Creative Pep Talk
069 - REST Pt. 3 w Brandon Rike
(upbeat music) Hey y'all, just a quick heads up. The episode you're about to listen to is eight to 10 years old. Now, these episodes were intended to be evergreen, and I still believe there's a lot of good information in these early episodes, but I do wanna let you know that some of my ideas have evolved over time. Times have changed since we made these episodes, and ultimately, I'd like to think I've grown a lot as an artist and a human, and that these don't necessarily represent my best work, or the best of the podcast. If you're new around here, I suggest starting with the most recent episode, or at least go back to around 300, and move forward from there. Enjoy the episode. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) Hey friends, it's me Andy J. Miller, commercial artist, and you're listening to the Creative Pep Talk podcast, and this show is about commercial art. You know, I wanna bring that term back, I wanna think about the idea of business and art, and trying to hold them in the same vessel, whether it's possible, what I'm learning, and you know, it's been such a thrill to explore this topic with you, and I've learned so much, and I'm so grateful to be able to bring these episodes to you week after week. So, before I get anywhere, let's just say, we've got a proud syndicate, illustrationage.com/creativepeptalk, you can find the show there, they're a great illustration resource. Today on the show, we have our last episode on Rest, Rest Part Three, an interview with my good buddy, Brandon Reich, designer, illustrator extraordinaire, fantastic dude, always enjoy having a nice, long conversation with this man. We get probably deeper than we should on the topic of rest, but it's, you know, that's where we like to go, and that's good. But we, I don't know, I love this conversation, there's, you know, it's not just about rest, it goes into all kinds of different things. I think that there's a lot of takeaway here. You know, I wanted to spend three episodes on this because this is a topic that I don't have figured out. I haven't figured out how to switch off and how to go from being an artist to being a dad, to being a husband, to being a friend. You know, going in and out of these roles is not easy. I don't think it's easy for anybody that wants to perform on a high level. And you know what, I've gotten better at it over the years, but having these conversations I think really did help me, and I hope that they help you too. So without further ado, here is Brandon Reich on the topic of rest. Miro is a collaborative virtual workspace that syncs in real time for you and your team so that you can innovate an idea into an outcome seamlessly. We talk a lot on this show about the idea of how creative research shows that playing with the problem is essential to innovation. Now, when I think of play, I don't think of documents and email. So if your team is often working remote, you need something more dynamic and collaborative. I think that Miro's mind maps and flow charts where team members can edit and play in real time has a lot more capacity for innovation and playing with the problem than traditional ways of collaborating over the internet. Whether you work in innovation, product design, engineering, UX, agile or IT, bring your teams to Miro's revolutionary innovation workspace and be faster from idea to outcome. Go to Miro.com to find out how that's M-I-R-O.com. Hey, in case you don't know, we have a monthly live virtual meetup every last Monday of the month with supporters of the show from Patreon and Substack. We have so much fun on these calls and they are the warmest, most encouraging creatives that I have ever met. And we also talk real creative practice stuff. We have authors, illustrators, lettering artists, picture bookmakers, fine artists, musicians, and folks that work in video and film as well. And we have people that are just starting out, people super established in their creative careers and everything in between. For the rest of this year, we're gonna chat through our new Journey to the true fan series, exploring questions and ways to apply these ideas to your own creative practice so that you can leave 2024 stronger than you came in with more visibility, connection with your audience and sales. Sign up to whichever suits you best at either patreon.com/creativepeptalk or antijpizza.substack.com. And I hope to see you at this month's meetup. (upbeat music) - So, I wanted to talk to you because I know that you are, you consider yourself to be a type A personality who has worked really hard for what you have achieved and you have and all that's true. Now, I had a friend of mine, Jeff Bowman, who's featured in this episode, who is good outside, outdoorsy guy and we both graduated at the same time and we were both really passionate about having a career and he found like that letting go and having a chill out period is where he started to really find some really interesting things and although I feel like I had some experiences like that, I think that there's part of me that I have a hard time, I can physically step away, but I have a really hard time mentally stepping away. And I knew that some of that's gonna resonate with you and I just wanted to talk about it with you, I don't know. - Yeah, I think there's like a tension, you think about all the work you have to do, but then you think about all the attention that you have to give that work. So, the work is sort of an obvious thing to know that okay, I'm not on my sketchpad, I'm not on my computer, I'm not on any of that stuff, so I'm not working anymore, but your attention is a more abstract thing and you don't know, you can't turn that off, you can't stop it and say that every day at six p.m. or five p.m. that you know, okay, I can turn the attention off too, that's dedicated to my art, that like never stops. So, the rest I think is more like it gives you time to sit and realize why you're doing what you're doing because in the hustle and bustle of doing the work and just getting things out the door and constantly like all the production of everything, there is no time to think big picture. - True. - So like in the four hour work week or the emith, you learn these basic principles of theirs, basically three people needed to run a business and a lot of times those people are the same person, but there is the technician, the person who actually does the work, that does the technical work, so the person drawing the pictures, the person designing the graphics, all that stuff. There's the manager and that's all the annoying day to day stuff like returning emails and writing invoices and all the stuff that isn't necessarily designed but it's work, but then there's-- - I'm hoping I'm the third guy. - But then there's the entrepreneur. Now, entrepreneur is the big picture guy. - That's me. - And he's only thinking about what's ahead and he's always thinking about the big picture and all that stuff and so-- - I could just cry. I know, I wanna hear all of this really bad. I'm desperate to hear all of what you're gonna say 'cause I don't know all of this, but I think a big problem for me is that I'm really mostly number three and I have to really force the other things, and I do and I have and that's any of the success that I have is due to forcing those other things, but I am more most purely number three. - Yeah, and the three of those take an enormous amount of time to shift gears between. It's essentially a room that you have to walk backwards out of side step and walk into the next room to be that. And mentally, there's different things that happen so in the transition between doing the three, sometimes Facebook or Twitter's in there, sometimes going and getting the mail is in there, sometimes going and getting lunch, sometimes just like, I don't know, wasting time, however you choose to waste time. Those are the gears that you're switching because you can't just be like, okay, I'm thinking big picture, thinking big picture, I got to write an email about a deadline today. - True. - Thinking big picture, thinking big picture, I actually have to get this work done and stop thinking big picture so I can switch over to this. So you have to know about those three and kind of know where you're at and understand, oh, I actually probably should realign my workflow so I don't have to switch between this to this and I can just do all technical work today. And maybe the next day is all managerial work so I'm returning emails and writing invoices all day. And then maybe one day a week, you're only thinking about entrepreneur, you're updating your website, you're thinking up a new idea, you're writing a new business plan, whatever it is, but you need all three of those. For me, so you say that you're the entrepreneur. - True. - I'm the technician. - Right. - And I just wanna-- - I'm aware of this. - I just wanna-- - I can see it. - I just wanna get my head down and do the work and I want everyone to leave me alone. I don't want to get another email for the rest of my life. - Yeah. - Just let me do the thing that I do really well because I don't know if I'm the best email returner or the email writer or any of that stuff, but I can do this thing really well, leave me alone, let me do it. - Yeah. - Of course that doesn't happen and I get frustrated that that doesn't happen because I still need to be the manager. I still need to be the entrepreneur. - True. - But the entrepreneur only happens at rest. - Right. - So that only happens on the two hour drive to my parents house when I think, "Oh, you know what I should do? "I should try to do this." That only happens during rest. It doesn't happen in the middle of some super like tedious project. - Yes. - It happens when you've given yourself space, you've exhaled, you're breathing, you're not thinking about the next thing you have to do. That openness, that no deadline looming that time, that rest, that's when you can think of the next big idea. - And actually part of the reason I wanted to ask you was because when did we meet? It was a, it was it in 2015? - I would say in the middle of 2015 somewhere. I heard your podcast before I met you and then we had a mutual friend who said, "Hey, this guy puts out this podcast "is actually living in your town." - Yeah, according to Google. - It's 12 minute drive. - 12 minute drive, yeah. - So I, you know, the first couple of times we met, we talked a lot about where we were both at and it's different places, I think, in our careers. You've been doing this a little bit longer than me and we're different types of people. And you were a little bit frustrated or something with whatever zone you were in. There was tons of awesome things going. Everything was up and running and working smoothly and you were a machine killing it, but there was something looming and then when you stepped away at the conference, which was October, in that rest season, all of a sudden, all these things started, you know, coming up in your mind and that, just what you're talking about right now. So how do you, what's your plan for baking that in to your everyday schedule? - There is a practical force yourself to do it, type of thing because the ideas are great unless you never execute any of those ideas. So I can think up amazing ideas that, you know, if I had a clone that I could totally do those ideas, that would be amazing. And then there's the ideas of, if you win the lottery, if you had $100 million, what do you do? You know, which one of your ideas are still around and which ones are you doing for the right reasons, you know? So for me, since we, you know, I've been very frustrated this year, I've been really burned out. And I think the main source of the burnout is realizing that sometimes the thing I get paid the most to do isn't my best work. So I could make more money doing work that doesn't challenge me, but I know how to do the work that makes me money. - You're right. - So that really screws up everything you thought you knew about being a creative because being a creative is very much about being driven by a passion, being driven by some type of like excitement. And if all of the work that you have for the day, you know is gonna make you money, but isn't gonna make you happy, it's a really screwed up thing. And even if you're, you know, if I take all this work that I say doesn't make me happy, and then I put a whole portfolio together of it, it's probably gonna be fine. It's probably gonna look good. But I know those little nuance of the things that I do that really excite me. So part of my whole, you know, so let's say creative works, it took me, I was just basically, I'm frustrated. I am just going to be calm and absorbed. That's what I wanna do for creative works in October. And then recently, a couple of weeks ago, I actually flew to Seattle. So at Seattle, I sat down with Jesse Bryant from belief agency, and we did this belief session. So the belief session is basically this kind of like a therapy session that he does with his clients, where most of the time we're talking about businesses, but you get to the heart of what the business is. So he's worked for people like Salvation Army, Seattle Seahawks, you know, all these different, you know, different types of companies. But if you get down to the core and the heart of what they are, you'll find something very simple. And that simple credo or that simple sentence kind of makes everything, you know, makes everything make sense. So for me, you know, the process of flying in a plane, all the way to Seattle, having the physical distance, the physical distance, feeling out of my element, being like, this new environment that you're in, I've been in Seattle plenty of times, but this new environment that you're in is going to, in your memory, represent the time when everything changed, or the time when you started seeing things differently. So, you know, Jesse actually asked me in an interview I did with him, why did I spend the money to go? And why did I take the time to fly up there? And for me, it was like, I want this experience to be as potent as possible. - Yeah. - And to make it more potent for me is, you know, like change your environment, make it feel differently than you normally feel. - It's holiday shopping time, y'all. It's time to freak out, not. - Because "Uncommon Goods" is here to make it easy. Listen, all I did was click the "For Her" section on this site and I instantly saw five things that I could get Sophie, don't tell her, but I'm thinking either the National Park sweaters, the tea advent calendar. There's also just below that little bubble tea kit for my oldest and then I saw one of these, you know, the retro little viewfinder orange real viewer things, but you can make it your own photos. Okay, it might not make sense, just you have to go check it out yourself. Here's the thing, I have seriously never seen so many good options for gifts online in one place and unlike lots of other convenient options, shopping "Uncommon Goods" actually supports small businesses. To get 15% off your next gift, go to uncommongoods.com/peptalk. That's uncommongoods.com/peptalk for 15% off. Don't miss out on this limited time offer "Uncommon Goods." We're all out of the ordinary. (upbeat music) So anyway, the core of the belief session for me was "Don't let them kill your soul." That is me summed up. So you'll find that everything I do is a little bit dark. The words that I use are a little bit intense. My tone, my vibe, it's all a little bit oddly intense and that's okay, but it stems from the fact that I am so passionately trying to help people keep that creative soul that they had when they were five years old and they wanted to be an artist for a living or whatever it was. Whatever that thing is, I have fought my whole career so that nobody can kill that. Whether it be high school art class, whether it be the colleges they told me to go to, even the non-art colleges. I got good grades in high school so I was like, well, you could go to this and be a doctor, be a lawyer or whatever. Screw you, I don't wanna do that. So, well, okay, well then you're an artist, let's take you to this art school. Screw you, I don't wanna go to that art school, I don't wanna do it that way. I don't wanna be beholden to this program or whatever so I just kept fighting and being like, "Let me do this, the way I wanna do it, "let me take this vision and keep sticking to this vision, "I will not let you kill my soul." And then so obviously with that mentality, there's not too many options other than be a freelancer 'cause the other ones involve a boss of some sort which I wouldn't be good at. So, at least throughout all this rest that I've given myself, even the three days I took to go to Seattle, that rest allowed me to not do any work, not have any like plates that I had to keep spinning. It was just me, Brandon, sit down, be calm and listen and allow room for new ideas and realizations to come into your head because the more, the busier I make myself, there's no way any new inspirational thing is gonna pop in. I'm just way too busy. I don't have the attention currency available for inspiration to come in so that's why I need rest. - Do you, so one of the things that, one of the themes that I've been thinking about is that I don't necessarily think, I think work and what you create with your life is very important and it's towards the top of the things that are important. But, so I can see how, you know, part of my answer about the importance of rest comes from when you rest, your work gets better, right? - Yeah. - So, but that is saying that that's the ultimate goal to a certain degree, right? And that's kind of the way I think of it. But then there's part of me that's thinking about, okay, well, what about the other components in your life and how your work feeds you to be a better, husband or your, you know, all this kind of like give and take. So anyway, that's all kind of side note, but are there times when you can in rest step away mentally from creativity? I struggle with this, that's the, I want, that's a loaded question because I do, but it's a challenge for me and I'm looking for new ways to disengage my mind. - I think I can honestly say, and this is something I've just been realizing the last couple of days, I think it's been years since creativity and design was my number one priority in life. Like it's been years because I think everybody assumes that and I think sometimes in email, you know, obviously my email is full of project requests and stuff, I get frustrated, especially around the holidays. I get frustrated because like, why are you asking me to do this the day before Thanksgiving? - I had someone ask me to spend Thanksgiving weekend working on a bed. - Yeah, get out of here. So it's like, do you not have a family? Because I'm going to be with my family for the next four or five days or whatever. That's the thing I'm doing. And then after that, I'm gonna come home and I'm gonna decorate my house for Christmas. And then last night, I had a flat tire, so I needed to take my car to get the tire fixed and to get all that stuff taken care of. Then after that, we've got to get some stuff at the storage space and then we've got to meet with these other people, like my life is going on. So sometimes when I go back to being the technician, that's where it does become valuable because it's like, listen, you may not be excited and inspired at this moment, but at least you know how to be the technician and keep that engine running, even if your heart's not totally in it. So I think that there's pro and con where sometimes I'm working slightly uninspired, but I'm really thankful that I can work while uninspired, because if everything relied on emotions, there would be no consistency. And my whole career has been about me being able to be consistent. Emotions are not consistent, I am moody. So yeah, I'm glad that I don't rely on inspiration before I do work, 'cause I'm working without inspiration all the time. The inspiration is that bigger picture, is that thing of, okay, Brandon, but where are you headed? Or what do you wanna do? And how do you get to a place where on your deathbed, obviously you're gonna be thinking about family. Yeah, I don't care about the art that I made my deathbed. Exactly, yeah, that's totally true. But in terms of there is a, well, okay, well, let's talk about that. Let's talk about that because it's a good conversation to have. There's a part of me that... Now we're talking about real rest. We are talking about final rest. (laughing) It's got real rest. Final rest, I know, golly, man, I don't know. The final rest in place. But, gosh, I'm so funny. Oh my gosh, you know, I do this without thinking about it. That's how my mind works. I'm like, this is all the reality, let's talk about it. Let's do a podcast on death. I can see you. I'm in rest. (laughing) Oh my gosh, yeah, all right. Let me lighten it up a little. Okay, I am saying that there is part of me that I know my ultimate goal is the dedication to husband and father. Right. You know, I know that for a fact. I think money is a weird thing to throw into that. Yeah. Because you have to do that well, you have to make a reasonable amount of money. Yeah. So that's one thing. And then work is also whether you wanna be, you wanna think about it in philosophical terms or just plain and simple facts. You spend the majority of your life working. Yeah. So, it is who you are. If that is true, then there is a certain degree of that is your legacy to a certain degree, even if your legacy is wrapped up in other things too. So there is part of me that at the end of it, I want it to have been for something to a degree. Yeah. And that, what you're talking about the big picture of being inspired, if you spend a bigger percentage, you can't spend every moment inspired in your work. Totally, that's just not true and it's unrealistic. Yeah. But I do think that getting that spark going and trying to find where that next season that's more inspirational will in the long run mount up to something a little bit more worthwhile. For me, that looked like, you know, a few years ago, I was, I'm kind of in the illustration world to a certain degree, although I have a lot of qualms with that. I just, I thought, all right, I really wanna dig in to what it means to be an illustrator because I want to be great at it. And the more options I dug into, the more I saw that whatever realms there are to be quote, unquote, great in illustration, I knew they weren't gonna be me. Yeah. And I wasn't interested in them. I wasn't even interested in competing. And so for me, that turned into some pivoting and I'm still in the middle of that to try to find an area that feels more worthwhile pursuing. And that came out of rest in the entrepreneurial side. But I don't know. I'd love to hear any thoughts you have on all that. 'Cause it's a lot. Well, I don't have, I haven't made my mind up by any means with this. So we're in the middle of it. Yeah, I'm gonna be thinking through this as I say it, but I think right now where I'm at, like there's a legacy as far as your art and stuff goes, but that's gotta be a secondary legacy. If you're a decent human being. Secondary to what? Secondary to being a good husband. A good son, a good father. Yeah, you have to be a decent human being. Part of being a decent human being is about being passionate about what you do every day. So being passionate about what you do. See, I don't need my kids to be artists. I just need them to, well, I need them to look up to their dad because they're passionate. He's passionate about what he's doing. He's excited about what he's doing. It doesn't matter if they build cars or whatever, if they're mow lawns or landscapers, whatever they do. I don't care what you do, just be passionate about it. If you work at Starbucks, if you work at McDonald's, if you're the trash man, whatever it is that you do, get fired up about that, do that thing. So more than anything, I feel like my message for people is I don't care what you do, just be passionate about it because there's passion in you somewhere. And if you let that passion die, we're missing out on it. So if I can inspire people to be passionate about what they do, we make better human beings. - True, totally true. - So if the goal of my whole entire thing is make better human beings, then that seems pretty legacy worthy. - It is totally. - That seems pretty of valiant effort. Just so happens that my method of doing that, my vehicle for doing that is art because I was gifted with a talent to do art. And I decided to be passionate about it and the harder I worked, the luckier I got. And this is the career that I have now, but it's gotta be secondary because there are, I mean, you look at people like, I don't know, I don't wanna like-- - You don't have to name names. - Well, I'll just name names 'cause he's big. Michael Jordan isn't that great of a human being. He's just great at basketball. You know what I mean? So it's like, a lot of people find out that Michael Jordan's actually kind of a jerk. So, but man-- - I know Michael Jordan's listening to this, just kidding me. - Yeah, I know. Michael, sorry. Thanks for all you did. But yeah, but I love Michael Jordan. Some people love Michael Jordan. He left the legacy. - Absolutely. - Oh, I've had this conversation a billion times, by the way. - But deathbed Michael Jordan, who cares, man? If you don't have a bunch of people who just think you're the greatest father or the greatest husband or the greatest grandfather, whatever. Like, screw that. You know what I mean? And so that gets down to the heart of what it is. So I want to know that, you know, I am spreading intensity and passion for what I do, whatever it's going to be. So I guess that's-- - I just tried all kinds of things back to death. - I was like, where did we get there from the rest? - I don't know. But yeah, there's a really good quote that I can't think of offhand, but it's the heart of it is, you know, can you be a, oh, I think it's something like this. Can't remember who said it. I'll try to look it up and maybe add it later, but can you be a great man and a good man? And that being a pretty poignant thing. And in terms of what I talked to Jeremy Slagle about one of the things was perpetuating the idea of this crazy intense white knuckle passion hustle, pedal to the metal, every waking hour of your life is the only way to leave a good legacy or to actually make any headway in the creative world. And although, you know, I do think I spent a season more in that zone and I still am working really hard and lots of hours and all that to a certain degree, you're saying, I think, and you can tell me if this is right, that it's within the rest that you find the inspiration, you find, when everything settles down, you get to, you get in tune with, am I still passionate about this thing that I'm doing? - And if you're not still passionate about it, what type of, how do you have to change your goal or what new goal do you have to make so that you can have a clear vision for where you're headed next? So I could change my next year. You know, we're, I don't know when this podcast comes out, but we're coming up to the end of the year, so it's New Year's resolution time. So I could, you know, set a goal for the end of 2016. I want to, whatever. So then that gives me a new site, but I can only think of that at the end of 2016, when I'm not busy, you know, when I'm not, you know, that's only, that's either gonna come in the morning before I'm working and my head's clear or at just some like unpredictable excitement time and who knows when that's gonna come. But I think with rest, those come a little more often. Your brain's a lot more open to those new ideas. So I think that, you know, about the hustle, I honestly can say that when I see this crazy hustle being preached, there's, I have to believe that they don't have a real life to go to. And that may be a sad thing, and maybe that's just the reality of people's experience, but, you know, I've been married for almost 10 years now, and there's another, thank you. There's another person in my life that is way more important than me. - True. - You know, so that, you know, her happiness is way more important than my ability to design. But I'm lucky that my passion also drives her and inspires her, so that's a part of our relationship is that I'm an inspired dude doing what I wanna do with my life, but I also know that as great as my career may be, it's never gonna be number one priority ever. And like mowing the lawn is a bigger priority to me over, you know, getting ahead on a project. If I've met on my deadlines that day, you know, get out of here, I need to mow the lawn. There's some inspiration that's gonna happen when I'm mowing the lawn, and that's a valuable thing. I gotta get out of here. - And so part of me, part of this discussion and what I wanna talk about, I feel like we're talking a lot about the duality of holding a lot of different ideas in your head at the same time, because that's one of the things that I think humans aren't good at and the relativity of things, and because of that, we aren't very nuanced in the way that we talk about creativity because there is an element of hustle and there's an element of rest, and it's okay to hold both of those ideas in unison. And that's why I thought let's shine a light on that because it's not getting a lot of light shined on it. So yeah, that's really good. - So the moral of the story is don't hustle all the time. - Like hustle. - You do hustle, but know that part of the hustle is to chill out. - Too, totally true. - That's it. - Yes, awesome. - I think we've got it. - That's it. - You have any other final phrases, words, things you wanna put out there into the universe. - I think what I wanna say is don't get so worked up if there's other things in your life more important than your art career, because there's importance to it. It's like a comedian, like you have to go live, like Louis CK is rich now, like there's not as much funny stuff happening as a rich person. So you gotta live the life and you have to go out there and experience life to actually be inspired by stuff. So it's okay to chill out. And if you can afford to take a month off, take a month off, you know, if you can, you know, give yourself a moment, like force yourself to get away from time to time and just try it out and see if it works and see if, you know, more inspiration comes in because, you know, staying busy constantly, which is pretty much most of my career, it doesn't allow room for more ideas. It just allows me to do the work, write the invoices, make the money, and then do the whole thing over again the next day. - Actually, I'm really glad you ended there because I think that was the common thread through all three of these conversations. - Yeah. - Was that if you, it's something that I talk about on the podcast all the time, is that, you know, an art that lacks life is dead. - Yeah. - And you, if you're not living, your art will have no life. - And have no story. - And have no story, no reality. And you do know these people that I could name a billion musicians that started doing this very authentic thing that was on the back of a life lived. - Yeah. - And then they spend the next year in the studio with tons of cash and the next album has no life. - No conviction. - And eventually it all ends up being hip hop because they're all partying with, you know, hot ladies and going crazy and it doesn't have any connection to reality. And obviously, we're not at risk at that. There's not that much money, you know, in risk in our industry. But I think it is true that, you know, resting and enjoying life and finding things outside of creativity that inspire you and excite you only, although work isn't the ultimate goal, it does ultimately, that feeds into that. And then that work that's inspired feeds back into your life too. - Totally. - And that, it's not either or, so. - That's why Adele disappeared for the last few years and now the new record is freaking fire. - That's right. Adele, if you won't, yeah, she's-- - Adele, we know you're listening. - She's a big fan of the podcast. - 25th grade. - You know, she actually got into a massive rut and started listening to the podcast and I think you pretty much have that to think. - Yeah. - Yeah. - You're welcome. - Thanks, babe. (upbeat music) - All right, good times. That was a good old time. I need to get back and do some hangout time with my man, Brandon, if you're listening, Brandon. Thanks, guys. Thanks for listening to the show. Thanks for all the support. You guys have been reviewing the podcast on iTunes like Mad. You've been sharing it all over the place and I see it and I appreciate it and it's awesome. I'm so happy to be a part of this with you. I hope you learned something on the topic of rest. I encourage you to try to strike a balance where you're working from a place of rest. Thanks, guys. You can find this show on illustrationage.com/creativepeptalk. I will speak to you soon. I've got some exciting ideas for the podcast next week and for the podcast in general. There's all kinds of cool stuff going on behind the scenes. Thank you so much. Stay Pepped Up because you know what? I really do believe that success in the commercial arts has everything to do with being in the right mindset so that you can consistently hammer away at the right direction week after week, day after day, year after year. Thank you, guys. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - Hey, y'all. One more quick thing. Earlier this year, I rebuilt my website using Squarespace's new fluid engine and I was so pumped about how it turned out that I have been really thrilled to find as many ways to partner with them and tell you about what they can do and bring you discounts as possible. With social media going haywire, I think having a site that feels as unique as your creative work is essential to building trust with your target audience or your clients. I have had several clients point out how cohesive and fresh my site looks lately. And if you want to check that out and what I was able to do without any code, check out AndyJPizza.com. If you want to test it out, go to squarespace.com/peptalk to test it out yourself. And when you're ready to launch, use promo code PEPTALK for 10% off your first purchase. Thanks Squarespace for supporting the show and for supporting creative people. (upbeat music) - I did consider Barney a friend and he's still a friend to this day. - The idea of Barney is something that I want to live up to. You know, I love who you love me. I call it the purple mantra. - Barney taught me how to be a man. - Generation Barney, a podcast about the media we loved as kids and how it shapes us. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. (upbeat music)