The Benefits of Skateboarding and how it helped me

The benefits of skateboarding are pretty large. I say that because skateboarding can teach someone what it takes to achieve something. Because there are many times that a person will be scared. By being scared I mean scared to the point of shaking and hesitating.

Being scared is something that we will always encounter in our life. The thing we tend to learn later on is how to deal with that fear. Whenever I get scared or hesitant about something in my life I use what I learned skateboarding. There are many other things I could have done but skateboarding found me.

The other thing that skateboarding taught me was how to connect with people. I say that because skateboarders come from all walks of life. But when you are on your board with your friends none of that matters. You can be the best dressed skateboarder but if you have a crappy personality and are rude you’ll be more likely to not have any friends to skateboard with.

The creativity that street skateboarding requires is like no other. Street skateboarding requires you to see something out of nothing. Riding around the streets and or your city to find spots to skateboard. There could be a school with steps and a church with a handrail. Also there could be a ledge in front of a gas station or bank.

Being in tune with your environment helps. Till this day even though I do not skateboard other than riding a cruiser around I look at the city differently. Therefore I translate that into my designing. Because to me creating something out of nothing is fun.

Seeing the progression in our work is another enjoyment. Seeing how far something and or someone who wasn’t as good as they are now is great to see. Because we know that there are countless hours of working that no body will see. Once we are ready we put it out there and show everyone what we have.

Learn to love being a designer

Learning to love being a graphic designer and or a creative person is not easy to do at first. Because there are many situations that try to tell us it’s useless. They say you’ll never make any money from your art. When they are just putting their beliefs in your head.

They people who do that are ones looking out for your best interest and they do not want to see you get hurt. There’s nothing wrong with them doing that at all. This leads back to you learning to love being a designer and or a creative individual.

There are many people who love creating. They are those who just create and never make much money from their work. The starving artist thing is not something that is true. I only see someone starving as an artist is when they do not learn the business of being an artist.

Being a creative person requires you to learn the business of sustaining yourself. Learning to love being a creative person should not lead you to quitting your job and you starving. Then which will lead you to taking on whatever jobs you can do to survive.

Fall in love with creativity the smart way. Avoid falling into the love of creativity that you fail be honest with yourself as a creator. If you are creating you are going to suck and or produce very poor quality work starting out. Loving the process of creating is an important part of being a designer.

Real Love for Your Craft

When you have real love for your craft it shows. You are able to continuously produce and you do not get tired of it. Because it will become more of who you are. When I first started writing calligraphy and designing it took awhile before it became a part of me fully. There are so many different aspects of it that I can go into detail about.

The opposite of having real love about something is knowing when you have lost the love for it. There is nothing that you should do to keep others happy. If you are not happy it is ok to move on to something else. The main thing is to not allow this to become a habit. Once you start something finish it.

Learning the mentality that you have developed when you have real love something is great. The love you are able to develop for a skill and etc is a wonderful feeling. Going all in on what you are loving is not describable at all. I mean it may be (at the time of writing Im not able to find the right words).

The phrase all money in is one that I learned from Nipsey hussle. To me it represents having Real love for something and not being afraid to go all in on yourself.

It can be done you just have to believe and not let fear hold you back.

Staying Determined

Whatever you decide to do you have to stay determined. Determined that it will all work out in your favor. Determined that you will not give up and give it your all. Consistently failing and not having things work out in my favor helps me stay determined. From applying to jobs and not getting any calls back and going to interviews not moving on.

But I do not let the little setbacks hold me back. Neither should you let them hold you back and discourage you. I love the journey of getting to a place where you are achieving your set goals. The people who do not let you learn from your failures are not helping you.

The reason I say that the more you fail the more determined you become. Well for me that is how I have been able to develop the mental fortitude to withstand many things. Skateboarding provided me with the process of falling down and getting back up to accomplish my goal of landing the trick.

Being determined is good and can cause you to forget about yourself. By forgetting about yourself and taking care of yourself can do more harm than good. The harm of eating like crap (which is something I fall victim to) can show us how out of control we can get.

Staying determined while at the same time having discipline to take care of yourself. Getting lost in the process is so easy to do and having your focus become tunnel vision. I learned how scary tunnel vision is when we moved from NC to down here to South Florida. Because when I was driving I go tunnel vision and was slowly drifting off the road.

Lets get back on topic do your best to stay determined that what you are wanting to do you will keep going. You will keep at it until it works and also realize when the time to just stop makes sense. There comes a time when you will get bored with something and lose motivation. But you have to be honest with yourself and say “Am I wasting time and do I still have motivation to do it or not?”.

Taking Actions On Ideas

Taking Actions on our ideas at first is a very scary thing to do. Because we can either be scared of the success that will come from achieving our goals. As well as not knowing how to deal with the success that comes from the hard work we have put in. You may think what are you talking about being afraid of success and what comes from it.

I am only speaking from what I used to deal with mentally awhile ago. So I’d say if you know deep down in your heart that you want to be successful prepare yourself for it. There are going to be a lot of things that can seem to come all at once. Which will lead you to be overwhelmed.

I am very thankful for my parents and family for raising me the way that they did. Even though at times I was a very rebellious type and wanted to do the things I wanted. But you know they never ever forced me to not think big. Nor did they ever tell me to not go after what it is that I wanted.

So this leads me to the mindset that many graphic designers/creative individuals fall into, which is creating just to create. As well as not sharing my work with everyone. There are certain projects that seriously should not be shared. As well as not feeling accomplished enough to put out products for people to have and enjoy.

When I started selling products on my Etsy shop and seeing them in the wild I was even more fulfilled. Because instead of them sitting in my bedroom office collecting dust they are being enjoyed. Learning to think bigger has been fun.

As well seeing the value in my work, whether it be graphic design, Calligraphy and Products I create. But I do not want you to think I was not afraid to start selling my own products. The main thing I had to do was make a decision. Making the decision of I am not going to create products just for me.

Then having the mentality that I am going to make sure that I will create items that I would hang up in my home and use. This mentality is what helps me continuously create work that I am proud of.

If you are just starting out creating products and being a designer be honest with yourself. First by knowing whether you work is something you are proud of. Also whether it is something that you would like to have your name attached to. The reason I mention that is because you want to have the types of clients/Customers who appreciate the quality of work that you do.

Think of the possibilities that your work can turn into.

The Journey is Everything

Believe in yourself more than anyone else

Learning as a creative person you have to believe in yourself more than anyone else. This is definitely a requirement that helps you get through the rejection letters. The rejection letters that are pre-written and say the usual “we’ve decided to proceed with a different candiate”. I do not let those demotivate me.

Instead of getting upset by them I don’t really care who turns me down. The reason is because I learned that I do have the ability to go beyond, what the person who sees my resume sees. I also had to take back the power of those people whom we’d think are in charge of our careers.

The best thing to realize that you are in charge of your career. Then you have to be willing to be honest with yourself. Also being willing to go through what you have to do what it is that you want. Believe me creating youtube videos, writing blog posts, running an etsy shop are not easy. As well as posting daily to instagram.

The way how I am able to do these things without getting burnt out is that I enjoy them. Also knowing that I know what it takes and that it takes time has helped me. Believing in yourself is not something that comes overnight and never will.

Each day is more of a test on yourself and if you can believe in yourself and or sit around and waste time. Doing things that you enjoy repeatedly can become habitual and easy. If you are going through a creative block take time to realize why you are in one and then what fires you up.

So with all of this said please do your best to not let anyone believe in you more than yourself. As a creative individual and or a business person stop being scared and just go for it. Whatever it is that you want to go for, do it the smart way. Don’t make the mistake of putting yourself in a bad situation. An example of being at a job that is ok for you and then just deciding one day, “I’m done and I quit”.

Then with making that choice you will put yourself in a tough situation and starve yourself of the needed mental clearness. I’m not saying doing that is a bad thing. More so to be more strategic with your plans you make.

A Real Loser is

A Real Loser is someone who knows how to win but chooses not to.

This a quote from Andy Frisella. I was watching instagram stories and he had this on one of his clips. I will have to say it hit home. Because I thought of the times in my life when I was skateboarding, and there were tricks I knew I could land but I just didn’t give it my all. I was giving it about 90% and I knew I could land the trick.

But guess what I didn’t land the trick and I knew exactly how to land it. There are many things like that in our life and choices we make. The time is never too late to make the change.

Nothing changes if nothing changes.

Nothing changes if nothing changes. Simply saying if you do not make the simple change needed then nothing will change for you. This goes for you slacking off and not doing things you know you should be doing. Instead of doing them you’ve grown used to not doing them. We have these grand ideas for what we want to achieve and do in our lives, but we tend to take the easy path. The easy path is a routine that we have gotten used to doing day by day. This is one thing I’ve noticed about myself and I’ve been pushing myself to do things that I used to do but let fall to the side. Really in a sense of getting back to what I did early in my design career and how wide eyed I was with everything , working on design project and etc. Calligraphy is such a wonderful thing and I love having connected with so many of you and thank you all for supporting me as well as purchasing products and as simple as clicking the link and seeing what I have. I’m forever grateful 🙏🏾. Thank you and now let’s continue this journey.

Chase Dreams not People

In our life we tend to end up chasing people instead of our dreams. I for one fell into the trap of chasing people more than my actual dreams. But once I stopped chasing people and refocused my vision on chasing my dreams I became more focused on my goals.

The people that we want and need in our life will come and stay. Once I learned this I stopped chasing those people who wanted to leave and not be involved with me anymore. A great example is the feeling you get when someone deletes you off of snapchat and or unfollows you on instagram,twitter for example.

Because wanting that human connection with someone else can be a need that we need to constantly feel. But if you are needing and or wanting the wrong thing it can end up being the wrong thing for you. Just think if you focused on your goals as a creative and or person in general how much more beneficial will that be for you?