Dealing with Depression as a creative Person

Depression is something that a lot of us experience. I am not going to pretend as if I do not experience the symptoms of what depression is. You have to be more in control of your feelings and how to not let them determine what your results will be. Especially when you are doing things and not seeing many results if any.

Which can lead to feeling as if “why are good things not happening to me?” Then you begin to question other things in your life. Which then would lead to even more feelings of depression. You have to not let your feelings determine how you will end up. Develop more control over your mind and emotions.

You have to remember that there is no need for you to be so hard and down on yourself. Our brain can either be our destroyer or our best companion. One thing I learned from Listening to David Foster wallace was that when people commit suicide more or less they shoot themselves in the head.

So just take time to think how much your life would change if you stopped feeling sorry for yourself and fought through the depression and go to work. Whenever I experience feelings of depression coming into my mind I get to work. If i’m just sitting around wasting time I make sure I am learning something or doing whatever I can to improve my skills and move closer to my ultimate goals.

Remember when you feel as no one supports you or they do not understand they are not meant to understand. You don’t need to quit or give up. Prove to yourself that you are capable as a designer, artist or business person to do whatever you set out to do. But be honest with yourself and realize that its going to take hard work and its not going to be easy.

Believe in yourself and Your Design work

When we you start out in anything you have to believe in yourself. I experience this time and time again that believing in yourself and work is key. As a creative person we can doubt our work like no one else can. We tend to fall into the same habits of doing what is easy.

The way that I have gain belief in my work is to trust myself. I trust myself and the process that I go through completion of the work. I had learned that as long as the work is 95% complete in regards to my terms it will be just right. The 95% completion of the work will be as close as it can get to 100%.

I say that because there is nothing out there that is 100% complete. The reason is because there is always something that can be improved or has room for improvement. Being self aware of this is allowed me to develop a stronger belief in my work and myself.

Family, friends, coworkers and whomever do not have to believe in your work. The reason I say that is because its your work! No one has to do anything for you your life is your life. If your clients do not like your work then it could be, a number of things.

With all of this sad believe in yourself even when no one does. If you are not getting clients or making sales of your artwork keep at it. The amount of information out there is endless on you becoming better than you already are. When you start improving and getting better you will learn how much of an impact it can be on you.

Every wish we have gets granted

Whether you me or anyone else believes it or not every wish we have gets granted. Because the mentality that we possess as a living being can determine a lot. The decisions that we make in our life is what helps us get our wishes granted.

For example if you are a graphic designer fresh out of school and you are not able to land a job at agency your wish will get granted by you putting in the work. The reference can be seen the same as the principle of putting in the work. When you put in the work the results will show.

I will be the first to admit I did not have a lot of patience before I embarked on my journey of being a successful graphic designer. Because the amount of patience and persistence you have to have a graphic designer and or in any career is a secret.

When you realize that you yourself have been lazy and not doing what is needed to be done you make the corrections. Be honest with yourself and you’ll move a lot quicker in your profession. Because you may not know that a lot of people fall into the trap of being comfortable in the cycle of their day to day.

Your wish will get granted if you believe in them. But remember no one else has to believe in your dreams and the reason is because they are your dreams and not someone else’s.

Give more of yourself in your work

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This may be a hard thing for some people to do. But you have to take the time to think what would happen if I gave more of myself in my work. The results would be greater than you could imagine. By that I mean if you started giving 120 instead of 100% in your work you would feel a lot better about it.

As a graphic designer we can tend to become lazy and set in our ways. Because when someone has a way they go about doing things they do not want to try anything new. The mentality is if something isn’t broke why fix it.

Well if you are not afraid of trying something new it could be a good thing for you. The way to give more all starts with you making the decision. You have to say I am not going to keep being average and that I will learn more than what I already know. The amount of information that we have access to there is no reason to not continue to improve and learn.

A good place to start is skillshare. I had found out about skillshare early last year. Skillshare is a great way to get started. Because on there they have curated classes that are not just all over the place. They have a recent promotion where you can sign up for 3 months at $.99 one of the very first classes I took was poster design class.

Then I found out aaron draplin from DDC has classes on there. Learning from him and how he works has helped me a lot and it continues to help. Therefore it has allowed me to give more in my design work. The process is what you can learn from a lot of people and use their techniques to give more in your design work.

There is no need for any of us to not be able to give more in our work. By giving more I mean to give more of yourself in what you do. Avoid falling into the trap of being comfortable with just doing what is required. Remember why be average when we can be great?

Why I stopped listening to podcasts so often

The reason why I stopped listening to podcasts is because to me it felt like I was being motivated but taking no action. There was something that I noticed about myself I liked listening to them and learning but nothing was coming from it. I was being a learner but no practice and or action was being taken.

So one day I started to realize that I needed to rethink my strategy with many things. Another thing was I needed to be consistent. The thing is that there is nothing wrong with listening to podcasts but you have to stop and think for yourself. There are many podcasts that are putting many things into your head and telling you what to do and how to think.

I am not saying that there is anything wrong with that if you enjoy it. But for me there came a time when I just had to depart from listening to certain podcasts on the regular. Because it just seemed repetitive and there was no longer much value in it for me. Another thing is that I wanted to take what I learned from listening to the podcasts and put it into action.

Putting what I learned into action is such a rewarding feeling. The same as the people who you get advice from that have built businesses compared to those who have not built them. So you have to take time and decide what makes the best use of your time.

Master the moment

Master the moment in whatever it is that you are doing. You do not want take the time to waste it doing nothing. Because this is something that I have learned being a designer. At times that is something that is easy to do.

We as people can get comfortable in the aspect of doing nothing. I for one was being lazy with vectorizing and putting new work on my instagram. When honestly I really enjoyed the aspect of posting work daily and documenting my progress. I will admit that it was a relief to have a few days off of posting.

I did not want to end up burning out and fading away. The whole aspect of running a marathon and doing all of it for the long term. Also realizing that even though I am not getting the same amount of likes and etc as others it doesn’t matter. I just think about how gary vaynerchuk mentioned he wasn’t getting any views on his youtube videos but he kept putting them out.

So you want to master the moments. When you keep the right mentality you will realize that mastering the moments do not take a lot of effort. By that I meant it will become normal to you.

With all of this said make sure to do your best to master the moments of your life and to not take them for granted. Which means in a simple way saying to not waste time and be more vigilant

You attract the type of energy you put out

whether you believe it or not the type of energy you project is what you attract. If you are focusing on the possibility of not having enough you will keep getting that. Also the same if you are not confident in dealing with clients and etc you will not have control.

By not having control you will not have the confidence in your ability to deal with them in a professional manner. The same thing goes if you are selling products and basically any other thing. If you are not the type to believe in what you are selling who else will. Also you have to be proud of what you are selling.

Being proud of what you are, what you are doing and all that you do. Project the type of energy that you would like to receive in your life. The time that you spend on things that matter will not benefit you so redirect that to what you do want.

The king and the pawn go into the same box

This quote is one that I came across recently. The overall significance made me understand things a lot better. Because no matter what position that you are in the pawn and king go into the same box. If someone is in a higher position than you just remember the are really no different than you.

Well the overall stipulation is to not think of anyone being higher up than you. You want to keep the mentality of that you can compete and be just as good as them. I personally used to think that I would not be able to have the same mentality as someone who is successful.

The best way is to learn how successful people go about doing things. A great example is to watch documentaries on the people who inspire you. One very good recent series is the dailyvee from Gary Vaynerchuk. Just seeing the overall grind and how hard he works inspires me. Also it lets me know that I am not executing like I should be.

So what If I am working a graveyard shift there’s no reason for me to not be executing. So being honest with yourself is a great thing to know what you are not doing and then get up off your ass and do it. Remember the people who are doing what you want to do they are executing.

Follow your dreams and cover your footsteps

Following your dreams and cover footsteps meaning follow your dreams but you do not need to brag about anything. If you are the type that likes to tel everything you should stop doing that. You have to take time to focus.

By focusing on the grind and getting to where you want to be everything will work out. The reason why I say this is you do not want people to lose respect for you bragging and whatever else you do. Just think if I wrote blog posts which would come across as me crying about how hard things are or what I am doing to work as a designer full time you may lose respect for me.

One main thing that I learned last year and will continue to stick with me is to make more moves and make less announcements. If you do this people will think you’re an overnight success when you’ve just been working silently without bragging.

Have a great monday and I also am going to be launching a Skillshare class teaching gothic calligraphy.

Young Black and gifted

This is one thing that I am so happy that I possess. But you know the thing behind the title of this post is my belief about myself. Because I have been told that I am gifted. Honestly I would not be in the position I am in if I did not work hard.
Because a lot of people like to think there current life circumstance determines how they will turn out. But you know you are able to alter those circumstances. If you come from a bad neighborhood then you do the opposite of the negativity that exists and gets done in your environment.
You are better than that no matter what ethnicity you are. So stop using whatever you can as an excuse. Life comes to those who get out and hustle. Not to those who cry, complain and wish for success.