"The bad news is time flies. The good news is you're the pilot" ~ Michael Altshuler.

Hey creative friend!

It's been a hot minute since my last newsletter. I did have technical difficulties and was unable to connect to send out any newsletters. But all is fixed and we can continue our discussion on how to identify time wasting activities and how you can redirect that time into a creative activity. I will also share my practical tips for managing some of these activities that are necessary but tend to take up more time then needed.

My aim was to find little pockets of time in my busy day that I could use to nurture my creativity. It was about finding time to spend on playing with my art supplies with no end result in mind, just the process of creating. It is in the process of creating that you reap the benefits; creating art will improve your focus and reduce your stress.

In the last newsletters we looked at time waister no1: Doom-scrolling with the excuse that you are looking for inspiration. (If you missed it, I will post it in a blog post soon).

Time waister no 2:

1. Binge watching online tutorials

I did touch on this last time but I did focus more on doom-scrolling social media while having my early morning tea. Today I want to talk about online tutorials - they are very useful and necessary if you are building up skills or learning a new colour medium, but... we can get lost in binge watching and never doing and so we "learn" nothing.

You can't just consume. At some stage you have to put the screen down and create! We all have artists that we admire, I have many and I love learning from them. I buy their classes or watch them on YouTube but if I don't take some of the new information that I have acquired and apply it, I have "learned" nothing, because that knowledge is only stored in my short-term memory.

When you apply new knowledge, that is when you improve your skills and train your hand-eye coordination. You build the muscle memory and you store that knowledge in your long-term memory.

What to do instead:

• Pick one skill / technique / colour medium you want to practice (improve on).
• Choose one tutorial that teaches the one skill and watch it once.
• Gather all the necessary tools and supplies to practice the skill and put them in a separate box/bag/pencil case etc.
• Practice the one skill daily for a week. Find little pockets of time in your day that you can practice for 5 or 10 minutes.
• If you struggle re-watch the same tutorial if needed during the week.

The essential key to the above mentioned re-direct:

Having your supplies ready to go! If you have to rummage through drawers or dig boxes out of a cupboard every time you have 5 minutes to create, you will waist time looking for things and not get to creating.

You do not need a mountain of supplies to practice a key skill or learn a colour medium. Take time to identify the bare basics needed to explore and practice that one skill. Pick your favourite colours of the medium and only use those for the week.

This will help you to hone in on the skill and not get distracted or overwhelmed with the supplies.

Would you like to get out of the house and nurture your creativity with like-minded creatives? Join me for a workshop out in the country-ish side of Perth.

I run 3 workshops every month:

• Watercolour pencil
• Abstract watercolour and mixed media
• Art Journaling

Join me each month and make a new piece of unique art and learn new skills and techniques.

Upcoming workshops:

• 26 Aug 10am - Art Journaling - Colour blocks and doodles
• Newsletter exclusive discount code: BLOCK10 (10% discount - enter at check-out)

Looking forward to see you in a workshop soon!

Thanx for joining me on this creative journey.

Have a fabulously creative day!

Theresa