Is it Time to Leave Your Comfort Zone? [58]

What is your optimum comfort level? Do you work well under a bit of pressure or would you rather stay just where you know?

Apple podcast

This week, we’re discussing comfort zones. This is a phrase coined by a business consultant called Alasdair White who described it as: “a psychological state in which things feel familiar to a person, and they are at ease, and in control of their environment, experiencing low levels of anxiety and stress.

In this zone, a steady level of performance is possible.” That doesn’t sound too bad does it? But psychologist Robert Yerkes suggested that to perform at our best we need to be in a state of what he called ‘optimal anxiety.’  Too anxious and our performance goes down, but it seems that we are at our most creative when we are just outside of what is comfortable for us.

This week, we discuss these ideas and debate whether it’s necessary to stay comfortable and safe in some areas so that we can be brave and bold in others. We also offer some questions you can use to determine whether you are working at ‘optimal anxiety’ or whether you are holding yourself back. Those questions are:

  • What areas are your comfort zones? Is this where I want to be?
  • How am I feeling about this? (What beliefs are holding me in this energy space?)
  • Where might a risk it take me? (Long-term benefit)
  • Where am I over-complicating this? (how could I make it easy?)

Other topics this week include the value of community, an unusual approach to painting edges, and a new way of looking at an ‘impossible’ project

Mentioned:

Nicholas Wilton CVP program

If you have a question you’d like us to discuss, click here to send it to us

If you are enjoying the podcast this is an easy and inexpensive way to help support it and ensure it continues. The demands of making it each week can be challenging. Your support is allowing us to hire some editing help. If you’d like to help out with a one-time or a monthly donation, you can “buy us a coffee” us at Ko-fi.com

Contribute to the podcast here:

Follow Alice on Instagram @alicesheridanstudio
or Louise @louisefletcher_art

Credits
“Monkeys Spinning Monkeys” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

Is This Your Year? Bonus Episode [57]

Apple podcast

If you are an artist, this is the time of year when you start to hear about CVP, the online 12-week course taught by Nicholas Wilton. (Full name: The Creative Visionary Program).

We have both taken this course in the past and Alice has been part of the team as a CVP coach in 2019 and 2020. In this extra episode, we discuss our own personal experiences with the program and answer some of the questions that we are most frequently asked.

2021 UPDATE: the free Art2Life workshop starts on 15th February 2021
JOIN HERE

Our discussion covers financial considerations, the logistics of online learning, how much individual guidance you can expect, how much time is needed, and which kinds of artists can most benefit. Does this work for you if you are a beginner? How about a skilled professional? Should you take it if you paint realistically? Or is it just for abstract artists. We cover all this and more in a frank and wide-ranging conversation.

We also thought you might like to see this one 🙂 It’s the same, but you can watch on YouTube if you prefer! You may also like to read this blog post

Mentioned:

CVP 2020 is now CLOSED. If you would like a reminder when the free workshop opens next year, and an invitation to be part of our bonus buddy group, please leave your details HERE

Sue McNenly on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/suemcnenly/

If you are enjoying the podcast this is an easy and inexpensive way to help support it and ensure it continues. The demands of making it each week can be challenging. Your support is allowing us to hire some editing help. If you’d like to help out with a one-time or a monthly donation, you can “buy us a coffee” us at Ko-fi.com

Contribute to the podcast here:

Follow Alice on Instagram @alicesheridanstudio
or Louise @louisefletcher_art

Credits
“Monkeys Spinning Monkeys” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

Dealing with Overwhelm & Making Time for What Matters [56]

Do you ever feel overwhelmed? Do you find that your painting time is being eaten up by admin and emails and marketing and social media … not to mention spouses and kids and parents and pets?

Apple podcast

Even when we love what we do, it can be stressful to cope with competing demands on our time. This week Alice is fiercely protecting her painting time despite pressure to do other things, while Louise is facing up to her tendency to put others’ needs ahead of her own.  We discuss our strategies for managing overwhelm, offer tips for prioritising what matters, and debate whether it has ever been possible for an artist to simply make their art on a full time basis. We also discuss the value of good framing and Alice shares her experience of receiving a very special letter.

Mentioned:

RWS Contemporary 2020: https://www.royalwatercoloursociety.co.uk/exhibitions/36-rws-contemporary-watercolour-competition/overview/

If you have a question you’d like us to discuss, click here to send it to us

If you are enjoying the podcast this is an easy and inexpensive way to help support it and ensure it continues. The demands of making it each week can be challenging. Your support is allowing us to hire some editing help. If you’d like to help out with a one-time or a monthly donation, you can “buy us a coffee” us at Ko-fi.com

Contribute to the podcast here:

Follow Alice on Instagram @alicesheridanstudio
or Louise @louisefletcher_art

Credits
“Monkeys Spinning Monkeys” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

How Do I Find My Style? [55]

This week’s episode was inspired by a question from an artist who wrote: “I can draw well, and I paint in watercolour and acrylics but my style is all over the place. How can I find a style and settle on it?”

Apple podcast

We discuss whether you need to settle on a specific style, or whether it’s OK to have multiple strings to your bow. Perhaps this varies depending on your goals for your art. We also share our own individual journeys, and debate whether there are concrete steps you can take to find your own style.

An artist’s style, we agree, is the result of many different choices (subject matter, media, process, and decisions about colour and design and value among many other things). But it is also something that evolves – and that is perhaps never fully defined. After all, many of the “greats” changed styles multiple times as they explored different ideas or different ways of making their work. Most of, we both feel that your style is something that comes through doing rather than thinking – you must make work and in the process of making that work, you find your style.

This is also one with giggles over builders, a few tears and even disagreements over confectionery!

Mentioned:

I changed a painting quite drastically recently and suddenly it worked and gave me that *buzz*. Watching Nick’s video helped me to understand why it worked which was really valuable, because at the time it was just a lucky accident!

Corinna

Lesley Birch: https://www.lesleybirchartist.com/

‘Canopy’ can be seen on this page: https://alicesheridan.com/landscape-unlocked/

If you have a question you’d like us to discuss, click here to send it to us

If you are enjoying the podcast this is an easy and inexpensive way to help support it and ensure it continues. The demands of making it each week can be challenging. Your support is allowing us to hire some editing help. If you’d like to help out with a one-time or a monthly donation, you can “buy us a coffee” us at Ko-fi.com

Contribute to the podcast here:

Follow Alice on Instagram @alicesheridanstudio
or Louise @louisefletcher_art

Credits
“Monkeys Spinning Monkeys” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License

Creating the Impossible & Making Bold Moves [54]

Apple podcast

This week’s chat was inspired by Michael Neill’s book “Creating the Impossible.” The book, which is subtitled “A 90 Day Program to Get Your Dreams Out of Your Head and into the World,” argues that we can accomplish more than we ever imagined without the constant stress and pressure associated with high achievement and asks “what if creating what you want to see in the world isn’t dependent on believing in yourself, or even believing that it’s possible?”

In other words, if we get out of our own way, and stop telling ourselves something isn’t possible, new possibilities and opportunities start to reveal themselves. In this episode, we discuss the idea of the mind as a “virtual reality generator” and explore what happens when we change the way we are thinking. If we allowed for the possibility that our wildest dreams might be attainable, how would we act differently? And what might unfold as a result?

We also celebrate reaching dizzy heights on the Apple podcast charts and share our excitement about letting loose and making some bold moves on works-in-progress.

If you have a question you’d like us to discuss, click here to send it to us

If you are enjoying the podcast this is an easy and inexpensive way to help support it and ensure it continues. The demands of making it each week can be challenging. Your support is allowing us to hire some editing help. If you’d like to help out with a one-time or a monthly donation, you can “buy us a coffee” us at Ko-fi.com

Contribute to the podcast here:

Follow Alice on Instagram @alicesheridanstudio
or Louise @louisefletcher_art

Credits
“Monkeys Spinning Monkeys” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License