MONDAY BYTES — December 14, 2015
Holiday Stress anyone?
Inevitably, at this time of year we look over the past 12 months and ahead to the next—often with a feeling that we’re powerless to make significant change.
My holiday gift to you is a game changing exercise found in a terrific free PDF that will help make 2016 YOUR year.
This is from Andrew Simonet’s excellent “Making Your Life as an Artist” (download as a free PDF). The book is a very quick and powerful read: I recommend it highly—think of it as your holiday gift to ourself.
Andrew recommends:
“Go somewhere by yourself, no phones, no computers. Write responses to the following:
What do you want personally, professionally, and artistically in the next year?
You have to write about all three.
Personally means everything in your life that does not have to do with working or making art.
Professionally means how your career unfolds, and how your work is delivered to the world.
Artistically means your art practice and the skills and collaborations that make it possible.
Don’t censor. Don’t “preshrink” the goals to make them easier to accomplish. Eliminate any “shoulds.”
Dream bigger than you think you should.
Leave it alone for a week.
After a week, get out the list. You can add new goals and cross off any that don’t feel important anymore. Then sift through it for what feels most important. Choose your top three goals.
That means three goals total. And you don’t have to choose one from each category.
Choose three that will have the most positive impact on your world.
This part is hard. Most artists aren’t good at prioritizing. We like to work on 27 different things at once.
But I have seen over and over that artists who do a small number of things fully and excellently go further.”
What I love about this approach is that it’s holistic, focusing on the three essential dimensions in our lives—the personal, professional, and artistic.
What’s more, Andrew’s approach recognizes that we have often have too many goals but that with time for reflection, we can winnow these down to focus our energies and impact.
Use the power of 3 to fuel the changes you want in your life in 2016!
As always, I’d love to hear your reactions and thoughts about any of this!
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