The Artist's Way: Week One
The Practise: Episode 1
*a little note for our regular readers:
For those of you that have been reading the RoundUp - first off, thank you! Secondly, don’t worry, I haven’t pivoted genres suddenly, there will still be a semi-regular RoundUp article from me in the near future, I haven’t run out of creatives to cover.
We’re looking to expand our articles here in our little corner of Substack, so hello and welcome to The Practise, a series where I work through different programs designed to improve creativity, and on our debut episode, we are starting strong with Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way.
The Artist’s Way
Taking the creative side of the internet by storm, Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way seems to be the way to connect with your inner creator and overcome artists’ block once and for all. I first learnt about the book by watching Doechii’s (singer, rapper, grammy-award winning, you know the one) old youtube videos, where she credits The Artist’s Way as being one of the reasons she went out to garner such success.
Quite a good selling point for the book. So, here I am trying it.
For context, no, I don’t want a grammy, but I am a habitual creative, both a writer and a painter, who has struggled with creative block for a while. I’m in that weird liminal space that is your mid-twenties, where childhood dreams require both raging audacity and dedication to stay alive, especially when it’s so much easier - and harder- to sell your soul to a regular 9-5.
As someone who is a perfectionist, I’m approaching this with a ‘better done than perfect’ attitude. I don’t really have any hard and fast goals for the state of my creativity at the end of this book, but I would like to gently lift the claws of perfectionism that have cleaved itself into my soul every time I pick up a paintbrush or read over my work. : )
The Structure
A 12-week course, with about an hour of tasks per week, as well as:
The Morning Pages - 3 pages of prose every day, for the duration of the 12 weeks.
The Artists Dates - an allotted amount of time per week to take yourself out on a date. (walk in the park, visit a bookstore, see a movie. Anything really, but you have to do it alone )
I’ll be giving updates for Week One, Week Four, Week Eight and Week Twelve, so stick around if you’re interested, or wait until the very end. Either way, hopefully you figure out if this is something you want to try out too!
Week One : Completed.
Tasks: Completed
Artist Date: Apple juice and window-shopping
Morning Pages: 5/7 days
Notable Changes:
Painting: I picked up a paintbrush for the first time in so long! Dog-sat for a couple of days this week and got inspired by an adorable poodle, won’t be finished with the painting until next week, but here’s a past one I did:
Writing: A couple weeks ago I started looking into editors for a finished manuscript and I signed a contract this week! I don’t think this really has much to do with me doing the Artist’s Way, but the book is quite adamant that there are no coincidences. While I wait for work to continue on my first manuscript, I’m working on draft one of a second manuscript, and am currently at 31,000 words- though I will admit, not much writing got done this week.
Morning Pages: As someone who has the ability to ramble, I didn’t find the idea of the Morning Pages that daunting, but by day three/four they got a bit tiresome. Some days got away from me, but I’m saying it’s a good start.
Artist Date: Went to a local shopping centre on the weekend, bought an apple juice and perused some books. Wasn’t exceptionally profound but surprisingly this is a task that I’m having trouble with - something that I didn’t foresee.
I’m quite an introvert and I am more than happy to go and explore a place by myself, but that’s usually at the last minute, in a ‘oh-that-place is interesting’ way and less a dedicated time in my calendar to pursue. I also work from home, so for the past couple years I’ve made a note to go to new places with other people for the ~ human interaction ~ so planning for myself seems a little counterintuitive, but regardless, an artist date was planned and executed. (Apple juice rating: 8/10)
Tasks: The theme for this week was ‘Recovering a Sense of Safety’ and combatting some of the negative stereotypes about being or becoming an artist - and to square up against these allegations, we use affirmations. I’m still at the part where affirmations seem very silly, but in the moments I start slowing down in my morning pages, I just write down the affirmations.
Final Thoughts:
Doing some more research into The Artist’s Way and Julia Cameron, I don’t think this book has my specific demographic in mind, but not many mainstream media do. However - the act of looking inward and allowing yourself to pursue your dreams and dissect how you see yourself is universally a good practice; if done with self-love.
So far, this book seems very well structured, it does make several references to ‘God’ and ‘Him’ which could deter some readers, I have just been reading it as ‘The Universe’ instead. There is a section in the book that accounts for this and says to just interchange the word to what you want. Though the book leans slightly religious in some instances, I wouldn’t say it’s a hinderance.
Motivational quotes and instructions can get you so far, the real work is the time you put in on the self-reflective prompts and the morning pages, so you can structure them however you like.
This is my first time doing some type of self-guided creative challenge and I’d say it’s a good bite-size amount. Reading through each chapter takes maybe 10 minutes. Morning pages take me 20 and the tasks just open tabs in your brain that you can flit through when doubts come bounding back - they take around 30 minutes.
As with anything in life, do what you can. An artist date is quite hard if you have to look after kids, or lack a mode of transport, have a chronic illness - the list goes on. Sometimes life happens, weeks vary and plans are sidelined in an instant. Things happen.
Seasons change.
I’ll be back with the second rendition of The Practise at Week 4, hopefully with a much bigger word count and a few more paintings to share. Until then, as always, be kind to yourself and happy creating.
Catch you later,
Kaye
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