7 Ways You Are Limiting Your Creativity (and hence Yourself)

As an artistic creative, I've noticed that people tend to equate creativity with the arts, and fail to acknowledge it in other professions or in the everyday aspects of life.

 

What many don't seem to realise is that to be human is to create, and creativity is an innate part of us all.

 

To further illustrate this, here are 7 ways you may be limiting your creativity, and hence yourself and the possibilities for your life.

 

 

1) Telling yourself “I’m not creative."

 

All humans are born with the capacity to create something, whether it's an artwork, an invention, a solution, or finding the best way to fix your look on a bad hair day.

 

If you already believe that you’re not creative… then you won't really try to be creative, even in situations that call for a little creativity, which leads to feeling helpless about the situation, which further perpetuates your conclusion that you aren't creative... And basically what you have created is a vicious cycle.

 

And since you unconsciously created that cycle in the first place, why not put some of that energy (if not ALL of it) into actually exercising your creative abilities in a forwarding way!

 

Ask yourself: What makes you even have this self-limiting belief in the first place? What happened that led you to create this conclusion about yourself?

 

Creativity is a muscle, and like all your other muscles, and the more you exercise it, it will become stronger and easier to wield. You'll begin to see connections between things that on the surface seem unrelated, which is where out-of-the-box thinking begins.

 

So stop telling yourself that you’re not creative, and start allowing yourself to ACCEPT THAT YOU ARE!

 

 

2) Telling yourself “I can’t draw"

 

Remember the time when you were a child and one of your natural pastimes was to put crayon to paper (or the nice clean wall..) and make seemingly random marks?

 

And after a while you'd start to re-create your world, scribbling smiling stick figures to represent your family, a triangle over a rectangle to represent your home, green for the grass, blue for the sky, yellow for the sun, and so on...

 

Did you care if your drawings were “good”? And when you felt you messed it up or made a mistake, did you not just get another piece of paper and start again?

 

Weren't you simply enjoying the moment and expressing yourself, a simple process of celebrating your world through mark-making?

 

I often meet people who, after finding out I’m an artist, almost immediately proclaim that they can’t draw, or that creativity is not for them.

 

Upon further probing, I’ve started to realise their conclusion has roots in memories of an authority figure (usually parent or art teacher) criticising their artwork or reinforcing that an ambition in art is nothing more than a pipe dream.

 

(The latter happened to me at age 8, and I stopped drawing for the fun of it after that.)

 

For most individuals, all it takes is one significant incident, and that’s it — from that point they no longer believe they have artistic abilities, or that they are creative.

 

And worse, they completely reject an innate ability that every one of us possesses — mark-making, which is the basis of drawing.

 

Mark-making is the one thing that ANYONE can do. ANYONE. Even quadriplegics or people with no arms can make marks on a paper. (Even apes and elephants can wield a paintbrush and make marks!)

 

And like all abilities that get more refined with intentional and consistent practice, when you’ve spent enough time with mark-making and learning different tools for improvement, you can easily create shapes and forms that represent your world.

 

The point here isn’t about what a “good” drawing is supposed to look like, or if your images fall into the category of what “art” is or isn’t.

 

The point is that the belief that we can’t draw makes us completely stop making marks on paper, completely stop expressing our world, ourselves and our creativity -- a tool that is innately ours from a very young age.

 

 

3) Telling yourself “I’m not good at …. “ or “I can’t….”

 

The moment you tell yourself you’re not good at something, you’ve already closed off all possibilities of even trying it out, and subsequently, of expanding your own horizons and experiences in life.

 

Such statements like “I’m not good at sports” or “I can’t write poetry” or “I’m not flexible” are limiting, because the moment you believe them, you’d have unconsciously created a box around yourself.

 

The only time you may be allowed to declare that you’re can’t do something is when you’ve tried EVERYTHING possible to learn it, and you put in 10,000 hours to be good at it, and you learn from ALL the best teachers in the world, and you still end up sucking.

 

We’ve read stories of people with disabilities who’ve become accomplished athletes, artists and other professionals (such as this guy). We’ve heard stories of famous people who never gave up until they got their breakthroughs and how their actions shaped the world at that time.

 

I’ve seen my grandmother start learning ballet at 60, and every day she stretched until a year later, she could easily do a front-back split.

 

And as for myself, I spent most of my teens and 20’s believing that I could never be physically fit. This belief was further justified when I found out at 25 that I had Thalassemia Minor, which explained the times I got light-headed easily and nearly blacked out during strenuous P.E. lessons in school.

 

Then at 29 I went on a 3-week long hiking and camping road trip in America, without any prior training or regular exercise. And after daily hikes of long distances and various terrains in Yosemite, Mt. Zion, Bryce, Arches, and the Grand Canyon (in cool-looking boots that I realised later were really not meant for hiking...), I started to see that whatever I had previously believed about my physical limitations were nothing more than self-created delusions.

 

Today at age 32, I’m in the best physical shape of my life (and still working on it!), after being in the worst shape for the whole of my 20’s.

 

 

4) Choosing to watch from the sidelines, versus jumping in to participate.

 

Life is short, and we simply aren’t given enough time to try all activities available and to become good at them.

 

Hence it’s normal to live vicariously by listening to others’ stories, reading about their experiences, or watching their performances.

 

That’s part of what sells books and seminars and shows, because we want to know what it’s like to walk in someone else’s shoes.

 

And there’s nothing wrong with that, because exposure to all of these adds to your own experiences of life anyway, though in an indirect fashion.

 

It becomes limiting, however, when all you do is watch, read and listen — when you’d rather be a part of the audience, instead of an active participant.

 

When it comes to something that you’re interested to experience, watching all the videos or reading all the books or speaking to all the experts in the world will not give you the truth of what that experience is really like.

 

That is something only you can find out for yourself, and your first-hand experience is unique only to you.

 

The more first-hand experiences you have, and the wider the range, the more you’ll find connections beyond an intellectual understanding, and you can draw on that to create something out of the box.

 

So jump in and try out and really get your hands dirty with the stuff that you’re interested in.

 

Who knows, maybe after messing around in it for a while you’ll realise that you actually don’t like it. And if you don’t like it, why would you want to continue to spend more time, energy and resources on related books, talks and videos?

 

Simply take your new experiences and learnings and move on to something else.

 

 

5) Staying in your comfort zone

 

One of the reasons why people live vicariously through the records of others’ experiences has to do with fear.

 

Fear takes many forms — fear of failure, fear of making mistakes, fear of embarrassment, fear of the unknown, and more common than you’d think: the fear of success.

 

When you’ve created a self-limiting belief and held fast to it for most of your life, it becomes part of your comfort zone, and part of your identity.

 

Challenging your self-limiting belief is terrifying because if you actually succeed at what you once thought you couldn’t do, the comfort zone and identity you've created will no longer be relevant, and something else needs to be created to take its place.

 

Creating and defining this “something new” comes with all the fears mentioned above (and more that we’re perhaps not aware of). It can be painful, confusing, and unsettling for some time, until the new (more evolved) comfort zone and identity is created.

 

As a result we tend to sabotage ourselves and create justifications and excuses, so that we won’t have to give up our old comfort zone, so we won’t have to change who we believe we are, and life would just be smooth-sailing from here on (or so we assume).

 

What I’ve come to learn (reluctantly) is that the process of growth is painful and uncomfortable, and that’s just how it is. If you want to evolve as a person, breaking out of your comfort zone and hence challenging your identity is inevitable and even necessary at times.

 

But when you can leave your comfort zone, you gain a wider, more encompassing view of yourself and your world, and that can spark inspiration not only for creative ideas, but also for a new direction and new creations in your life. Expanding your awareness and challenging your perceptions in this manner allows you to see things in a new light, and connections between what used to appear unrelated.

 

 

6) Watching too much TV mindlessly

 

Watching TV is one of the most passive pastimes, as it simply involves a mindless absorption of what’s happening on the screen.

 

Unless you’re watching something that blows your mind and challenges your perception, or unless you’re actively analysing and studying the layers in the show, simply watching and absorbing and getting sucked into the drama doesn’t go a long way for your creative development.

 

(I’m honestly writing this one for myself.)

 

TV-watching represents a very comfortable time in my childhood as it used to be my family pastime. It’s also a chance to escape from my boring and painful reality, and live many completely different lives through someone else's stories.

 

Of course, it’s not wrong to watch TV! Like books and the Internet, TV offers a window to the world-at-large, and you can get ideas and expand your knowledge from there.

 

What really matters, then, is HOW you’re spending your TV time. If you’re engaged mainly in mindless absorption and escape from reality (and mindless snacking), then how forwarding is it really to your health, life, and your creative development?

 

This also applies to other forms of information like books, articles, websites, etc. If you’re constantly lost in mindless absorption and mental escape, how much of life are you actually missing out on?

 

 

7) Listening to people who are limiting themselves and their own creativity

 

And of course, like the blind leading the blind, people who stay within their comfort zone will want others to do the same.

 

Most of the time, their intentions aren’t bad and they believe they’re looking out for you. Like when your parents tell you that an artistic ambition isn’t practical in the real world. Or when your romantic partner is happy with the routine you’ve both created and doesn’t want anything to change.

 

They’re not wrong; they’re human. And part of being human means having numerous self-imposed limitations that you’ve unconsciously created over the course of your entire life.

 

And honestly, there’s really nothing wrong with having those self-limiting beliefs either. You’re human too!

 

But if you’re tired of repeating the same patterns and behaviours, and wondering why you can’t seem to achieve the goals that you want, then perhaps it’s time to exercise a little bit of creativity, and create something different for yourself.

 

And in the process of doing that, people who don’t know any better will try to get into your head and stop you.

 

So be careful who you choose to listen to.

 

Heck, don’t even believe anything I’m saying! I’m just a human being too, and I still have many of my own self-limiting beliefs to sort out.

 

But I enjoy sharing what I’ve learned and realised in my journey, and I hope that what I’ve written can support you in yours.

 

The only way to find out is to find out for yourself. So go test it out!

 

And remember to enjoy your process!

 

7 Ways to Love Yourself Every Day

PenguinGirl learns about self love and loves herself.

Lately I’m starting to realize that my existence thus far has been a long drawn-out quest for Self-Love. Up until 3 years ago, I didn’t have a clue what Self-Love is, but ever since I found the courage to plunge into my artist dream by organizing my first solo exhibition, I’m learning a little more about how my previous perceptions of Self-Love are far from accurate. It would take another entire blog post to define what Self-Love is and isn’t, and I don’t believe I’m at the right place to shed some light on that at this time. Instead, I’ll share a few of my realisations and ways to show yourself a little love every day!


1) Exercise regularly

I used to tell myself that I’m not an athlete, that I suck at sports, and exercising is something simply not for me. I remember back when I was in secondary school and we had to be tested on our physical fitness and based on their standards I barely passed every single year. I hated it. I hated being the person who comes in last at the end of a 2.4km run. I hated that as much as I tried I couldn’t push myself to be faster or to hang on longer and beat my own personal record (which everyone else was beating easily). To be honest I was quite resigned about the state of my physical fitness and instead of trying to work at it regularly and get better, I told myself I was simply not athletic and will never be that way.

For the past 2 months I’ve been working out an exercise habit (pun intended). I jog about 3-5km twice a week, and I have a routine of strengthening exercises that I get on almost every day. Sure it was tough at first, and in the beginning I could barely do 20 push-ups (with my knees to the ground), but now I can do 50 at one go and I can run 5km without stopping for a little over 30 minutes. It may not seem like much to most people, but for someone who typecast herself as the not-athletic sort and would never be so, it’s definitely been a lifestyle improvement.


2) Follow a healthy diet system that works for your life

From all the dieting fads out there that I’ve attempted and read about, I've learnt one very important thing: If you want to have a healthy diet, it’s really about finding a system that will work for your life. So if you decide to do 5-6 small meals a day but your daily schedule is always irregular and you keep missing your meal times, find another system that complements your schedule. Or if you’re not good with details, then counting calories would be a bad idea. Ultimately you want to find a system that is easy to follow and incorporate in your life, and that will help A LOT with building the discipline you need to sustain it.

For myself, Intermittent Fasting (IF) has been the most effective so far. IF is based on the premise that you go without food for an extended period of time (fasts), such that your body can finish burning off the carbs you’ve accumulated from your meals and start burning your fat reserves. So my eating window is from 10.30am to 8.30pm daily, and during my fasts I drink only water. There are, of course, the occasional days where I catch up with friends over supper or later-at-night drinks but generally I keep this pattern 5-6 days a week. IF works for me because it’s a very easy system to follow, and it has allowed me to curb my bad habit of snacking late at night (which is probably how I’ve gained weight in recent years haha).


3) Do something that tests your limits (ie. outside your comfort zone)

You’ve probably come across this saying: “Do one thing every day that scares you.” Some people may wonder why anyone would want to do that - like isn’t life difficult enough as it is; why add on more stress? However, it's only when you push your limits that you get to see what you are made of. Adversity in life is inevitable, and even if your life is generally smooth sailing, you'll never know what kind of shit will hit your fan. So I believe it's better to intentionally test your limits and rise to the challenge way before life forces you unexpectedly into a chaotic situation.

Earlier this year, as part of a program on leadership, I completed a marathon hike of 46km... TWICE in one weekend. Fortunately for me I had started hiking from an adventure trip in the U.S. I did earlier in 2012, so I was already somewhat physically adapted to walking long distances. Or so I thought. Little did I know that with long distance hikes, it goes beyond testing your physical limits. It reaches a point where getting through it depends on your ability to persevere one painful step at a time, and how you can support your team mates to ensure they get to finish line together with you.


4) Pick up a new skill or hone an existing one

Off a similar vein, learning a new skill not only tests your limits, but also expands your perspectives and general knowledge. As an untrained artist, I've been drawing and painting in my own way, and it's resulted in somewhat of a recognizable style but it has its limits. Hence I decided to really work on my drawing skills and follow a structure as taught by mentor. Since we started 2 months ago, I've finished 3 classic books on drawing and suddenly all the basic principles of drawing which I intuitively somehow knew before just totally made sense.


5) Spend an hour with yourself by yourself every day

When you meet the most awesome boy or the most beautiful girl and they love you back, you want to spend time with them, getting to know them better and connecting with them. Well, your self is no different from your romantic partner; in fact, your self is more important than your partner because partners will inevitably leave you (when the relationship or one of you dies), but you will be with you for the rest of your life. So isn't it worth the investment to spend time connecting with yourself and getting to know yourself better?

I try to incorporate an hour of self-time daily, and I've noticed that on the days I do spend that time, I'm more connected to my larger vision for my life, and clearer about what I need to work on in the short term to better position myself for the long run. Usually I spend the hour journaling for about 30 minutes, which really helps to sort out my thoughts and reflect upon what's going on in my life. The rest of the time I have a chat with myself and make sure I'm clear about my goals, or sometimes I fold in exercise time and go for a jog.


6) Journal first thing when you wake up

When you wake up, your mind is fresh and ready to kick start your day. But many people spend their mornings rushing to get to work, checking their emails or Facebook updates, reading the newspaper.. and basically not making the most of this critical time to set the right tone for the whole day. When you first wake up, your mind has spent the whole sleep time sorting out what happened the day before - your learnings and lessons, your emotional state, and sometimes you get dreams that still linger for a little while. Journaling in the morning helps to align oneself such that all these thoughts can be integrated, in order to bring you clarity for the new day's work according to your bigger goals.

I first came across this concept when I worked through Julia Cameron's "The Artist's Way". She called it the Morning Pages, where as creatives we need to spend 20-30 minutes each morning writing at least 3 pages. I've gotten many creative ideas while practicing these Morning Pages, and especially now that I'm getting into the habit of blogging weekly, these journals have been a way to track the current themes in my life and my learnings and realizations. In fact, this blog post was birthed from my recent journaling and recorded realizations.


7) Get enough sleep and make sure you end your day such that you maximize those sleeping hours

I'm not going to say what's "enough" sleep, because that's really up to you to figure out what's enough for you. Only you can know how much energy you need for all your tasks so plan your sleep accordingly to make sure you get through each day in the best possible manner. What I do want to stress is the importance of winding down intentionally. Which means scheduling your sleeping hours just like any other appointment or task in your day and sticking to it. Not only that, it’s also about completing your evening such that when you get into bed, it’s really about lying down, closing your eyes and going to sleep and not to continue working on something until you fall asleep.


So there you have it, some of the ways to love yourself daily such that you can get closer to achieving your goals in life! If you have other suggestions on ways to love yourself, feel free to comment below, or send them to me at penguingirlart@gmail.com. Have a great week everyone, and remember to FLY (First Love Yourself)!
 

Realizations from a Recent Rendezvous with a Roach

A few hazy evenings ago I got home and went straight to my Macbook Pro in my bedroom to put down some thoughts from a sudden inspiration. I was barely five minutes into my writing, when I heard some scraping sounds behind me, and I turned just in time to see some creepy crawly slip behind one of my paintings on the wall. I decided to leave it alone, thinking I had some time before it came out and I could always get to it later. Then the damn thing came crawling out and it was a f—king HUGE ASS COCKROACH. Literally I was like, OMG OMG WTF WTF OMG OMG WTF…

And to make matters worse… just like the penguins I create in their lovely world in the sky… it liked to FLY!!! ARGH!! I hate cockroaches, and I’m kinda scared of them (probably from the childhood trauma when I was 6 and one sprinted literally across my bed WHILE I WAS IN IT…), and as long as they stay away from me, I’m totally cool. But when it’s fluttering around my room, landing on my stuff, taunting me with its giant twitching feelers, there isn’t much else I can do except squeal in terror and attempt to nuke it with a whole lot of F bombs. Which clearly didn’t work.

Anyway, my brother happened to pass by my room at the time, so he got a roll of newspaper, and before he proceeded on my behalf to whack the bejeezus out of the little devil, I quickly closed the wardrobe door that was kept open by a jacket that needed to be dry-cleaned from 6 months ago. The newspaper attacks started from the top of the white cabinet where I kept some books and other trinkets from traveling, where my Tennessee license plate was displayed together with a Statue of Liberty and a pig with sunglasses, both made from those stress ball kind of material. Together with a Coca Cola football from almost 20 years ago, these items ended up on the floor as my heroic bro removed them to gain access to the monster, and as he whacked at it, there was a little poof of a dust storm.

The cockroach flew across the room to the chest of drawers outside my bathroom, where I had hung a t-shirt and running shorts on one of the handles. It hid between the shirt and the drawer, and after Aaron moved the shirt, the terror ended up on the floor behind extra bottles of liquid Dove and Pantene, and under the drawers. I grabbed my flashlight and followed it under my table, which housed a basket of scented candles I was never going to use and some paintings in an ArtFriend plastic bag that was disintegrating. This was when Aaron seized the opportunity of the space beneath the table to destroy our common enemy (whacking it a few times more than necessary), and it received a watery farewell down the toilet. *insert MAJOR SIGH OF RELIEF*

I wish I had documented the process (like the social media pro that I am, ahem ahem) to better illustrate this little story, but this post really isn’t about the victory over that nasty nasty thing. That really wouldn’t be all that interesting because I’m sure you’ve got your own heroic tales of taking down this vile creature, perhaps even more entertaining than mine. But as I looked over the aftermath of our victory - the stuff strewn on the floor, the dust under the chest of drawers and on top of the cabinet, the hoarder’s paradise beneath my table… the one thought I had was: Why do I have to many things? How did I come to have so many things? And why are they still here?

And that’s just what the eye can see. What I normally pretend not to notice is the wardrobe filled with clothes I don’t wear, the cabinet filled with trinkets that have no use, the junk in the drawers I tell myself I'll use someday, the box full of old journals and stories I wrote from the first half of my life, old photographs from late-teen-early-adult years, old letters from friendships exist now only on Facebook, a bagful of stuffed toys, and earlier artworks and song lyrics that were messy and awkward and abandoned halfway - all signs of a life spend accumulating unused things and unfinished projects. Signs of a half-lived life, halfway gone, and still half-fucked. And if I were to die tomorrow (which, let’s face it, is a very real possibility), who would I leave behind to deal with this mess, and what can they do with it but to get rid of it anyway?

It was ultra clear to me - I can't LIVE like this. I can’t LIVE knowing that someone else would have to clean up after my messes, to continue to pretend that it doesn’t happen, to lead a life filled with unimportant things, unfinished work and half-arsed efforts. The real battles cannot be fought when there are all these incompletions and clutter in the way, all merely distractions, excuses, and self-created obstacles to keep me from what really matters, to keep me from fighting the good fight. And perhaps right now my good fight is about these things, to sort out the messiness of my existence, to cut out the fluff and get to the core of what’s real and what’s truly important.

In the words of one of my literary heroes, Paulo Coelho: "It is always important to know when something has reached its end. Closing circles, shutting doors, finishing chapters, it doesn't matter what we call it; what matters is to leave in the past those moments in life that are over.”

So what do we really need to let go of? Why do we continue to attach ourselves to things that only clutter our worlds and hold us back from our truth? Why does the mess exist in the first place? And even after we declutter and sort things out, how many times would we have to continue this work before the mess is finally gone?

I’m still searching for my answers, and I may never know all of them in this lifetime, but one thing is for sure, I definitely need to de-hoard and declutter, so that at the very least, if I were to encounter a cockroach in my room again, there will be fewer places to hide, and I increase my chances of winning the fight.

Studio of Self-Love

Photo contributed by Michael Tan.

Recently I was one of 10 artists selected to participate in the Noise Festival Singapore 2015, as part of an installation showcase called Studio of Wonders. The artists and I set up our respective little cubicles along the theme of "Curiosities" - essentially creating a studio space based on what inspires us and our art.

Well, initially I was gonna write about setting up the installation, post some pictures, the usual stuff, but an unexpected comment on my Instagram post about my Studio of Wonders changed the course of my writing:

(Read what's circled in ORANGE).

Screenshot of my Instagram post and the comments from a follower.

So I got this comment from @katybobsyouraunty and turns out she thought that this was an area of my studio! My initial thought to that was... Haha I wish!! ... because the space I created looks pretty darn awesome, a far cry from my real-life studio. (It's a mess, and very cluttered, and needs a long overdue spring-cleaning LOL..)

And that was when it hit me - why doesn't my actual studio look like this?

I had spent a month creating the design for this installation, creating new artworks for it, carefully measuring and planning, sketching when I have pockets of time, painting late into the night (as I currently work full-time). Then on a Monday evening, after 9.5 hours at the day job, I spent 3 hours to put this space together, agonizing over whether I should change my original plan, whether the paintings can be seen from the holes... And then ALL OF IT is sealed behind a wall with some tiny holes for people to peek into, and it's quite ironic that I invested much time and energy into this because no one actually gets to see the full extent of what I've created. And that's assuming they're intrigued enough to peek into the holes to begin with. Which again begs the question -

Why did I put in that much effort to create this studio-for-show than the real one in which I work from and look at every single day?

Well, for me, it's a really simple answer. Because besides myself, nobody is there to look at it, so there really isn't a need to beautify it, to care for it, to make it worth spending time in. It's serves its basic purpose as a space I work in, as a space to contain all my art-related stuff and clutter, and that's all I need from it, or so I believe. But tell me that a gallery owner might possibly stop by and take a look, and watch me scramble to fix it up and make it beautiful.

And really, when I faced up to it, it really isn't about the studio. It's a reflection of my own life, and how I love myself. How much time do I really invest into myself, to do something that's purely just for me? To do something that's not about impressing someone else, or living up to a society's expectations. To do something that's important to me simply because it is important to me (whether I'm aware of it it or not), and because I'm worth the investment of my own time, energy and effort.

I know a single mom who took on a 5-week project to redo her master bedroom because it reminded her too much of her failed marriage. It was one of the most difficult things she had to do, because there were always seemingly more important things than her project, like caring for her son, running errands, working over-time... but she stuck to her commitment to herself, and transformed the entire room within 4 weeks. And she felt happier, felt more connected to herself, and it improved her interactions with others, and especially with her son.

We live in a world filled with busy-ness, taking on various commitments to the people or causes that matter to us, constantly running and striving for success in various forms, but what is all of that really for? Who are you trying to impress? What are you really working towards? And if none of your answers is for yourself, your own happiness, or your own growth, then it really begs the question - how are you loving the most important person in the world - YOU?

So I'm about to jump into what's perhaps one of the more confronting projects of my life - to actually turn my real studio in a Studio of Wonders. It's something I've been thinking about ever since the space was created almost 2 years ago, but I never got down to it. I'll be sharing more on that later, so stay tuned for updates, and I hope this inspires you to create something for yourself simply because it just makes you happier. :)

Here are some pictures from setting up on Monday, 14 September 2015. And also pictures of my completed Studio of Wonders. Before it got walled up :(

The exhibition runs from 16 September - 11 October.

View from the top on Setup Day, 16 Sept 2015. That's outside my Studio of Wonders, scratching my head.

The original plan was to have the Penguin piece in the center.

Dream Tree Totem all setup!

Finished Studio of Wonders!

With sketches on the left wall...

And the Dream Tree Totem and more sketches on the right wall!

Closer view of what's on the table...

"I'm NOT a Photographer": 7 Things I Learned from My First Photo Walk with 70 Other Photographers:

I'm not a photographer. At least that's what I tell myself, and what I started telling some of the first few people I met on my very first photowalk yesterday. I'm an artist, yes. I'm creative, yes. I've been an actress, a set dresser, a singer, a songwriter, a musician, a poet, a writer. But I'm no photographer.


In the process of my self-discovery project that will culminate in my second solo art show in October, I started to hear myself whenever I turn something down and label it as "Not Me". I began to question, how do I know what's "not me" until I really test it out to prove that it's "not me"? And what's with all these labels anyway? I get that we use these labels, such as our occupation, our hobbies and interests, our position in our family, descriptive words as qualifiers of our identity... but how many of these labels do we need to accumulate until we find who we are? And in the larger scheme of things, do any of these labels even really matter?

So I set out to challenge one of my labels, to step outside of my comfort zone of sketchwalks and drawing events and explore another realm of art I once refused to be a part of, simply because "I'm not a photographer."

1. The only person who's really judging you.. is yourself. 

I learned this very early on in the session. You see, out of the group of 70-80 photographers who showed up, the only person who DIDN'T have a large black Canon, Nikon or Pentel was.. ME. Every single person had their professional DSLRs, and a couple of SLRs slung around their necks or hanging off their shoulder, and backpacks with tripods stuffed into them. Me? All I had was a little Canon S110, a hand-me-down from my Mom which fits nicely in the palm of my hand, and my Samsung Galaxy S4, which I had only started using 2 days earlier. I felt SO extremely out of place, like how I felt when I first walked out of the airplane into the Nashville International Airport 6 years ago. I felt like I stuck out like a sore thumb, and that everyone was looking at me and thinking: "What is this girl doing here? How come she's here when she's clearly not a photographer? Does she even know how to take pictures?"

 First group photo of the day.

I suppose it didn't help when the first person I tried to talk to (by asking if this was the photowalk group) took one look at my little silver digicam, and he was rather unfriendly, and didn't seem to want to talk to me anymore after telling me I was at the right place. After that I was really worried that no one else would want to hang around me, and maybe I should just leave. It got a little better when I met the organizer, Wilson, and I started talking to another guy, but I still couldn't shake off the self-consciousness that plagued my thoughts and I felt so embarrassed when I took photos with the little Canon. I started to tell people, "I'm not a photographer." or "I feel like a black sheep in this group with my digicam", etc. and then after the 3rd or 4th person I said that to, it suddenly occurred to me that none of them cared about that (except maybe the first guy, who I'm still hating on.. grr...).

Really, the only person who was judging me for standing out like a sore thumb or a black sheep, for not belonging to this group or this event... that person was ME. The truth was, no one else cared if I'm there or not. Everyone is so caught up in their passion for photography, in capturing their own shots that it didn't matter what I was using to take my photos. I guess if I was sketching I would probably get more attention, but the reality was, no one cares if I'm there, let alone if I belong there or not.

Funny thing is, I realize how EVERY TIME I try to join a new group or an event of strangers, I judge myself like this each and every time. Believing that no one wanted me there because I didn't belong. OMG what a delusion!

My first Instagram shot of the photo walk. I absolutely love this photo. 

Coming soon as a painting!

2) People are a lot friendlier than they seem at first, and most times, they are just as scared to talk to you as you are of them.

I'm terrified of initiating contact with a stranger, because you never know how they will respond to you. And after my attempt to talk to the first guy and he shut me down, I was even more shaken. But I managed to gather my wits, and tried again, and I realized that actually people are friendlier than they look. And the only way to find out is to take a chance and talk to them.



3) The fastest way to get people to open up is to ask them about their interests.

In a photography group, it’s pretty obvious. So I'd ask them, “How did you get started into photography?" or "Are you a professional photographer?" And before you know it, they’ll tell you the most interesting stories you never expected, and it gives you a window into their lives. One guy got into photography because everywhere he went with his girlfriend, she would want to have her picture taken with literally everything around her.


4) You can learn a lot from opening up to people and listening to their stories.

A professional photographer taught me how to use the reflective surface of the table to capture an interesting shot.

From a Polish photographer, I learned that in his experience, Singapore is one of the best places to photograph birds because they aren't afraid of people, like literally you can walk down the street and in the tree along the roadside he has found birds' nests with baby birds in them. AND if you're looking to photograph night wildlife, Vermont Cemetery is a great place for seeing owls and civet cats.


 
5) Be prepared to be a subject in others’ photography.

It’s a photo walk, and you’re a person, and if there are photographers who like to shoot people in a natural state, don’t be surprised if you see someone’s camera pointing in your direction. Also, be prepared to take a few group photos along the way.

 After I snapped this alley along Ann Siang Rd and I walked off, someone else snapped this:

6) You’ll never know what you’re capable of until you do something out of your comfort zone.



Before yesterday, I didn't see myself as a photographer. Now I realize that even the word itself can mean so many things. Sure, I may not be a professional photographer with one of those bulky cameras, but I'm an artist, and the camera is simply another medium for creative expression. And nowadays with so many tools and apps, you can always use a filter on your photos to make them look closer to what your vision was. I ended up actually taking more photos on my Samsung and using Instagram filters to turn them into something really cool.

 By using my Instagram square cropper and a filter, I got this cool sky shot, from the photo below.

7) Keep on trying.

Like all things in life, if at first you don't succeed, or you're absolutely clueless about what to do, or you don't seem to get the results that you want. Just keep on trying. Try something different. Try a new angle of looking at things. Try another method to get the result you want. And if things still don't work, put a pause on them and move on, and come back another time.

Here are more of my favorite photos from this walk:

Self-Discovery and Growth: A prelude to my second solo exhibition.

Paintings in progress for my second solo exhibition, 2014.

A little over a week ago, I decided it was time to have my second solo exhibition. To be honest, I've been putting this off for months out of FEAR - fear that nobody would come to my second solo show or buy my art. You see, there's something you may or may not know about me - I tend to believe in general that I'm not good enough to deserve success or things going well in my life. So I'm worried of finding out that I have no real artistic talent, and that my first solo show was a success only because it was the first and most of my friends/family hadn't expected me to go down the artist's path. In other words, it was simply beginner's luck and I'm simply not meant to be an artist. YIKES! (This is normally where I go and watch TV and escape into lala land...)

I recently posted on Facebook about asking a stranger out for coffee, which is by far my most popular post to date. (Quick update: No follow up, I kinda got busy and forgot about him haha). The thing that gave me that extra push to just go talk to him and ask him out was this:

I asked myself:

How long more do you want to wait before you do what you really want to do? How much time do you think you have left?

And if you don't do this now, then when?

This second solo show is something I eventually have to face anyway, since I've committed to walk the artist's path. And if I don't do it now, how long more do I want to wait? How will everything else I have intended for my artist career in the next 5 years happen if I keep avoiding this one thing?

So armed with my paintbrushes, canvas, imagination, and a whole lot of impulse and guts, I jumped on the opportunity that my friend and life coach Carina presented - to coach me on a 4-week long project that would lead to the creation of this long awaited second solo show. From our first coaching session in at 1a.m. on August 26 (yes, she is a very dedicated coach!), I uncovered what this project is going to be about... "The Adventure of Finding Who I Am".

A few months or maybe even a year ago, another friend and life coach Kunqi posted this on her Facebook wall:

"What if I told you, in order to find out who you are, you have to find out who you are not and try to be a lot of different things including who you are not to find out who you are. And in the process, you'll find that you don't mind being who you are not and it really doesn't matter who you are. Question is, do you know where you wanna go?"

 I copied and pasted it on a virtual sticky note on my Macbook, and it's still there to this day:

So I've spent nearly 3 decades of my life following what I think my parents expect of me, and how I perceive others would want me to behave, etc. Simply because I have a deep fear of rejection, and so I choose to play it safe, to hide in the background, to remain on the fringes instead of really throwing myself into the life I want and embracing all that it has to offer. But how much is there that life has to offer? The only way to know is to jump in and find out. And "in order to find out who you are, you have to find out who you are not and try to be a lot of different things".

If you don't do this now, then when?

I must admit the first week went pretty horribly. You know how when you decide to really go after something, your defenses kick in and you start making all kinds of excuses not to do it? Like when you see a cute stranger and you start imagining what it'd be like to hang out with him, and you think maybe you should go talk to him, but then what if he doesn't like me, what if he already has a girlfriend, what if he thinks I'm crazy... etc. etc. etc. But thanks to my second session with Carina, I managed to sort through these excuses and put them aside. I have twice as much to do in this second week to catch up, but I know I can make it happen. (After all, I've done it before in January 2013 when preparing for my first solo exhibition. I really have no excuse for not being able to pull it off another time...)

So the tree has been appearing in my work lately, even in my current art campaign to make art-buying more accessible to the general public: "100 Artworks below $100". (If you would like to get original art by an emerging artist at insanely affordable prices, join here). The tree is a symbol for growth, for strength and endurance, for something that takes root deeply within oneself, and evolves into something greater. A journey of self-discovery is also a journey of growth. I'm excited to see how this body of work evolves over the next few weeks.

The dates aren't set yet, the venue isn't confirmed, and I don't know how the art is going to turn out, or where I'm going to get the money to fund this next show... and these sure are enough excuses to quit and put this show off again for the next few months. But if I don't do this now, then when?

I invite you now to really take an honest look at your life.

What is one thing that you've always wanted to do, but for whatever reasons, you keep putting it off? How long more do you want to wait?

If you don't do this now, then when?

Your life is waiting. Jump in.