Creative Pep Talk
029 - Unlock Your Best Work
Hey y'all, just a quick heads up. The episode you're about to listen to is 8 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 want to 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 and enjoy the episode. Well, hello again, it's been a little bit of time, I've been, I took a week off because we had our third baby, yes third, three of them, three of these children, we're crazy people who do that, I'm going to support three children now with art, but no, it's amazing and we had Alice last week and that's why I took a week off and she came into the world and it was great and she's beautiful and really sweet and quiet and we're loving her like crazy. So that's why I took a week off, thank you for all the congratulatory messages, they mean a lot, it's really nice to have support from the creative community, it's awesome and I just thank you for that. But we're back and now it's time to get peped out of our minds with the creative pep talk. This is me, Andy J. Miller, I'm a graphic illustrator. You can hear the podcast online at Andy-J-Miller.com/podcast or you can go to the website illustration age.com/creativepeptalk. The great man and illustrator Thomas James who used to have his own podcast called Escape from Illustration Island, he was a big fan of that, he set that syndication up and I thank him for that, he's the best, go check out his work too while you're at it. So also, one quick, we're going to get through these really fast, trust me, okay, we're going to get into the content but before we go, I just wanted to say thank you to those who have gone on my blog and donated some cash to the podcast. I didn't make this podcast to make money, that's not what my initial goal was and I'm going to keep doing it. Even if I can't financially justify it, I'm going to keep giving it away because I believe in the stuff that I'm doing here but I do appreciate those people who had reached out and wanted to donate some money. It does help me make this justify it, you know, spend it in half a day or more, a week on this, I really appreciate it. You guys make it easier for me to spend more time on the podcast and to everybody that's bought that do not be afraid, creative pep talk poster, you guys are awesome, I've got more ideas in the works, I've got a digital book in the works that should be out relatively soon, I'm really pumped about that. Anyway, thank you for reaching out for the donations and the buys and all that, it's really awesome and it's definitely helping me consider just spending more time doing these sorts of things. You know what, I've had some people reach out and ask about speaking gigs and I'm open for that, I really like doing that kind of thing so if that's you, hit me up on my email @andy-j-millor.com. Okay, now we're going to get straight into the content, today we're talking about how to unlock your best work. This is something that's been on my mind like crazy recently, you know, I feel like I spent the first couple years of my work developing my process, my craft, the quality, the style, getting, finding my voice and now that I feel like I've done a lot of that work, I'm thinking a lot more about the content of the work and knocking it out of the park when a project comes into my inbox, you know, not just getting the job but kicking the jobs but, you know, doing something that's blows the client's mind and I don't always do it, sometimes I fail and I have had failures in the past with this stuff but I'm trying to learn how to why systematically do that because being a professional, if you're a professional designer or a professional illustrator, that means that you are a gun for hire and when somebody comes to you with an awesome job you have to have the ability to deliver every time and if you really want to make a career out of this, you've got to figure out how to deliver really well because the career is made from repeat clients, repeat customers, people that you've knocked it out of the park before and you can do it again and I think that that's the key so you've got to learn how do you make good work on command and it's not easy, there's all kinds of things that get in the way, you know, I've heard a lot of people say that their best work is their work they do for themselves and actually I understand that, sometimes that's true for me but I think if you really want to make a go at this, you've got to figure out how to make your client work just as good and I think that those things that you learn about when you're doing the personal work that you can actually transfer those same ideas over into the work you're doing for clients. So here's what we're going to do, we're going to go through the list, I've got eight points, you know, me and I like my list and we're going to get deep into this thing and hopefully we're going to come out the other side with some good stuff. We're going to talk about John Cleese, Michael Jordan, we're not going to talk about Fraggles this time but you know I'm sure I'll get back on that next week, we are going to talk about Dragon Ball Z though so stick with me. I'm a believer in the idea of dressing for the job you want, not the job you have and I have applied this to my creative practice too which means if you want professional results you need to present online like a pro and that means going beyond social media and having a professional website that reflects your style and looks legit. I rebuilt my site this year with Squarespace's fluid engine and was so happy with how easily I could build my vision without coding that when they approached me to support the show, I jumped at the chance because I love and use this product. So go check it out Squarespace.com/peptalk to test it out for yourself and when you're ready to launch your site use promo code PEPTALK, all one word, all caps for 10% off your first purchase. Thanks goes out to Squarespace for supporting the show and supporting creators all over the world. 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 going to chat through our new Journey of 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 AndyJPizza.substack.com. And I hope to see you at this month's meetup. Number one. All right, play first, edit later. This is something I talked about in my little icon talk that I did last summer. Play first, edit later. Michael Jordan would not be able to win the championship. He would not be able to do his best work. He would not be able to get into the zone if he had to be the point guard and be the referee at the same time. Like you can't be in the mind of creating and editing at the same time. You've heard that silly like get the critics out of your head. It's true though. You've got to be able to go onto the paper and make marks that you don't know are going to be good. You have to do that. You have to surprise yourself. And you have to get into that zone of play. You know, I've talked about John Kleece. You should go look up his videos and talks on creativity. They're brilliant. He's the Monty Python guy. So he talks about you have to get into this open mode. That's when creativity happens. That's when the good jokes come. That's when the good drawings come. The good ideas come from being in that play mode. And I think actually when you become a professional and you grow up and you've got, you know, what bills to pay or people to support. It's easy to like lose the play because it doesn't feel like work. You know, it's hard to because when you're playing you can't like give yourself tight restrictions. You can't, you know, force it to happen. That's the opposite of play. Play happens when you're relaxed. Play happens when you don't have all of those pressures on your mind. And I think you've got to get in that zone to find your best ideas. You've got to get weird with the, you've got to get weird with the process. You've got to let it happen. You know, you've got to make marks that are going to be stupid. You've got to feel free to mess around. You've got to block off a big chunk of time where there's no distractions and there's no pressure and you've got to do that for every job. You've got to, you can't rush that. If you rush that stage, the end product is going to suffer for that. And that's been so true for myself. Whenever I skip that stage, I always regret it. It's never my best work. All right, number two, tap into your subconscious. Tap into your subconscious. This sounds hippie-dippy weird stuff and a little bit of it is and, you know, I like that stuff. I like the kind of weird mysterious side of things, you know, but I think it's just as much practical as it is, you know, ethereal and weird. This is another John Cleese thing, I also heard a leadership guy, Michael Hyatt, talk about this. It's the idea of letting your subconscious do a lot of the work because a lot of, you know, your subconscious is really brilliant and it makes connections between things and there's so much rich information in your subconscious, you know, that's not in the stuff that you're actively thinking about. And this is actually scientifically proven. So, you know, last year I did a dream journal for Chronicle Books called Strange Dreams and we did some research, some, you know, just basic research on dreams and one of the things that I found that was really interesting is that they would do in these experiments where they would have these people play this virtual reality skiing game and then they would go to sleep and the next morning play it again and what they found was they would hit a wall the night before where they couldn't get any better, they couldn't score any more points on the game and then after they'd gone to sleep, after they've done their dreams, they would wake up and they would be able to break past that wall and they even noticed they would wake them up in the middle of when the brain was doing the waves that they were dreaming, they would wake them up and they found that you've got two basic types of dreams and they're in different cycles of your sleep. So, one of them is this, it's in the past, it's what you already know, it's the nostalgic dreams where you're putting, making connections between experiences and things that you already know and then the other one, and this is usually the ones that are like nightmares, are when you're doing, you're playing out new scenarios, you're like practicing and saying, what if this happened, what would you do, you know, what about this, what about that? So, you're going at the past and the future in your own head and so, the people that were playing this game, a lot of them were dreaming about situations that were relevant to the game like walking through the snow and one person had like, dreamt about stepping in the footprints in the snow and it was like his mind was saying, here's one thing you know about snow is that it's easier to walk on snow if you walk in the footprints and it's just like a computer like refreshing all of this information you have and you actually unlock things by doing that. If you've ever watched the show House, you know that it's kind of based on this principle of they rack their bread, House is a medical diagnostician, so he's diagnosing like hard to diagnose diseases and issues that people come to the hospital for, it's supposed to be like a play on Sherlock Holmes, so Holmes House, you know, and so they would, they'd get their team, they'd rack their brains, they'd brainstorm, they'd try to come up with the best solutions that they could for this idea for what does this person have and they would hit a wall and they couldn't think about it anymore and then House would go into his other parts of his life, his regular life where he's having his relationships and problems and issues and everything and he'll have some other random thing tip him off to the solution when his subconscious is working about it and it's not his conscious mind actively and working and it's that play mode, it's that open like, you know, relaxation where you unlock these things and I heard someone say this and I can't remember where I heard it so I apologize but it was like when you have a problem you think really, really hard until you can't think anymore and you hit that wall and then when you've got there forget about the problem, go play a video game, go take a nap, go on a walk, go hang out with somebody and when you're doing that that's usually when you're gonna have that idea that you're reek a moment and so I think it's really important to tap into the full part of your brain not just your conscious mind and force things to happen but let it simmer in your subconscious, one of the best things you can do is, you know, I do this for the podcast, I try to always do some of the work the day before, the night before, you know, the ideas and coming up with the lists and all that jazz and then sleep on it and let my subconscious work on it while I'm asleep and then wake up and finish and often times what you're gonna find is and I heard Michael Hyatt say this and it's been true for me is that when you come back to a problem you can't even remember what you were struggling with because it's so obvious how to solve it and so I think this is a really important way of dealing with making your best work. Alright, number three, don't be precious. I might have told this story before I'm gonna tell it again. It's one of my favorite stories. When I was in college I had that arrogance of the untested, you know, the thinking I knew everything before I actually was in the industry, that stupid arrogance and my teachers kept saying, you know, you've got to come up with multiple solutions, you've got to, you know, let yourself come up with a bunch of different stuff, don't get precious with your ideas because that's not the best way of coming up with solutions. And, you know, what I would always do and I see a lot of students do this is they, you give them the brief, you give them the problem and they come up with an instant solution for the problem and they love they're married to that solution. They're obsessed with it and there's nothing you can do to change your mind and actually that's one of the worst ways to come up with ideas. You know, my story is for my thesis project, my end of the year project on my last year of college, we got to come up with a dream project and you had to come up with four unique solutions to the same project, to the same problem. And I came up with this, it was the project I came up with was a CD to be packaged with the red iPod which some of the proceeds of that go to AIDS relief in Africa. And I came up with this idea to do like this CD that had artwork and a poster that had was influenced by folk art from Africa. And I was married to the solution, I thought I was the best solution, I instantly had thought of it. And to come up with the other three ideas that I was required to come up with, I was just going to like phone it in, come up with something really fast and just mock it up and actually make them look worse. And I don't know if I was doing this consciously or not, but I kind of thought, all right, I'll just do, I'll really make the first one look great. And then the other three won't look so great. And then they'll pick the first one and I'll get to do that one. And so the last night I think before I had to make my presentations, I was in bed thinking of my other three ideas. And I was even thinking of like, I'm going to make dumb ideas because I don't want them to be good because I want to do the first one. And it was while it was laying there, the last idea I came up with was basically the indie rock coloring book, which if you don't know, that's one of my biggest projects I've done today. It turned into a published book, you know, it sold kind of a big quantity for a coloring book. And it was one, it's one of my biggest projects today. It's one of the things that my work is known for is my indie rock coloring book. And that literally came from being forced to come up with other ideas. And I think one of the reasons that works is because when the pressure isn't on. So if you have, if you're going to come up, if you know you're going to come up with one idea, you know that idea has to be amazing because if it's not, then you failed. But if you're going to come up with four ideas, it doesn't matter if three of them are dumb. And so I think if you have that, you can, it's easier to get in that play mode, like go back to number one, when you think it doesn't matter if these ideas are good or bad because only one of them has to work. And I think when you're in that relaxed zone, it's then that you come up with your best ideas. I think the other thing, the other reason this works is that one of the best things you can do with your work is delight people. You know, Milton Glaser says that and Frank Chimero has talked about that and I totally subscribe to that idea is that with art, one of the best things you can do is delight people. And that has to do with this work of surprising. How do you surprise somebody with a solution? And if you come up with the first, if you go with the first thing you come up with, you're going with the obvious idea. And if you do that, you're not going to make a surprising thing. And I think the best way to surprise other people is to surprise yourself. And I think the way you do that is you get weird and you get in your sketchbook and you make bad drawings. You know, Ping Zoo, who's a great illustrator, she does these gouache illustrations with dry brush and they're beautiful. And she has a page on her website called Ugly Drawings where she shows all of her terrible drawings, all the bad sketchbook stuff. And I love that because it helps break down this idea that your sketchbook needs to be beautiful or every drawing you need to make is beautiful. And I've heard these people that, you know, they buy these fancy sketchbooks and they have all this pressure because their favorite artists have these beautiful sketchbooks. They have all this pressure to make, you know, these amazing drawings, you know, these amazing drawings for everyone. And I think that the thing that happens is you get so precious that you don't want to draw anything or you want to draw everything perfectly and it ends up missing the best part, like surprising yourself with those, forgive me for saying this, happy accidents that phrase, Bob Ross style. You know, these things, these weird things, that unexpected stuff, that's the good stuff. And so if you get an editorial project and let's say it's on Democrats versus Republicans in the next election and you know, when you get in your sketchbook and you start writing down or drawing all the obvious stuff, the donkey, the elephant, the candidates, the, you know, presidential buttons and stickers and all that. And that's fine and get that stuff out. That's the obvious stuff. But then the next stage, what you need to do is draw a baby elephant and then draw it in a zoo and then draw it in Africa and then draw the other African animals and then draw the zookeeper and then, you know, draw the zookeeper's wife and then go to the zookeeper's kid and him going to do his other stuff and what the zookeeper does when he's not at the zoo and now he's at the movies and now, you know, just go down that path and get weird with it, get off topic and it's in that stuff and then in the weird like overlapping of the sketches and just put everything down on the page, you're going to end up finding something that surprises you within that. And I think if you're precious with your work and precious with your sketchbook, you're not going to find your best stuff. Alright, number four is B.U. Lisa Hanawalt on her interview with Sam Weber on his podcast, Your Dreams My Nightmares. She said something that I found really interesting and it was something that I've experienced a lot too, which is, you know, she has this wacky kind of crazy illustration that, you know, has this off-beat humor and when she would get an editorial job in her mind, she would think what would an editorial artist do with this? And it would totally stumper and it would get all weird because she would have this idea, this pressure of editorial illustration is like this kind of thing and you try to make that kind of thing and you end up not doing your work. And then she realized like if someone comes to me, they're looking for me to do my thing. So instead of trying to fit into these rules, these imaginary rules, I'm just going to do my thing. And I think that pressure to fit into these unwritten rules really often throws us off. Recently I saw a tweet by Daddu Shin, who's an editorial artist, and he said he keeps forgetting that illustration has no rules. There's no rules. And I think that's totally true. I think when you get into the pro world, you learn so much, you hear so much criticism and advice and all of that jazz that you start imagining that there's these unwritten rules to design an illustration. And I think if you tried to write them out, you'd be hard pressed to do it because I don't think there really are rules and the best rule I think is to bring your own voice, bring your own opinions, bring your own way of doing stuff to your projects and don't allow the pressure of what this thing should be, throw you off from what you should make it. You know I think about this The Muppets movie from a few years back with Jason Segal, which I'm a massive fan of Jason Segal and Muppets. And I loved that. And Brett from Flight of the Concords actually wrote a few of the songs. Those songs were super good. And he talked about how when they, when he had this opportunity to write these songs, he was at first kind of worried with the pressure of filling the shoes of the guy who'd written the Rainbow Connection, which is a massive song from one of the early Muppet movies. And I love that song. But I think at some point he had to shift gears and just write it kind of like it was a Flight of the Concords song. And actually if you hear those songs, you hear the same kind of humor that are in his personal songs. And I think it's that ability to take that process and that freedom of your personal work and inject it into your client work. That's when you start to find it really starts to work. That's when it starts to get good. And I've actually heard Jeff McFetridge say the same story of, you know, he would get a project and he would kind of do what they asked him to do. And it never really worked out. But it was when he started to go back through his sketchbooks and pick stuff out of his personal stuff and try to make it, and he kind of approached it like, you know, it was like his gallery work. That's when stuff always starts to get interesting. And I totally agree with that. So number four is BU. Do your thing. Okay, five is know the process, know your process. You know, I think back to like the scientific method. And I think they kind of think that science was born when they figured out the process of doing science. What was the method for approaching this thing? And I think of the design process as a great process of, you know, defining the problem, researching, developing, getting feedback, you know, making iterations. And I think that that process is so important to know not only processes that work, but understanding what your process is. You know, my dad pointed out to me a few years ago, I was writing a lot of content for the web about creativity, kind of similar to this podcast. And you know, I would go in circles like when, because I didn't know my writing process, I would do a lot of things like I would write a little bit, but I get frustrated because it wasn't working. And then I'd call my dad or call one of my friends and talk to them about it or talk to my wife about it. And then I go back to the drawing board and then, you know, and I just realized, and he just pointed out my dad said that, you know, you seem to have a kind of way of doing this where, you know, you go on a walk or you spend some time in your head, just kind of mulling over stuff, then you take notes, and then you talk about it with somebody, and then you write it, and then you edit it. And then when I got that process down, it was, my time spent working was so much more fruitful, and the stuff that I made was so much better. I think it's really important to recognize what's happening when you're in the process. You know, last night, you know, I teach a class at CCAD, the Columbus College of Art and Design here in Columbus, Ohio. And last night, they did a cyber question and answer with Jessica Hisch, the brilliant letter in overall nice person. She was answering questions of the students, and one of the things that she was talking about, she's known for this quote of hers, where the work that you're doing when you're procrastinating is probably the work that you should always be doing. And she was just saying that that doesn't have to be some giant thing. It can be like when you're working on a project, noticing the part of the process that you enjoy the most, and then trying to maximize that and do more of that. So for instance, you know, when she would do her illustrations and she would find herself doing lettering, she realized that she really, really enjoyed that part of the process. And so she would try to expand that to make her work more about lettering. And I think under being really present and getting some distance and being self-aware about, oh, this is the time in the process when I get my best ideas or when I did that thing, when I worked on my sketchbook, for me, my best ideas come from when I think about stuff first, separate to drawing. When I go on a walk, when I take a bath, and I just, I let all of the ideas start to come, and then I just start making notes in my phone or on a piece of paper, and then I start drawing, and then I, you know, that's how I come up with my good ideas. But yours are going to be different. You're going to have a different way. And I think having the self-awareness and the distance to kind of understand what works for you, and then being able to, like, come up with a workflow, coming up with a process that's pretty hardcore, that's, you know, pretty defined so that you can go back to it, and you can keep doing it. You don't have to go through all the muddy waters of coming up with a new process every time and doing it randomly. That's kind of what an amateur does. A pro has to understand how to work, how do they do their thing. So I think that's really important to come up with, to know what your process is. Okay. Number six is be present. Be present when you get a job. Here's the, here's the dark side of being a professional. The dark side is you develop craft, you develop process. And when you've got your craft to your work and your process, you don't even need to be present to make good work. You don't need to. It's kind of like they're like a formula. You can do craft plus process equals pretty good work. And that's great. You need to be able to do that. You need to be able to fire on command and have that predictability and consistency. But I think if you listen to the bands that, you know, get really good at the craft and the process, it's like they plugged in the numbers and the album came out. And yeah, it's good. It's like, you know, it's a, it's an above average album, but that soul is missing. And I think often when we approach our work, especially when you come a pro, you let the craft and the process dictate the solution. And it's really easy to do it that way. But I think the way you get great work is you do craft plus process plus presence being in it and adding that human thing, adding that thing that surprises you and remembering to be, to be there. And you know when you're there and you're, and you're actively thinking, what would be funny here? What would be unusual? What would be surprising? What, you know, the times when I do it that way and I'm active, I'm actively present, like I want to be in this moment, in this project, and I want to give it my all in the moment. And I think you got to think of like pro athletes. It's like, again, I'd go back to basketball all the time. My childhood was surrounded by basketball, even though I didn't actually, I wasn't interested in it. But I think about these pro athletes who, you know, they've got the mechanics, the muscle memory of their shot, right? And they, you know, Michael Jordan can, Reggie Miller, he can do threes all day, right? He can just, it's got, it's automatic. But when you're, when it's game time, it's not just that automatic muscle memory. You've got to be actively present in that very moment, making those decisions right there. You have the beat, your whole self has to be there. You can't be distracted. That's how you get great work. I really believe that. So when you're in that sketchbook, you're not just doing, oh, I sketch that, sketch that. Oh, and I know how to, you know, put this kind of shine on it in the final touches stage that makes it look good, kind of no matter what the idea is. You've got to be actively engaged in that process. You can't just let the process and the craft determine the outcome. You've got to come up with, you got to let your mind actually do the hard work and do the hard work of being present and self-aware and, and, and pushing your, your, your current self into the mix. Oh, the holidays are here. You've got to find a unique gift for Uncle Derek and your sister Catherine and her kids, Jetson and Jeddah and Jirfree and Jaggab and another two Jay kids. There's so much thinking, so much searching. Plus there's the ethical thing. You've got to shop small. It just, it's a lot, but it doesn't have to be. Uncommon goods makes all of this simple and straightforward for real. The site is chock full of unique and interesting gifts that also support small businesses. My fam loves advent calendars. I think Sophie would like to stitch a day advent calendar and 12 days of hot sauce is definitely shouting my name. Sorry, that wasn't me. 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You know, being human is so much about expectation or the animals on this planet that think about the future or the ones that, you know, a joke actually is a play on expectations. You think I'm going this direction and then I surprise you by going a different direction and that makes you laugh. And it's that kind of thing that you're looking for in your work. And if you just let the craft and the process and the formula determine the outcome, it's going to be expected. You're not going to do something unexpected. It's actually allowing yourself to be human in that moment that gets your best result. All right, number seven, get in the zone. We've talked about that book flow before, right? This idea of getting in the zone. You know, I heard Michael Hyatt actually another thing that he reminded me of recently was on his podcast was getting into the zone by music. So one of the things that I did that's really helped me is that thought of those songs that really inspire me that really feel like my work and my style and the type of work I want to make. And I created a soundtrack to my work. And that actually really helped me get into the zone of like what kind of work I want to be doing. And so the times when I put that on and just kind of sketch and get into that moment, I come up with the types of solutions that I really want my work to be like. And so I've kind of noticed over the years and taken note of when some piece of music is really getting me into that place. Oftentimes it's instrumental for me. One of my favorites is John Bryan's score for Eternal Sunshine. For whatever reason, that music really gets me into that flow mode. I think that's a really easy way to do it. But I think the other thing, you know, I think about it like this, right? I watched Dragon Ball Z when I was a kid. And if you watched it, you knew that 90% of the episode were these characters charging up, just basically like grunting and like glowing and they're like charging their power up as they're like staring each other down. It's ridiculous. I think if you took out all that charging, the show would be like two minutes long. You know, the whole season is these guys charging. And you know, the main characters, they're these sands from a different planet. And they have this ability to get super powerful. And they go from having black hair to blonde hair, which sounds like a really weird thing actually. And they get blonde hair. And when they go from regular sands to super sands with blonde hair, they get their super powers. And I kind of imagine that figuring out how to get into your flow is like becoming your super saying. You're going from the regular you to the super saying you. And if you try to do your best work in the regular mode without getting into that flow, which is phoning it in, you're not going to beat the boss. If you don't go into, you don't power up into your super saying mode, you're going to get your butt kicked. And I feel like that's what flow is like. And I think that you've got to figure out, you've got to be able to think about and detach yourself enough to kind of get distance and look at what when you make your best work, when do you get in that feeling where, you know, they describe it in the author of the book flow described it as getting into this mode where it almost feels like the work is making itself. It's just flowing onto the onto the page. When do you feel like that and noting those things and noting those circumstance, because when you do that, it's going to be easier to return to that place. So go super saying. Well, I guess it was getting the zone. Number eight, discipline, right? Steven Pressfield in the book, the war of art, which I said wrong last time, I said art of war, so easy to say it that way. But the war of art, Steven Pressfield said that you've got to be a pro. You've got the difference between someone who goes on and does great work and someone who doesn't. You've got to be a pro. You've got to show up every day. And he talked about this artist that said or author that said he was asked, do you wait for inspiration to strike or do you just show up, you know, are you disciplined about it? And he said, well, I wait for inspiration to strike. Luckily, it strikes at nine a.m. every day. And it was basically just saying that you've got to show up every day. If you're going to be a pro, if you're going to learn how to do this thing on command, you can't sit around waiting for the magic inspiration. And I kind of liken it to lightning striking, right? So let's say in this one point on in a field, lightning strikes randomly, but we know it strikes five times a month in this spot. But there's no way of knowing when it's what minute it's going to be. That's kind of like what inspirations like. But if you every day wake up and get to that spot at nine a.m. and leave at five p.m., you're going to be way more likely to catch that lightning than if you just go there randomly. And I think that's the kind of idea of doing great work. You've got to actually have the discipline to do the process, to show up to the page, even when you don't feel like it, sit down and do the work. You know, I've been noticing, I feel like we've had the rise of the pro musicians. I feel like there's a lot of bands out there. You know, I feel like we've gotten tired of these bands that wait for inspiration. You know, they take years off. When they do an album it's kind of totally random and they don't have a craft. So they're, you know, sometimes it's really good. Sometimes it's really bad. And I think for me, my taste has actually changed. So I like the bands. And I think there's more of them now than they ever have been who you can count on. When their next album comes out, you can count it's good. And it's because they treat it like a profession. They treat it with the discipline of I'm going to go through all the right processes. I'm going to come to this with fresh eyes. And I'm going to do all the things that get me into the zone. And I think we're seeing a lot more musicians approach it that way. You know, the rock star mentality where it was like party and just see what happens and whatever. You know, that gets a lot more mixed results. If you want to do this as a profession, you've got to figure out how to make how do you do creativity disciplined. And that and all of these other things we talked about, they're all part of the discipline of doing your great work. You've got to figure out how to systematically approach this stuff. And yes, there's parts of art that is magic. There's parts of art that's like falling in love that you can't plan. But like the lightning striking, if you're showing up to the pitch every day, you're more likely to catch it. I wanted to do one more that I thought of while I was doing this number nine. And it's when I talk about all the time, but it's get a life. And I can't stress this enough because I think if you're going to make it as a pro commercial artist, you do have to be a little bit obsessed. You do have to be a major fan of the field. You do have to like put all your everything into it that you've got that you can. And I think sometimes though, it's to our detriment. You know, this podcast is no good. If I don't have any references outside of our world, you know, it doesn't give us any distance. I got to listen to other, I got to listen to radio lab. I got to read other books. I got to enjoy movies. I got to go be with my family. I got to go have new experiences outside of art so that I can bring those things back and make our work have life. I always say, if you don't have a life, your work will be dead. Your work won't have a life. You know, illustration or design, four designers about design is so dead. It's so boring. You know, it lacks the life. You know, and I feel like you've got to give yourself permission to take time off, to enjoy other things, to have new experiences that have nothing to do with the industry. And if you don't do that stuff, your work is going to lack person. It's going to lack human quality. And other people outside the industry are not going to be relating to it. You know, sometimes the work I like a lot is the stuff that my peers really like. But it's not always the stuff that actually works in the real world. And I think you've got to be able to fill yourself up with life and, you know, finding all of the ways how you get full as a person and then let that fullness leak onto the page. I've said this metaphor a billion times when I think it's really good, which is you get those bands. They start with their career with this album that's full of life because it's on the back of a life lived. And then their second album they approach from a life in the studio and it's an album about music making. Or, you know, these people that go from doing their craft and doing their thing and their music is all about their life. And then eventually they get famous and now their celebrities and now their life is weird, their life is Hollywood and nobody can relate to it. You know, their life is about the industry. And I feel like that's such, that's a recipe for disaster. It's a recipe for bad work. So I really do believe you've got to have hobbies and interests and life outside of your career and outside of your industry. That's so important. Okay, that's pretty much it for today. You know, I'm going to keep trying to do my best work. I've been really trying to like when I get that email with the new job, you know, the biggest challenge for me is when it's a job that's a big job for a client that I'm excited about working with. It's so easy to like buckle under the pressure of that. And then early in my career, you know, I had some opportunities when I first graduated that I desperate to go back with all the, you know, just like Uncle Rico, you know, when he's like, don't you ever wish you could go back with all the knowledge you have now? That's what I feel like. I wish I could go back and do that project that was one of my dream projects. And I just, I didn't do it right. I didn't do, I didn't have all these disciplines and these things. And I feel like I want to remember these things. I want to be systematic about tapping into the zone and play and doing my best work. And so I hope these are good reminders for you. I'm guessing it's not a bunch of new stuff. I'm guessing it's just stuff that you maybe needed to remind it of or getting pumped up about. And I hope it helps. Again, I appreciate all those reviews on iTunes. That's I'm told that's how other people find it, how the how the popularity of the podcast goes up. I'm super thankful for that. I'm super thankful for the donations, the people that've gone out of their way to donate to the podcast and buy the poster and all that jazz. I really appreciate all that stuff. I appreciate your notes and your messages and sharing it on Twitter and Instagram and Facebook, all that support and the people that have reached out and told me that this has made a difference to them and that I should keep doing it and that they're loving it. And all of that stuff makes it worthwhile. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much. Thank you for listening. Thank you for sharing this, especially you guys out there. I know my peers who I really respect to you guys have been so encouraging about this. That means a ton to me. I'm really grateful that I can kind of serve our community in this way. And yeah, I just hope that I can keep doing it. I'm going to at least try to do a hundred episodes. I might do more. This is episode 29, I believe. I might just do it forever, but my goal is to do a hundred. And I've got a digital book in the works. So watch out for that and I'll let you know when that happens. Also, last note, you know, I got a new website. I've worked on it for quite some time. I'm super proud of it. Go check it out. Andy at Andy-J-Miller.com. You can check out my new website with new work and all kinds of stuff going on there. Thank you illustration age for syndicating the podcast. You can find it on illustrationage.com/creativepeptalk. And also, hey, if you got some kind of company out there and you want to talk about sponsorship for the show, I'm open to that. I'm going to be getting a few sponsors, I think. Again, help justify this financially, justify taking time off. I'd like to even spend more time doing these sorts of things. Writing more, writing books, writing more on my blog, being able to spend more time doing kind of personal consultations on stuff. I've been doing a little bit of that. I love doing this stuff. I love helping people make their best contribution as creatives. And I'd like to spend more time on it. I'd like to maybe spend 50 percent of my time doing this and 50 percent of the time doing the art. And so, yeah, you guys are making it possible. I couldn't be more thankful to you guys. And until next week, keep peped up. Oh, and just one more thing. I've had a lot of people reach out and say they've missed the slurping. And so, after the music stops, I'm going to wait three seconds. And I'm going to give you one real big slurp for all of you. And that's a warning for all of you out there who hate the slurps. But, you know, let some of my tried and true fans, they're missing me. They're missing the slurping. They're missing our coffee chats. And so, for them, here is a nice big slurp. See you next week. Hey, y'all. One more quick thing. Earlier this year, I rebuilt my website using square spaces, 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 at your first purchase. Thanks, Squarespace, for supporting the show and for supporting creative people. 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 love as kids and how it shapes us. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. (upbeat music)