Practice Makes Perfect?: How I Deal With Perfectionism As a Creative #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone and welcome to my letter P post in the #AtoZChallenge on creativity. Like I’ve said a couple of times before, I can be quite a bit of a perfectionist. Today, I want to talk about that.

Of course people say that practice makes perfect. I disagree. Even after a lot of practice making unicorns out of polymer clay, I still make mistakes. You see, here’s my most recent unicorn.

As you can see, one of its ears is slightly bent backwards and its horn is slightly crooked. You may or may not be able to see this, but the heart-shaped platform on which it stands is also slightly curved.

Sometimes, when my creation is really off and I don’t find out until after I’ve baked it, I throw it straight into the trash. That rarely happens now. In this sense, I’m not that much of a perfectionist, in that I do let less-than-perfect creations remain and even share them online.

When I still work on a project though, I try my best to perfect it. I don’t accept a mediocre result from myself when there’s still room for me to improve on it.

It does, however, feel slightly discouraging knowing that, even after months of practising, I still can’t create the perfect unicorn. I’d like to move on to something else, but if I’m still not able to craft this sculpture exactly as I want it, how can I move on?

Of course, I can, and I do craft other things besides unicorns. But doing a different design for a unicorn would feel like giving up on this particular design. And I have just a little too much experience having to give up on a technique or an entire craft.

Do I seriously not believe that practice makes perfect? Maybe I do believe it, but not in my own case. And maybe that’s a thing of low self-esteem and it needs to change. After all, maybe just practising sculpting the same unicorns using the same techniques a thousand times won’t make me perfect, but I could still ask advice from other polymer clay artists on how they’ve prevented their slabs, for example, from going curved. That way, maybe my next unicorn will be another step closer to perfect.

Negative Feedback: How I Cope As a Creative #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone and welcome to my letter N post in the #AtoZChallenge. I am feeling very uninspired today and almost gave up on writing this post, as my headphones decided to no longer work. Yes, those headphones I got for €239 a few weeks ago. The cable connection to my computer still works though, so I really have no excuse.

Today, I initially wanted to share some resources for newbie crafters, but that’d get rather boring. Instead, I’m going to share how I deal with negative feedback as a creative. This may get rather, well, negative, but oh well.

After all, I’m not thick-skinned at all. Like I said when writing about my creative frustrations and in other posts too, I get easily discouraged. As a result, my way of coping with negative feedback is usually to give up a craft entirely.

I didn’t do this when starting out with polymer clay. I mean, I did get some rather blunt comments early on, but I could see they weren’t meant to degrade my efforts or my ability to ever learn at all. It may’ve been because I had used polymer clay for a short time years before and, as a result, knew that it isn’t an inaccessible craft for a blind person.

It was different with card making. With that, I got hurt very easily when getting kicked out of groups for flaking out of my obligations for swaps etc. Still, it wasn’t until someone flat out told me that my work didn’t meet her expectations even though she knew that I was blind, that I decided to give up. Card making is not altogether inaccessible for blind people, but it can be very hard when you want to follow the traditional “rules”.

Then, with macrame, people doubted my ability to be able to learn the craft as soon as they found out I’m blind (and have mild cerebral palsy). With that, I decided, probably sensibly so, not to invest in a lot of supplies before I’d really decided whether I could master the craft. I so far only have one color of cheap macrame cord and a few supplies. I am so happy about this, since, with card making, I may’ve spent as much as €1000 without ever being remotely proficient at the craft.

Now that I’m okay as a beginner polymer clay artist, I still do get negative feedback at times. I can handle it when my staff point it out when I do something that I need to retry it as it’s not looking good. I also don’t mind people reacting badly to my finished projects. I remember once, when I’d published a polymer clay shell with a bit of a fleshy color to my Facebook wall, someone saying they were freaking out thinking it was a body part. That made me feel off for a bit, but I was quickly reassured by my staff as well as my other Facebook followers that it looked like a shell and I definitely hadn’t posted NSFW content or something.

On my blog, I get the occasional negative comment. Usually, it’s based on a misunderstanding and we’re easily able to resolve the issue. I deal with clear trolls with a direct hit to the spam folder. Then again, these are very rare.

Mental Health and Creativity #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. For my letter M post in the #AtoZChallenge, I’d like to talk about mental health as it affects my creativity and vice versa. There’s a common stereotype, and it isn’t entirely untrue or so I’ve heard, that people with severe mental illness are also often particularly creative. At the same time, autistics are commonly thought of as especially unimaginative. Now I indeed don’t have the most vivid imagination, but I wouldn’t say I have aphantasia (the inability to form mental images) either. I wish I were more imaginative and able to create things in my mind’s eye than I am though.

Anyway, my mental health is interconnected to my creativity in that, when I am depressed, I cannot usually put the effort into doing anything creative. For years while in the mental hospital, I struggled to write even one blog post a week. Now that I’m more stable, I at least find myself able to write almost daily. Still, I notice that my crafting ebbs and flows with my mood.

I also experience a huge flow of ideas sometimes, but am not always able to put them into action. For example, I have been wanting to craft a polymer clay squirrel for weeks and did indeed mix the colors I wanted to use for it, but I haven’t actually gotten down to starting on the sculpture itself.

Due to my autistic obsessiveness, I can perseverate about a particular aspect of my craft for a while, then lose interest completely. Some autistics have special interests that last for years or even a lifetime. I don’t. In my case, I am really lucky that I still enjoy polymer clay pretty much everyday nine months after having started the hobby. I do tend to change which aspect of it I’m most interested in though. Right now, of course, it’s mixing colors.

My creativity impacts my mental health in a positive way, in that I find in it a means of distracting myself from my anxious or depressing thoughts. When I accomplish something in the area of my creativity, it is a true mood booster. Conversely, of course, when I experience frustration while crafting, it can have a negative effect on my mental health.

Learning to Swim

Posted on by Astrid

Today’s topic for Throwback Thursday is “learning to swim”. There are no specific questions, but we are allowed to interpret the topic as we see fit. Here goes.

I got my first swimming lessons at the special school for the visually impaired I attended from first up to third grade. I, however, was very scared of the water and particularly of the deeper end. I vividly remember my teacher taking me to the deep end and my anxiously asking her if she could stand there. She was quite tall, but even so, she couldn’t. That scared me intensely.

According to my parents, my teachers were just overprotective, so my parents put me in swimming lessons at the pool close by their home. I didn’t need to start at the really shallow end, as I had had some swimming experience already, but could start at the 90cm deep second pool. Within a week, I was moved to the 110cm deep third pool, even though I think I protested.

It took me several more years before I earned my first swimming diploma. This first diploma at the time required students to be able to do breaststroke and backstroke, to swim one pool length with loose-fitting clothing, to tread water, etc., but it did not require students to swim underwater.

By the time I got my diploma, I had transferred to another school for the blind, where I had once again been put into the relatively shallow pool. I proudly showed my teachers my swimming diploma that I’d earned at home and was reluctantly transferred to the deep end.

From earning my first swimming diploma to my second, it took me only about eight months. The second diploma required students to swim 7m underwater. There was no way I could see whether I’d passed the 7m mark, so I had to guess. According to my parents, I swam about 11m.

After that, I had swimming lessons for the next three years that I was at various schools for the blind, but I never earned any more diplomas or certificates. The reason was, once again, the fact that my fear started to act up. After all, I wouldn’t swim under a mat. My parents, however, were okay with it this time. After all, my sister never moved beyond her second swimming diploma either.

I now can swim in a pool or lake. When my parents took me and my sister on vacation to Vlieland, I would also sometimes swim in the North Sea. I doubt I’d be able to save myself should I get underwater unintendedly though.

Keeping My Craft Supplies Organized #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. For my letter K post in the #AtoZChallenge on creativity, I’m once again rather uninspired. This time, my various sources of inspiration didn’t offer any help either, so I had to be creative (no pun intended). Today, I am writing about keeping my supplies organized. I hope this is not going to get me stuck once I reach the letter O post, but oh well.

Back in the psych hospital, when I lived with my husband and in the early months in the care facility, I had all my supplies in a large, wheeled shopping bag. Then again, I only had soaping supplies at the time and I still had to go to the day center with my supplies if I wanted to do something crafty.

After a while, when COVID hit and the day center closed, I put my supplies in my kitchenette cupboard. I still have a few things in the shopping bag, I think, but I really need to clear it out.

About a year ago, staff were talking about wanting to get rid of a large storage case from the living room. I told them I may want to have it, so it got placed in my room. I can’t imagine what I’d do without it, as the thing is now packed full of all my craft supplies and other activity materials.

My craft storage

For my polymer clay specifically, I first had just a basket with a few packets of Fimo in it. Then, I bought a stash of Fimo on Facebook that came in a large tea organizer. I used that for a while for storing my polymer clay, but have now graduated to a large storage box with many compartments. I currently organize my polymer clay by color, but the box doesn’t have enough compartments to store each color in its own place. For this reason, I have, for example, the Fimo soft brilliant blue, pacific blue and peppermint in one conpartment. I did at one point still have one empty compartment, which I now use for the colors I’ve mixed myself.

My polymer clay storage box

I still have a lot of my polymer clay supplies in other places too. For example, the tea organizer now houses my cutters, at least, most of them.

In addition to the polymer clay box, I have several more boxes for jewelry-making supplies. I still have one largely-unused box, but already have a plan for it, as my day activities staff is going to order large quantities of my most-used polymer clay colors for me and those won’t fit in the other storage box compartments.

I guess I could easily say I hoard crafting supplies and, to be honest, I need to do some clearing out soon. Not of the polymer clay though, as I still use that. Thankfully, polymer clay also doesn’t really expire, so even if I were to get tired of it, there’s no reason I should be throwing it out.

Identity: Who Am I As a Creative? #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi and welcome to my letter I post in the #AtoZChallenge. Today, I want to talk about my creative identity. Well, I’ve been talking about that for most of this challenge already, so this may get a little repetitive. I’m trying not to make it that way. So, who am I as a creative?

Of course, I could start by what I do. With respect to writing, I am a blogger who writes primarily about her personal experiences. In the crafting area, I am a polymer clay hobbyist. I make all sorts of things out of polymer clay, from all kinds of jewelry, such as beads, charms and earrings to sculptures. The only thing I do not make are miniatures, because I’m cluless about scale. However, the thing I love making most are sculptures, especially unicorns.

In addition to what I do, I could share the social roles that creating allows me to have. For example, being a blogger allows me to be part of the blogosphere. With respect to polymer clay, like I said before, I haven’t yet found such a community outside of Facebook.

Lastly, I could share about the higher pursuits I achieve by being a creative. For example, I make other people happy when I give them a handmade gift that I crafted myself. I also find meaning in the creative process itself, in that it provides me something to do on a daily basis that I can be proud of.

Since I dabble in many creative hobbies, not just blogging and polymer clay, I struggle to find a clear identity as a creative. However, I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing.

I also haven’t yet found a style that is clearly mine in my polymer clay, with the exception of unicorn sculpting. As such, I often walk the fine line between copying work I find in online tutorials and being inspired by it. With respect to my unicorns, I think I can safely say they are mine, not a copy of something I found in a tutorial. In fact, even with the first one I created, though it was based on a tutorial, I purposefully changed some things to suit my own style.

Goals I Have in the Area of My Creativity #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone! Welcome to my letter G post in the #AtoZChallenge. Today, I want to talk about goals I have related to my creative process. Here goes.

First, I obviously want to improve my skill and learn new techniques. With respect to polymer clay, I would really like to learn to make jewelry, such as earrings or beaded projects. I would also love to improve my color mixing skills.

I also may want to learn macrame, although I’m not 100% sure about that yet, as there’s still so much I can learn with respect to polymer clay and I’ve discovered I may not have reached my full potential after all.

With respect to my writing, I want to learn to write poetry that doesn’t look like a teen on drugs wrote it. I would also like to learn more about fiction writing. Of course, practice makes perfect, so I’ll really need to write more.

Secondly, my goal is to share my projects, when appropriate, more than I do now. I may really want to work on creating an Instagram profile. Either that, or I should share my projects on this blog or my personal Facebook profile more often.

I would also someday like to exchange my knowledge and skills with other crafters or writers. Of course, I do so online already, in Facebook groups, but I’d love to join a writing or crafting club or something. I’m not sure I’ll ever fit in with the polymer clay guild, as I need too much support with my craft. However, maybe I’ll someday be able to join in with some crafting workshops either online or in real life. I heard the American Council of the Blind organizes them online. Not for polymer clay specifically, but for crafting in general.

Lastly, I hope to continue enjoying the polymer clay art. This may seem obvious, but it can be quite the challenge, because due to my combination of perfectionism and impatience, I often give up when I don’t move forward in a craft quickly enough for my liking. I also dabble in quite many hobbies at once. Now, I really need to stick to just a few.

Frustrations in My Creative Work #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone and welcome to my letter F post in the #AtoZChallenge. I didn’t change my mind, so today I’m writing about the things that frustrate me about being a creative.

The first thing that frustrates me, is the learning curve. This may contradict what I wrote yesterday about enjoying learning about other people’s creative processes. However, what I mean is the fact that it takes a lot of practice before I become even remotely proficient at a skill. This has been especially true for my crafty endeavors and less so in the area of my writing. I am both a bit of a perfectionist and quite impatient, like I said in my letter A post. This means that, if I had it my way, I’d be able to create perfect polymer clay sculptures right away rather than now, after nine months of practice, still barely having moved beyond the absolute beginner stage.

The second thing that frustrates me, is the comparison trap. This is related to the first and may once again contradict the point I made yesterday about loving to share my work. Indeed, I love to share my work, but knowing how others have moved far further along in their journey towards perfection within a certain timeframe than I have, can be quite frustrating.

Similarly, negative feedback can be quite frustrating to me. I am not that thick-skinned, to be honest and get easily discouraged.

Lastly, it is particularly frustrating especially with my polymer clay when I’ve worked on a project for a while and then once it comes out of the oven, it isn’t as I’d expected. Whether that is due to some mistake I made or some problem while baking – which I consider largely out of my control even though I really know it isn’t -, doesn’t really matter to me.

Excitement: Things I Enjoy About My Creative Work #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone and welcome to my letter E post in the #AtoZChallenge. There are many E words related to creativity, but I decided to share the things I enjoy about being creative. I chose the word “Excitement” for my post title, because that was the title of the prompt in The Year of You for Creatives that inspired this idea. Now, of course, I can no longer cheat and use another “Ex” word for the letter X, but I try to avoid that at all cost anyway. Tomorrow, if I don’t make up my mind before then, I’m going to share about my creativity-related frustrations.

The first thing I enjoy about being a creative, is learning about other artists’ creative process. I love watching and reading tutorials on the various crafts I enjoy and they truly inspire me. This is more of a recent development, since doing soap making in 2016. Before then, I’d just create what I wanted without any sort of tutorial. This, however, often led to disastrous results.

Another thing I love about my creative work, is shopping for new supplies. Either that or just looking for supplies online without actually buying them. I have a huge wishlist of things I want to buy someday. About a month ago, I decided to put some of them on my online birthday wishlist rather than buying them myself. My birthday isn’t until the end of June, so this is quite the exercise in patience.

A thing I especially love about all of my creative endeavors, is being able to share them online. I am in groups on Facebook for pretty much every craft I dabble in currently (and maybe even some I don’t anymore). I cannot really imagine being creative without sharing my work at all.

Lastly, something I am currently very excited about is finding new techniques to try with my crafts. For instance, today I tried to mix a color with polymer clay using my precision kitchen scale (yay, I finally bought one!). Knowing it turned out as I wanted to (for which, in the case of a color, I of course rely on my staff) is pure delight.

Deadlines: How I Cope with Time Pressure As a Creative #AtoZChallenge

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone and welcome to my letter D post in the #AtoZChallenge. Today, I was a little uninspired, so I looked to The Year of You for Creatives by Hannah Braime for inspiration. Several of her prompts ask about dealing with deadlines.

Of course, I usually create what I want to create when I want to create it, so I don’t have that many deadlines. I also don’t usually have that many unfinished projects lying around, except for polymer clay pieces waiting to go in the oven. After all, most of my projects can be done within one morning, afternoon or evening.

That being said, even small projects may have deadlines, for example when I want to create something for someone’s birthday or when a staff is leaving. Then, though I do usually start planning for my projects a while in advance, I prefer to finish them close to the deadline.

Deadlines for larger projects are both motivating and stressful for me in my creative process. I sometimes cope with the stress by having a smaller back-up project ready to finish should I not be able to meet my deadline for the larger project. For example, when I wanted to make a necklace with polymer clay beads for a fellow client’s birthday, I started months in advance, but, as the deadline approached, I got stressed. Then, I decided to have store-bought plastic beads for another necklace ready that I could string on a wire should I not be able to finish all my polymer clay beads on time. I finished the project I’d originally intended right on time though.

Most of my current larger projects don’t have deadlines. One though, in particular, does: the mobile I’m creating for the baby my sister is expecting. My sister is due in mid-May, so I don’t really have forever anymore. I tend to procrastinate about creating pieces for that one a lot, even though creating the pieces themselves should be fairly easy. Maybe, like with the necklace for the fellow client’s birthday, I won’t be truly motivated until the baby’s due date comes real close.

With my blogging, too, I don’t usually write my blog posts in advance and today didn’t even have a topic in mind until the actual day the post was due. I usually don’t, but then again normally I can write what I want when I want to. Not so with the A-to-Z. After all, I committed to writing 26 posts in the month of April and at least right now fully intend on completing the challenge. I have many challenges in the past that I gave up on, such as #Write28Days and the 31-day writing challenge (even though I actually paid $10 to participate). With the A-to-Z, the situation, somehow, feels different.