3 EASY Tips for Your Sketchbook Practice

Do you ever feel that strong urge and craving to create, that spark? Maybe you haven't in a while and you want to make it a bit easier for yourself to just start and get into your flow state. If this resonates in some way, in this episode I'd love to share elements that have personally helped me enhance my experience to feel flow and bliss in my art practice, which I hope can help you as well. I also invite you to grab your sketchbook, doodle your own things, create along with me as I get into this gouache painting. Get settled in, take your time, give yourself as much time as you need for prep. First let's acknowledge and get rid of perfection. Let's acknowledge to be patient with this process. Be patient with yourself, allow yourself not to rush, and focus on the present moment. This is the time to be with your sketchbook. Give yourself permission, allow whatever to show up on the page as it will. Remind yourself of the feeling and importance it brings for your soul within to show up and begin, and maybe choose a theme that you love today. No pressure, just focus on what feels good. And that brings me to my first point. Your environment, your space, the supplies around you should feel pleasant, should feel good, and is the first thing to enhance your experience. Light a candle, use that new supply you've been wanting to try, paint a photo you took with your camera, paint a memory, focus on what feels really good to you in that moment. And of course this varies in different sessions, but one element that I found always helps is preparing all supplies at hand. Spend that time laying out your paints, prepare your palette, no rush. Just allowing myself to fully get indulged in the creative process and having everything at arm's reach helps me stay in that flow without breaking it. Wherever you are in your creative journey, maybe just keep it super simple for yourself this time. I'm constraining myself to a limited palette today to make it easier for myself, but also trying a new one with more greens and browns, and that curiosity just gets me excited to create. Allowing myself to discover new things in the creative process is another way I create self-discipline and motivate myself. So allow yourself to get cozy, create that safe creative space for yourself, get everything prepared, and go for it. I like to section out some time to create and tell myself to put away all distractions. This can be putting the phone on silent, just to make sure that I'm fully present in that moment. Sometimes I enjoy the quiet and sometimes I enjoy music, podcasts, or shows, depending on what I'm listening to. But if there's a certain type of music that gets you to zone in, maybe you can audio listen to your favorite book while you draw. I found that putting on my noise cancellation headphones instantly put me in this zone, in this trance, and I'm able to focus at complete attention to my creative process. We want to aim to easily create and let that be our time for ourselves, to learn, to improve, to feel great. In the previous episode I talked about creative habits for artists and getting rid of perfection and practicing patience instead. So go into it with not being afraid to make any mistakes. In this painting, sometimes you just have to paint over the sleeve and try again. I love making mistakes and fixing things and trying again, because it allows me to see things in a new light. Each revelation leads on to the next, and in this part of the process, I thought it would be much better if I enhanced the background to be a bit darker, so that the lighting around her is more apparent. So I worked on pushing it back, toning it down to a darker green, and also adding that tone of green into the sleeve as well. And I knew this would make the painting a bit better and stronger, and when I think about it, I wouldn't have come to that conclusion if it weren't for that little mishap. And to follow that, I wouldn't have the craving to get some colored pencils in. As I begin adding some colored pencils, I'd love to share a quick word from today's sponsor, Squarespace. I've gotten a few questions about this all-in-one platform help to build and design your website, so since I've built mine with Squarespace and we'll be working together, I wanted to provide a quick tip that you may find very helpful. After going through and searching for some of the award-winning templates, some that I think are great for artists include the brine template, which I currently have and it's super versatile. I've also used the wells template before. I previewed my site actually before starting. All I did was drag and drop some photos to see how it looked. So for everyone who has recommendations on those templates, those are some that I recommend. And you can start your free trial by going to squarespace.com, and when you're ready to launch, go to squarespace.com forward slash jesscarp for 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. To speak a little bit about my process here before moving on to the third element, I find that adding colored pencils over gouache can really bring things together. It can add that extra layer of texture which can be really beautiful in your work. And for this arm specifically, I'm cross-hatching in the direction that the arm is turning. I'm creating marks and adding warmer values that will help and give it volume. Any shape always has small reflected light depending on what's beside it. So that's where I added the subtle pink to create that reflection. I also add a tiny bit of green to that reflection in the face to desaturate the skin tone a bit and keep the warmer areas warm. As a creative, whether I'm doing my website, creating some happy mail for patrons, working on making a lesson plan, painting in my sketchbook, doing a larger piece, here's one mindset that I have been implementing that has helped me so much. It lifts off all burdens and makes everything easy for some reason. But before I share that, let's take a moment with our sketchbooks, with our piece, with our creation. Let's take a look at it from afar, look at the bigger picture and just sit in silence for a moment. One of the habits that I like to implement is building my creative library. Adding all sorts of elements together on something that I feel comes from inside. And we all have it. A bit challenging to put into words but one of the best ways that I can do that is to pretend that I'm five years old again. And I invite you to do the same. Pretend you're five years old right now. What would your five-year-old self do? As kids we have no beliefs and no criticism to anything. We aren't afraid of what people will think. We're not afraid of what we need to post on social media or who's going to see it or how. We're focused on the present moment and we're focused on just simply creating or doing what we're doing. Picasso once said, every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up. And with that in mind, what I did here in this sketchbook spread and in other pieces that I really focus on implementing is to tap into that unique creative voice that we all have. It's something that comes in the moment and it's something that you'll feel. And I guess what helps me tap into that is pretending to be five years old again. If I want to draw random doodles and expressive marks with my pencil without focusing on trying to make each one of them perfect, I'm going for it. Embrace your inner child. Maybe take a step back, dance around the room, loosen up and just enjoy. If you feel the urge to grab your brush again and make a bunch of random squiggles, do that. I really felt like I got on a roll here and I took a little bit of distance with the brush and painted from afar, smudged some things with my finger. I tried standing, trying different positions to see the painting from afar. I focused on feeling. I focused on enjoying. And when I stepped back and reflected in that second, I realized this is my favorite way to create and enjoy the process. And at times I can really forget. We all can and that's all right. What matters is that we did it. We took the time to show up, to create. Believe it or not, your sketchbook is smiling. Go ahead, just look. Each creation, each moment is one step towards growth. And I'm glad that we can be growing together. So thanks for creating with me today.