I am officially half way through the 100 day project. Judging by the fact that the project is intended to wrap up on July 14, I clearly didn’t keep up very well. In my usual fashion, I lost momentum quickly in. I regrouped, started again, and then lost momentum again. I think my biggest problem was that I sorely underestimated how difficult it would be to add in some creative time to my schedule. Going from allowing myself practically NO creative time to suddenly deciding that I’d do it every day, proved to be a bit tricky.

After falling off the wagon for the third or fourth time, I decided that I was going to complete the project…it just wasn’t going to be by July 14. Some days I’d “play catch up.” I’d knock out several projects on the weekend to make up for missing several days the past week. That’s all fine and good, yet it does sort of miss the point of the project. Therefore, I decided to cut myself some slack. I decided that I might not be able to give myself creative time every single day. However, I would still create 100 projects. Even if it took me a few additional months, I’d still likely have way more to show for the year than if I hadn’t taken on this project.

I shared a progress report a little way in to the project where I talked about what I’d learned so far. Here’s a few more things that I’ve picked up on recently:

1. It’s best to do any sort of creative project in the morning. I tended to put off my creative time until everything else was done. Shame on me. First of all, things photograph better in the morning. Some of my photos are dark and not that great because I’d be photographing it with poor lighting late at night. Plus, expecting myself to feel creative and inspired after a long day of work, isn’t the smartest move. Most of the time, I’d come home exhausted and not work on anything, which resulted in me getting off track. If you want to truly embrace your creativity, it’s likely best to do that in the morning.
2. There are so many mediums that I’ve never tried! In thinking up ideas for the project, I realized that there’s a lot of artistic things that I’ve never tried. This project gave me the freedom to try out charcoals, watercolor, purchase a sewing course, etc. If I wouldn’t have taken on this project, I would have likely continued to put this sort of exploration on the back burner. I’ve learned that I have more artistic interests/abilities than I thought I did, and I’m happy to be trying new things. I’ll succeed at some and fail at others. That’s how this goes.
3. I mainly wanted to do more painting. I set my hashtag as #100daysofcraftythings because I didn’t want to limit myself. I wanted to be able to do all sorts of projects. However, I learned a little ways in that what I really wanted was to allow myself more time to paint. When planning out projects, I almost always gravitated towards painting. This project helped me to realize that I want to explore this art a bit more.
4. Everyone has an opinion. Some people love everything. Some people hate everything. I already knew that I can sometimes get my feelings hurt rather easily. Creating something and then getting somewhat negative feedback on that thing, takes hurt feelings to a whole new level. I have a new respect for “real” artist that put their art out there and in turn open themselves up to all sorts of unsolicited feedback. If you create something and freely share it with the world, I have mad respect for you.
5. I suck at following too strict of rules. The entire concept of this project is that you take time each day to nurture a creative habit. I totally get it AND support it. However, I also have a natural aversion to following the rules too closely. I think the main reason I couldn’t keep up was reason #1 (above). However, I also think that I sort of rebuked the idea of having to do something every single day…even if it’s something I wanted to do. I think I needed to give myself the freedom to not have to do it sometimes.

All in all, I’m still thrilled I took on this project and I also know that I’ll be immensely proud of myself once I reach #100. I’m truly learning a lot about myself and my creative ability through the process. I think that I’m going to benefit greatly from “giving” myself this time, and I can’t wait to report back with 100 projects completed.

If you’d like to see what all I’ve been up to, check out #100daysofcraftythings on Instagram. Can you imagine that there will eventually be 100+ photos there?! I hardly can’t.