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It’s pretty nice to be talented. If you are, enjoy, but it won’t take you that far. Work takes you a lot further.

Natalie Goldberg


That’s great if you’re talented, but do you put in the work?  It really doesn’t matter how talented you are—-if you don’t do the work, then you are not that writer, that blogger, that artist, etc., that you aspire to be.

The work doesn’t even have to be all that great.  It can be awful crap and that’s ok because it’s called practice.  Most of the work we do is practice. We’re learning how to perfect our craft our job, our skill.

A Quarterback doesn’t get on a field and throw a winning touchdown without practice.  But even in practice, they aren’t throwing a touchdown right away.  First, they need to learn how to hold the ball before they can throw the ball.  And those first throws won’t be for much distance.

And, even after that Quarterback leads his team to win after win, he’s still back the next week…practicing.  Perfecting his game.  Staying in shape.

The same is true of writing or painting or any other endeavor you want to try.  Want to be a pilot?  You don’t fly a jet the first time you sit in the pilot’s seat and you certainly don’t fly before you’ve done a lot of studying on the ground.  You don’t write a best seller the first time you put a sentence together.  To master your craft takes hours upon hours of work.  And for artists/writers that struggle with self-doubt too? It can seem even longer.

If practicing can work for a Quarterback then it can work for a writer or an artist. Practice in any way you want. For a writer that might mean Morning Pages, Creativity Prompts, or Journaling.  All that truly matters is the effort. Write the same word over and over again if you have to, at least you’re writing.

For an artist, it might mean sketching or practicing that one thing that eludes you. My brother doesn’t draw hands well. That means he has to practice to get them right. Drawing hands over and over again. Practice the same sketch or paint that paint stroke over and over again, at least you’re painting.

Vincent Van Gogh practiced painting in color for a year.  Think about that.  A year.  One whole year, just practicing painting colors. Prior to that, he painted in the dark style of the Dutch masters of that time.  He had to learn how to use color.  So he practiced.  Over and over and over again.  Until he felt that he had the coloring and the shading right.

What have you practiced for a year?  

I suffered from writer’s block when I was younger because I couldn’t stifle my inner critic and kept trying to edit each sentence as I wrote them.  I stopped even trying to write because of it.  It wasn’t until Julie Cameron and her concept of Morning Pages showed me how to write out the crap that I started writing again.

Morning Pages gave me permission to write crap and not worry about editing.  The whole process was very freeing and also taught me the value of dedicated writing sessions.  I started getting up earlier and earlier in order to have enough time to write before I had to get ready for work.

The very process of writing those Morning Pages got me writing.  They also taught me the value of dedicating an hour or two each morning to writing before work.  It’s my practice.  I can piece it together and edit it later in order to create something that flowed.  But in the morning, it is all just practice to me.  I flow right into it from Morning Pages. Writing to explore where I wanted to go with my content.  Taking an idea and seeing what developes whether I use it in the future or not.

But what if you feel stuck? What if you show up every day at your canvess or novel and nothing comes out? Read this post, What to do If You’ve Lost Your Creativity. It will give you self-care ideas to guide yourself back on the path of creativity.

Were you an artist today?  Did you practice your art? Please let me know if this content helps and if you need more.                

That's great if you're talented but do you put in the work? If you do nothing with your talent then you won't get very far. You need to take action to get your dreams. #talent #hardwork #practice #blogging #contentcreation