How to Keep Going When No One Gives AF.
I love immediate gratification.
That’s why most of my hobbies revolve around things I can see a result of quickly. Things like chess or art work that takes a LONG time to complete makes me twitch.
As much as I love to write, and do it multiple times daily in my private journal, sometimes it’s like pulling teeth to move forward online. Especially as a newbie that even google doesn’t want to acknowledge the existence of.
So what to do? I’ve tried sitting in my bed eating ice cream, with inner critics circling around my head.
OR try these steps that actually helped me get writing this post and drawing my pic:
- If your brain is adamant about wanting to numb out with distractions, try watching Youtube about other creators who have struggled before you.
I watched “create even if no one cares. practice in public // Black Girl Creative Podcast” by Alecia Renece The Artist (while eating said ice cream bed) and found my self literally living the point she was making:
“in the beginning, no one is going to care.. because the truth of the matter is you are (impacting). Someone is always watching”. I was watching, and she made a difference in my day. Watch her video here. - See no one caring as a double edged sword. Yup, it sucks that you spend all this time putting things out into the world only to feel like you threw a tiny pebble into the Atlantic Ocean. But! For people pleasers/perfectionism prone folks like myself who freeze at the thought of being judged (more about that here) this can also be a good thing. Tap into the feeling of freedom to stretch yourself creatively. I’ve worked at both one of the biggest corporations in the world and a smaller company. The amount of creative fun we could have without constantly watching our step to avoid media backlash was amazing.
- Acknowledge other benefits of building your craft slowly. Yes, being broke sucks and we need money. Facts. However there are other really important things that we need in life for your mental health.
~ Learning that your worth doesn’t come from other people’s applause. Hard, but life altering skill to learn to feel warmth and encouragement from your own approval.
~ Acknowledging the fact that we live in an instant gratification society where our brains are over stimulated with endless scrolling and “viral videos” that often have no additive value for other people’s lives and sometimes are just clickbaits. Learning to be patient, take time and put meaningful content into the world may not feel good in the moment but it’ll feel like chicken soup for the soul over the long term.
~ Challenging perfectionistic tendencies: especially if you weren’t taught that you are allowed to not be good at something immediately. - Be gentle with yourself. If you need a minute to bum out, give it to yourself without a guilt trip or hatred. There’s a lot of things our heart has to endure when we put a piece of our soul out there and no one responds. Imagine all the inner talk that happens with that. Be your very own advocate, speak to yourself so lovingly, and be your own cheerleader. This is one of the biggest learnings of my life.
And there we go. All those steps later, I finished my icecream, opened up my laptop and wrote this blog post. I hope this does the same for you.. whoever you are, where ever you are. There’s someone in the world rooting for your dreams.
