Mark McGuinness wrote a guest article on copyblogger recently titled The 7 Essential Steps to Creating Your Content Masterpiece.

It is a fabulous article.

So much of what he said was directly relevant to visual artists in addition to writers/bloggers.

His 7 steps:

1. Aim high
2. Get into productive habits
3. Create content strategically
4. Write material that’s strong enough to endure
5. Rework your themes
6. Riff on other people’s themes
7. Repurpose your blog content

I strongly recommend reading the entire article as it is chocked full of excellent material.

Make a Lot of Art

The point that struck a cord with me, and is something I’ve been saying for years, is related to productivity.

From his article:

In Creativity: Beyond the Myth of Genius, Robert Weisberg discusses statistical research into the proportion of masterpieces to minor works among great and not-so-great composers.

The researchers concluded that the rate of hits to misses was pretty constant between major and minor composers. The truly great composers produce more masterpieces than the others, mainly because they produced more work overall.

What distinguished them was not effortless genius or leisurely perfectionism, but relentless productivity.

 
This is the same idea behind the quality vs. quantity story in a ceramics class from the book Art and Fear.

A teacher divides a class into 2 groups and tells one group to make a large quantity of pots and the other to focus on quality and to make only their very best pots.

Turns out that over time, the best quality came from the first group, those making a large quantity of work.

Wrap Up

Want to make masterpieces? How much artwork are you producing?

Think big and get to your studio and make something. And do it often.

 
I invite you to become a fan of MakeBigArt on social media where I’ll be sharing additional tips and comments.
MakeBigArt fanpage
MakeBigArt on Twitter

In addition you can also find me here:

My Blog
On Twitter
Facebook Profile
Lisa Call – Textile Paintings Fan Page

 
—lisa

Thinking Big about Art

Motivation: the condition of being motivated

Motivate: to provide with a motive

Motive: something (as a need or desire) that causes a person to act

 
In the last post, The Power of Responsibility I wrote about how each of us is solely responsible for how we spend our time.

For many, most (all?) of us this often means accepting the responsibility for not getting the things done we’d like to. A very common phrase we use is “I wasn’t motivated”. There was no need or desire that compelled us to act.

What we need is something that matters enough to get us off our butts and into the studio. Or off of twitter and back to updating our website. Or off the couch and to the museum or library to do research.

Motivation is a big topic and one I’ll revisit often here on MakeBigArt as it is one of the 4 big M-words I’m focusing on: Marketing, Mindsets, Motivation and Management.

Accountability

Accountability: subject to giving an account

Account: a statement explaining one’s conduct

 
For me one of the best ways to get motivated is to have some accountability for my actions. This can take on several different forms.

1. Personal Accountability

This is possibly the ideal state, where you are capable of always doing what you want because you hold yourself accountable. On many many things we all do this every day. From brushing our teeth to living in harmony with our values.

For me I use personal accountability to work in my studio at least 15 hours each week. It’s important enough for me that I don’t need any other motivation. This wasn’t always the case and in future articles I’ll talk about the systems I put in place to make it easier to fulfill this goal.

Thing is, personal accountability is often not enough when you are parked in from of the TV.

2. Hire a Coach

Coaches:

• Assist people to identify specific goals and then reach those goals faster and with ease.
• Provide client with the tools, perspective and structure to accomplish more through a process of accountability.
• Reframe beliefs and create a point of focus for clients to reflect upon.

For those not familiar with coaching: An overview from the international coach directory website. Also a good starting place to finding a coach.

Coaching is not regulated and there is no training necessary to call oneself a coach so do your homework before hiring one. Every coach is different as are their strengths, focus and fees (from $50 and hour to thousands).

I’ve worked with a coach off and on for many years. One of the primary things I look for in a coach is someone that is good at holding me accountable for my actions. Having someone I report back to every few weeks is an excellent way for me to stay on track and keep motivated.

3. Use a Contract

My coach, who I just started working with again, is having me write a contract for getting my website updated. We talked about what motivates me and this sounded like the best plan of action for getting this done.

I’ll be writing the contract over the next week and at our next meeting we’ll go over it together.

You can use this technique, writing a contract with yourself, for just about any tasks that you are putting off. I will be including monetary penalties and rewards in my contract (donating money to causes I don’t support if I fail, massages and other treats if I fulfill my contract).

4. Accountability Partner

One of my favorite ways of getting things done is to work with an accountability partner. Daily or weekly I email my partner my to-do list for the upcoming day or week. I also include a run down of how the previous week went. They do the same with their goals.

I prefer to send my emails in the evening as I plan my day the night before. Yesterdays email would have looked like this:

Goals for saturday:
YES – 1) Work in studio 13 hours
YES – 2) Update social media
YES – 3) Run

Goals for sunday:
1) Work in studio 13 hours
2) Blog post for makebigart
3) Enter writing competition
4) Blog post for my art blog

In this way we hold each other accountable and make great forward progress. In addition to the accountability my accountability partner is a great person to celebrate completion and success with.

To find an accountability partner look around at your friends and acquaintance and start asking likely candidates if they’d like to try this out.

There are no rules so tailor the idea to fit your needs. Instead of email you can talk in person, or on the phone or text or twitter or whatever works.

5. Public Accountability

Publicly stating your goals is also a huge motivator and I use this technique often. I’ve posted goals on my blog, on twitter, on facebook or told friends. I find the more I talk about my goals and intentions in public the more likely I am to follow through with doing them.

Not only does it provide accountability but it also brings me into alignment with my stated intentions. They become more real and, if you believe in the law of attraction, this is because I am manifesting the outcome.

Whether or not that manifesting is true (I think there is some power in it) the more I talk about them, the more likely I am to take action upon them. And action definitely brings things into existence.

Wrap Up

How do you use accountability to achieve your goals? Please share you experiences in the comments.

Now back to the studio to make my goals for today (or at least come close).

 
I invite you to become a fan of MakeBigArt on facebook:
MakeBigArt.com fanpage

In addition you can also find me here:

My Blog
On Twitter
Facebook Profile
Lisa Call – Textile Paintings Fan Page

 
—lisa
Thinking Big about Art

 
(Definitions in this post from Merriam Webster online)