Judgment-Free Drawing Pays For My Attention
When I was younger, I liked to draw cartoons like the Animaniacs, or Tweety Bird, or Bugs Bunny. In fact, I’d say artistic talent runs in my family. My dad would draw us pictures of Wolverine or Spiderman on posterboard to put on our walls.
My brother is a fantastic artist and one of the most creative people I’ve ever known.
But, none of us really leaned into it enough to “make something of ourselves” in the fine arts or graphic art fields. My brother works in data, my dad mows lawns, and I am a marketing strategist and copywriter–which at least is in the creative realm.
Unfortunately, each of our biggest hurdle throughout our lives, has been a complete lack of confidence. Not only in art, but with everything in our lives.
My family aside, I can speak for myself when I say that I’ve always looked at my own creative talents as lackluster, slightly above mediocre at best.
Oftentimes, I chalk any ability I have as a result to my willingness to fail or look foolish. Which, is a big deal, honestly. Many people can’t let themselves fail and refuse to look foolish.
But, when it comes to drawing, I’m what I would call a “tracer.” Meaning that I can draw when looking at another picture, but I can’t just draw from my brain. Even in tracing however, because I lack the basics, the picture seems to always come out a little wonky (a scrambled nose, a wandering eye, one arm smaller than the other… that sort of thing).
Lately, however, in the act of trying to be more creative (and pass the time during quarantine), I’ve been putting my own judgments aside and watching awesome YouTube tutorial videos on HOW to draw. (Shout out to the creator of this one, actually — it’s freaking awesome and so easy to follow! BTW, I do not know this person).
YouTube is truly a place where you can learn just about anything. Growing up in the 80s and 90s, things like this didn’t exist. If you wanted to learn how to draw you either took a class or bought a drawing book — which for me, just never quite helped, because I would end up just doing what I always did and draw what I saw on the page as opposed to learning the basics of HOW to figure out where noses and eyes and mouths are supposed to go.
My first couple of pictures were decent enough, but the wonkiness is still very evident.
Then as I’m progressing, I’m getting better at testing different ways to draw faces and proper placements. Still wonky, but I feel good creating these from the ol’ noggin.
Now, I’m exploring getting away from “realistic” faces.
None of these are works of art and the goal isn’t to make them such. Instead, they are just practice and I’m appreciating the process of learning how to get better. Which, at age 38, I don’t do enough of anymore.
There has been an extra benefit, that I didn’t expect to happen. Drawing is helping me listen and pay attention at work better.
I work from home and have a good share of online meetings throughout the day. I find myself drawing during these meetings and it’s keeping me from surfing the internet, or reading the next email, or working on another project when I should be listening.
It’s also kind of fun (and a bit creepish, I suppose) to draw the faces of your coworkers without them knowing about it. BTW — None of the images in this article are my coworkers.
By allowing myself the freedom to create these simple drawings, I’m actually more present.
That’s pretty cool.
So, the moral of the story is (if there has to be one) if you find yourself having issues with concentration or if you need a hobby to help you during these boring, lonely times, consider drawing.
You may just surprise yourself while removing 30+ years of self-doubt in the process. :-)
