Navigate the Creative Wilderness: 3 Tips to Overcome Overwhelm

1. Welcome to Overcome Overwhelm: If you're anything like me and a lot of creatives that I talk to, the overwhelm of choice can stop us in our tracks. When we're standing here on the edge of the creative wilderness all packed up and ready to go, we can see the multitude of potential beautiful paths that we could take on our journey, but that multitude can feel really overwhelming to know where to even begin. That's why today in this class in the creative wilderness tip series, we're going to talk about how to overcome overwhelm and choose a path to move forward on your journey into the creative wilderness. Hey, I'm Liz, I'm an illustrator and creative educator based in New Mexico. I own a creative company called Prints and Plants and I have spent many years out here in the wild unknowns of the creative wilderness navigating a winding path through the lows and the highs and the immense raw utter beauty of the creative journey. Now I'm so excited to share my field notes and tips with you so you can gain more confidence in your own creative track and know that you're not alone out there. When there are so many options to choose from, there can be a lot of fear that you might make the wrong choice or choose the wrong path, and that fear can stop you from taking any step at all. Let me tell you, you do not want to miss out on the beauty and depth of the creative wilderness. You definitely want to get out here, that's why today I'm sharing how to move past your fear of making the wrong choice as well as my three guiding prompts to overcome overwhelm and make a decision to move forward on your journey. By the way, if you've taken one of the classes in this creative wilderness tip series before and are already acquainted with how it works and what you need, go ahead and jump right to lesson number 4. Let's get going. 2. Class Project: For this lesson, we're chatting about your creative wilderness class project for this lesson. Your class project for this portion of the creative wilderness tip series is to print off the creative wilderness field guide PDF and fill out the overcome overwhelm section. In this section, you'll find the following prompts. One, which path excites you most? Two, which path stretches you? Three, which path is practical right now? You'll learn about these prompts throughout this class so that you can fill them out in your own field guide. You can find the creative wilderness field guide linked in the projects and resources tab of this class. You can find that by navigating to this bar, clicking Projects and Resources, and navigating to the right side of the page. There you'll see the field guide linked and ready to download. Once you've completed the overcome overwhelm section of your creative wilderness field guide, snap a photo and upload it to the class project section. You can do this by navigating to the Projects and Resources tab and clicking Create Project. Here you can upload a photo of your completed section of the field guide. Be sure to include both a cover photo image as well as include the image in this box here. You can also type additional notes and observations from your creative wilderness journey in this space. Make sure you hit "Publish" when you are finished to save your project to the project gallery. In the next lesson, we'll go over the materials you'll need for this class. I'll see you there. 3. Gather Your Materials: In this lesson, I'm sharing the materials that you'll need for this class in the creative wilderness tip series. For this class, you'll need the creative wilderness field guide PDF and a pen, pencil, or writing utensil of choice. You'll also need your phone to snap a photo of your completed field guide to upload to the class project section. In the next lesson, we'll go over how to move past your fear of making the wrong choice so you can move forward on your creative journey through the wilderness. See you there. 4. Embrace and Reframe Your Fears: In this lesson, we'll talk about some of the main fears that come up when you're overwhelmed by creative options and how to move past your fear of making the wrong choice so you can move forward on your creative wilderness journey. There are many fears that can come up when we're on the edge of starting a new creative journey. Whether that's a new work of art, a new business idea, or a new client project. I'm covering three main fears in this class that have been pretty common in my creative journey and in the journeys of many creatives that I've talked to. The first fear is that you're going to choose the wrong path. The feeling of making the wrong choice can be really scary and stop you from taking any action or any steps out here into the creative wilderness at all. I think it's time we reframe the fear of making the wrong choice. I don't really believe that there is a wrong path to choose. Let's reframe this fear to say, "Every path will lead me where I'm meant to be." Even if it's through mistakes, and mishaps, and failure, which by the way, it will be, it will lead us where we need to be. Really, when you're looking at all of your options and paths and are worried about making the wrong decision, it's still going to inform you and you'll learn from that choice regardless of if it ends in the way that you expect. The second fear is that the path you choose is going to dead end and you'll have to turn around and start over again. First I want to say that dead ends aren't even marked on the creative wilderness map because they are everywhere, they happen. It's just part of the journey. You're on a path that's going great. You're in the flow and then you hit a dead end and you'd have to turn around. But what's so beautiful about that moment is that new opportunities and pathways open up that we didn't see at first glance. Because when we turn around at that dead end, we can see a new trail that we overlooked earlier or a new path that was cleared since we last passed it. No need to fear dead ends because we can reframe that fear to say, "Dead ends lead to new opportunities." The third fear that often comes up is the fear of failing or messing up. What I say who this fear is, welcome to creativity and to the creative wilderness. Failure is just part of it out here and failure is beautiful. As a perfectionist myself or as I like to say now, a recovering perfectionist, failure is something that freaks me out too. It's something I've tried and still try to avoid because failing and making mistakes, that's totally uncomfortable, and that's normal. But we can reframe the failure and say instead, "Failure helps me learn faster." Then we can welcome failure in and say, "That was embarrassing," or, "That was not what I thought it would be." But now what do I know from that experience? Because failure is experience and experience is such a good teacher because when we embody something and go through the failure first hand, we learn faster. Keep these three reframes in mind when you're feeling fearful of choosing a path into the creative wilderness. Number one, every path leads me where I need to be. Number two, dead-ends lead to new opportunities. Number three, failure helps me learn faster. The main thing when you're making a choice about which path to take on your journey is to just take a step. One step, one choice. You just got to get out here into the creative wilderness because once you do, more information will become available to you with each step that you take. Each step leads to the next. It's an intuitive process out here on the creative journey and each action, each step will help you build more confidence and your unique creativity, your intuition, and your path through this wilderness. This ties directly to art-making. Think about it. Making an art is an intuitive process. You don't have to have it all figured out before you create. You can make one line on a piece of paper that will inform the next line and the next and the next. Maybe you make a line that you don't like, no big deal. You incorporate it into the art or learn from it and move on. There are still so many ways to be creative, once a mistake has been made, it's part of the process. Embrace that intuition. Be thoughtful and intentional about your steps without being so overly thoughtful that you're not moving at all. I'm speaking from experience here. Embrace the fear and take one step so you can enter this beautiful creative wilderness. Because, what a shame it would be to always be living on the edge, rather than diving into the richness and beauty that's waiting for you out here. Now that we have those reframes and mindset in our back pocket, it's time to go over the three guiding questions you can ask to overcome overwhelm and choose your path forward. Because here's the thing, even when you know the mindset and reframes, if you're really excited by a lot of different projects or business ideas or illustration topics, you might want to work on all of them at once, which I do that too and I'm not going to pretend that I don't. But there are times when it's really necessary to pick one focus, hone in, and make traction on that path. In the next lesson, I'm sharing the first question to ask yourself to overcome overwhelm and move forward. I'll see you there. 5. What Lights You Up?: In this lesson, we're covering the first question to ask yourself to overcome overwhelm, and pick your path out here into the creative wilderness. As we dive into these questions, I want to note that when you make one choice, and choose one path, that doesn't mean that you're ignoring all of the other options forever. You're not saying that none of those other paths are ever going to happen. You're just saying, right now, this one path is my focus. That focus can be really refreshing because then you can break that journey down into clear, tangible, actionable steps. The first question you can ask yourself when you're making a choice for which path to take is this, what am I totally stoked about? What could you talk about forever, or what could you take a kajillion online classes to learn about? What pulls you forward, and gives you energy, and makes you really excited, and feel alive? Because having that energy is so valuable, and important. Because when you're walking on a path, and working on a path, it's winding and it can be hard at times, so having the excitement and joy can give you the energy to pull through. So what are you really excited about? What gives you that sense of energy? What gives you energy back when you devote your time to it? Is it a specific art process, a medium, a theme, a creative business goal? What excites you, and gives you energy? Once you've determined your answer to that question, go ahead and write it down in your field guide. In the next lesson, we're covering the second question to ask yourself to overcome overwhelm, and pick your path into the creative wilderness. See you there. 6. What Stretches You?: In this lesson, we're covering the second question to ask yourself to overcome that pesky overwhelm and move forward on your creative journey. The second question to ask yourself is, what is my stretch zone? Just like how we're out here at the edge of the creative wilderness waiting to enter into its depths and mystery, your stretch zone is just another edge in your journey. Your stretch zone is a place where you feel like you're stretching and growing, but it still feels manageable and not overwhelming. Instead of going from, say, 0-120 miles per hour overnight, what stretches you over time and makes you grow in a really sustainable way? This might be learning a new creative medium. Maybe you're a painter and so you start to try ceramics and that new medium is really stretching you and your skills. Maybe you're running a creative business and you're interested in making it more mobile and flexible so you can travel, so you start learning about a new print-on-demand site and that stretches your brain and skills and your ways of thinking about business. In your field guide, write your answer to this question. Which path stretches me? Which option out of all the options that you're choosing to enter into the creative wilderness, which one stretches you and puts you into that growth zone. In the next lesson, we're covering the third question to ask yourself to overcome, overwhelm, and pick your unique path into the creative wilderness. I'll see you there. 7. What's Practical?: In this lesson, we're covering the third and final question to ask yourself to overcome, overwhelm and move forward on your creative journey into the wilderness. The third question to ask yourself is, what's practical? When I say practical, I mean that you can see that the path that you are choosing is possible. It might not happen overnight or next week, but you can see roughly even if it's not the full clear vision yet, because that often comes with the steps that you take forward. But you can roughly see that there would be steps through the wilderness on this path that would lead you to the goal that you have. A path being practical can be as simple as seeing that somebody else has done it before you. That doesn't mean that your path, and your steps are going to be the exact same as theirs because even though we're all out here in the creative wilderness together, our paths look quite different. But just knowing that somebody else has done it before you, can be the practicality that you can do it too. The practical aspect is also tied to what's going on in your life right now because yes, you're a creative yes, you're an artist. You might be a creative business owner, but you're also a human being. I am a huge advocate for taking care of yourself and the human side of you. Check in with yourself. I know that's a balance. Things are busier at some times in our lives, and others. But consider what's practical in this season of your life. Again, allow yourself to be stretched and grow. But if you're moving or going through a huge life transition then maybe the path you're choosing right now is smaller, and it's a creative outlet to help you heal, or a creative outlet to help you process a transition. But if you have more space or time in your schedule, then maybe the path you choose takes more energy and focus because you have that right now. Another practical point from a creative business perspective is around money. For example, when you're looking at potential income streams that you could choose from, is there one path in those options that would help you bring in consistent income efficiently so that you could have a foundation upon which to build out other income streams that might take longer to show a return? Take a moment to reflect on this season of your life and write down your answer to this third question in your field guide. What's practical right now? Those are the three main prompts you can go through when you're facing overwhelmed to pick a path, and move forward into his beautiful creative wilderness. Once you've filled out those questions in your field guide, join me in the next lesson where I'll share a tangible, personal example of how I walked through these three guiding prompts to pick a path in my own creative journey forward. I'll see you there. 8. Learn from a Personal Example: In this lesson, I'm sharing a personal example of how I used the three guiding questions I just shared with you to pick a path in my own creative journey. I started my creative business, Prints and Plants in the spring of 2017, and it looks totally different than it did then, that's a story for another time. In 2019, two years after starting, I was teaching on Skillshare, then I decided it was a goal of mine to become a top teacher on the platform. In 2019, I also learned about licensing artwork, and was totally thrilled by that idea. Suddenly in 2019 I had two big goals. One, become a top teacher on Skillshare, and two, license my artwork. I started trying to do both at the same time, which in some cases can't work, but these were two really big creative goals that took a lot of my energy, learning, and time. At that time I was still working on another part-time job, so I knew I needed to pick one focus and one path. In January of 2020, about less than a year later after discovering these two big goals I had, I decided to go all in, and fully focus on the top teacher path. I would put off licensing until later. I knew I would circle back to licensing, but I chose the Skillshare top teacher goal because of the three guiding prompts that I shared with you in the previous lessons. First, I answered the question, what am I really stoked about right now? I determined that I love Skillshare, I love teaching, I love this work, and I love connecting with students like you. Then I answered the question, what's my stretch zone? I knew I had so much to learn in terms of audio, and video, and class production really go back to my very first class on Skillshare called Beginner's Guide to Fabric Printing, which you can find on my profile, and you will see what I mean. I was ready to learn a lot about these skills, and that felt like a great fun stretch zone for me to be in. Lastly, I answered the question, what's practical for me right now? One practical component was that at the time, as I mentioned, I was still working another part-time job while building my business, so I knew I was going to be compartmentalizing my business into the free time I had. It felt like I could do this Skillshare goal within the time I had open in my schedule, another practical aspect was that I could see that there were so many top teachers on the platform that I admired. I could go back and look at their classes, take their classes, and learn about what they do, how they incorporate class projects, how they film, what audio they use. I could see that other people had reached this goal before me, and it was possible, people had walked this path before. The last practical aspects I considered was from a monetary standpoint, because I wanted to go full time in my business, and I knew that with the licensing goal, that would likely take longer to reach, potentially years to see your return on investment of my time. But with the Skillshare goal, even if I wasn't a top teacher, as I published new classes, I would still be generating an increasing revenue in my business. Ideally, if I could increase it enough, I could quit my part-time job and go full time in my business, which was my goal. Those three prompts about excitement, stretch zone, and practicality, all felt fully aligned with the top teachers Skillshare goal. That's why I decided to focus my energy there first. Then I wrote on paper, by September 2020, I am a top teacher on Skillshare. Then I made a plan of actionable steps for that journey in the creative wilderness so that I didn't just wander around. By the way, if you want to learn more about breaking down a big goal into practical steps, you can take my time management for creatives class. You can find that on my profile page. I started with research. I looked at top teachers that I admired on the platform, and watched, and researched their classes, I looked for common threads of what was showing up a lot. Those threads were high-quality video, high-quality audio, and the teachers were being themselves. I was finding the common factors between top teachers and their class content. I also read so many articles on Skillshare's teaching guidelines and blog about how to up level my game. Then I planned how frequently I would publish classes that year. With each one that I made, I tried to take a bit more information from my research, and incorporate it into the new class, so that they could get better and better each time, and I'm still doing that today. Then what happened? Well, September came and went, and I wasn't a top teacher, and that was just fine. That's the important thing about the excitement prompt. I was so stoked to be teaching, and be on the platform, and be part of this community, that I was still enjoying the process, and not just the end result of the goal. Because I didn't reach my goal by my deadline of September, I didn't stop teaching, I published another class at the end of that month. I was going to keep teaching as long as I could. But what ended up happening was that in November I got an email invitation to become a top teacher on Skillshare, and I pretty much freaked out, I was so excited. But throughout the process of getting to that goal, I let go of a false outcome. I did everything I could in the process that I could control, like research, and creating classes, and connecting with students, and then I let go of the result. When I did reach the goal, the monetary practicality did allow me to shift into my business full time. By the way, that was almost four years after starting my business, so sometimes these things take time. If you feel like you're moving slowly or you're behind, you're not, it's totally normal. Now that I reached that goal, I'm still publishing on Skillshare, obviously. It's not like I checked it off a list and it's out of my life. But I learned through that path and journey in the creative wilderness towards that goal, that I could set up a system for how to create my classes and how often to publish them. I created a structure. Now that that system is there, it's more of a foundation. I'm still learning all of the time of course, but I have a solid understanding, and can start exploring the other paths that I'm interested in out here in the creative wilderness. Now, I've moved onto the path of licensing my artwork as the main goal. With this example, I want to note that everything you see on the creative wilderness map in your field guide were places I encountered on that path toward the Skillshare top teacher goal, and everything you see on the creative wilderness map are places I'm encountering now on the path towards the licensing goal. The creative wilderness isn't a onetime thing, it's a continuous, beautiful journey for any project or endeavor that you're working on. When you hit places like the Forest of Fear, or Celebration Pass, you know that those are totally normal spaces to encounter on your journey. In the next lesson, we'll recap the steps to overcome, overwhelm, and pick your creative path. I'll see you there. 9. Pick Your Path: In this lesson, we're recapping the main steps to take to overcome, overwhelm, and pick your path into the creative wilderness. First, embrace and reframe your fears. Here are the reframes you can keep in your backpack for the three main fears that often come up on this journey. One, every path leads me where I need to be. Two, dead ends lead to new opportunities. Three, failure helps me learn faster. Once you've befriended your fear and know that it's totally normal for it to join us on this journey, you can ask these three guiding questions. One, which path excites me the most? Two, which path stretches me? Three, which path is practical right now? Remember to fill out your answers to these prompts in your field guide so you can gain clarity and move forward on your path. Just remember that the main thing is to take one step because that will lead to the next step and it all leads you where you need to be. In the next lesson, we'll go over publishing your class project. I'll see you there. 10. Publish Your Class Project: Once you've picked your path into the creative wilderness, take a photo of your completed creative wilderness field guide. Then go ahead and upload that photo to the class project section on this class. Remember that you can upload your class project by going to the Projects and Resources tab, and clicking the "Create Project Button". Once you've uploaded your photo, be sure to hit "Publish". Also be sure to check out other class projects from your fellow creatives in the Project Gallery. We're all out here together, so let's show support for each other's journeys. Also, be sure to let me know in the discussion section which path you're choosing to walk down right now in your creative journey. In the next lesson, I'll share the next stop we're going to make out here in the wilderness together. I'll see you there. 11. Next Steps in the Creative Wilderness: Thank you so much for tuning into this class in the creative wilderness tip series. I really hope that you're feeling more equipped, confident, and totally excited to keep tracking into the wilderness together. In the next class in this series, I'll share my field notes for how to drop into the flow state on your creative journey so that you can create with more joy, presence, and ease to have forward momentum on your wilderness trek. In the meantime, be sure to follow me here on Skillshare, to stay up-to-date on new classes by hitting that follow button. Hang out with me over on Instagram at prints and plants and check out more of my work at printsandplants.com. Stay wild, stay creative and I'll see you soon. I knew I needed to take your stretch zone, gosh that's hard to say. This wind man. I'm just going to retake that whole lesson because apparently I'm focused.