At this point, every day you have to take at least one small action to focus on micro-goals while also adding a determining context.
What values do you pursue in your final dream?
For me, among the five determining values there is definitely the search for beauty and its expression in every form and one thing that is crucial for me: irony.
Irony allows me to create not only paintings, but also illustrations for magazines and book covers and this collateral passion was born after I started drawing cartoons for my facebook page (now transferred to instagram).
If my goal is to be a visual artist, drawing ironic cartoons about the difficulties of artists is a way to express myself, to make myself known and to emphasize the values of honesty, transparency, beauty (along with many others) through drawing.
Recognize the steps forward toward your goal.
Because there is a long road ahead of any affirmation, there will be times when you feel like you are not taking a step forward.
Getting to actualize your goals is not easy but neither is it linear.
The path is winding.
You may work for months without perceiving any step forward and then something will happen that will make you move forward in a very fast way.
It can be an award won, an article about you, something you sell, a particularly active word of mouth, a brilliant idea.
Don’t just rely on that but feel the success and celebrate it.
Write it down in your journal for those moments of discouragement.
But I also recommend a simple and effective exercise.
Each night remember at least three positive things that have happened to you.
Often we only remember the big events and the small events we discard. And we have the perception that nothing ever happens in our lives.
Big events are rare, and when they do happen they make us leap forward.
But to get where you want to be, it’s the little steps that accumulate that create the artist you want to become.
Small steps for a clear and limpid vision.
Daily steps are essential to nurture your talent, to understand the path you want to take. They are formative steps that dig deep into who you are and create you as an artist.
Meeting galleries, seeing exhibitions, talking to people in the industry are steps to clarify what you will be.
No vision is born and grows in a short period of time.
But when you are clear on what you want and what you don’t want and what you want to be, you will meet people on your wavelength.
All the obstacles, the mistakes, the falls, will be signals to change course, to let go of some things and insist on others.
Values like ideals are formed by your culture, your knowledge, your passions but also by the decisions you make throughout your life.
Just remember two important things that will probably hold you back many times:
- Perfectionism.
- Procrastination.
Stop for a moment before you ruin an artwork or weigh it down with too much color or shapes.
Stop when you insist too much on a road that won’t open.
Stop.
Maybe the road will open up, maybe the work will succeed better if you stop working on it.
Perfection doesn’t exist, you’ll never achieve it.
And don’t wait for the right word, the final brush stroke, the best phone call, the exhibition that will consecrate you.
That’s procrastination.
It’s not formative, it’s useless.
If anything, it increases VISION.
And here we return to our vision.
Imagine a distant but not unreachable goal, imagine intermediate steps of three months and one month and then divide the month into weeks.
Set yourself small goals that together make up the weeks and then the months.
Vision and loneliness do not always make a good couple.
Vision and loneliness do not always make a good couple.
Discussing with people who know you about your values, your ideals, your aspirations, is a great way to clarify your ideas and not waste time.
Joining communities of like-minded artists, online listening groups, or getting together in your own city is really helpful.
There’s always time to be alone in the studio creating, to write a story in a lonely room.
Comparison is essential for getting your feet on the ground and figuring out the way forward, for things to let go of.
Or even to learn new techniques, to discover useful books for your training, to find colleagues willing to help you.
The future always starts today and there is always time to start new paths and make your ideas even sharper.
Dreams and goals are part of each of us and the sooner we focus on what we like, the greater the likelihood of success.
But mind you, success for me is not just and only about becoming an international artist who earns very good money, but it’s about doing what I like in my own time and finding on the other side an audience that loves what I do.
Get started today and tell me what you think.
And if you’d like, download a free eBook below that I made with other artists, full of helpful tips to boost your creativity.
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We’re all creative!
