"I'm just not good enough," she said.
How to stop the naysaying and fulfil your creative potential.

A creative confidence coaching case study by Angela Terris and published in ‘Inside Creativity Coaching, 40 creativity coaches from around the world’, available on Amazon.

Article

Emma was a fine artist working from a small rented studio in the evenings and weekends. She worked full time at her ‘day’ job, which left her with little time or energy to be creative. She scarcely made money from her artwork as she felt uncomfortable asking people for payment and often gave it away for free.

Emma mentioned that "There is no focus in my work. I have lots of good ideas, but I am aiming to please others rather than concentrate on what I would love to do. It leaves me feeling directionless. It doesn't help that I lack the confidence to take my work to the next level and shy away from calling myself an artist."

Emma had contacted me after reading an article I had written about ‘Artists and Money’ and wondered if creativity coaching could help her. She wanted to build confidence in her abilities and to be ‘good enough’ calling herself as an artist.

Her WOW wish was to have a bigger studio.

In our first coaching session together I asked Emma, ‘What would help you feel more confident in your artwork?” and, “What would need to happen for you to be braver in sharing your work?” We discussed ideas and Emma identified three areas she wanted to work on that would help her have the much-needed confidence boost she craved. These were:

1. To increase my skills to feel more like a professional.

2. Get more focused on what I produce and create one collection of artwork to sell.

3. Have a realistic long term plan in place to reduce my ‘day’ job hours and have more time in my studio.

Emma felt these were realistic goals and became excited about moving forward which she hadn’t done in a long time.

Part of our working together was to address the obstacles and challenges that we're getting in Emma’s way of her dreams of being a productive, selling artist.

These were that she felt restricted by her studio size and unable to create the artwork she wanted. There was a discrepancy with how much time she thought was available to her compared to how much time she had, in reality, to be productive. Her fear of failure kept her in her comfort zone leading to procrastination in moving forward. Her lack of value in her artwork made her doubt whether anyone else would want to buy it. How comparing herself to other artists further down their career path left her feeling not good enough.

Quite a lot there. It was understandable that Emma felt stuck and unmotivated with how things were. What worked in Emma’s favour was her hope that things could get better and the determination to start moving towards what she wanted.

Part of my role as a coach was to help Emma unravel these problems so she could address them one at a time, helping to reduce overwhelm and get a better picture of how things were. Together we agreed a three month coaching period, including six online video sessions and e-mail support in between the calls, to help her find her feet again.

During the online calls, we would look at each goal to see what the next steps were, breaking them down into smaller, realistic actions doable in the time available to her. It allowed space to purely reflect on her creative practice, giving it the focus and attention it needed to thrive.

In the weekly e-mail check-ins, Emma was able to reflect on her progress. Was she still thinking about things or was she putting action behind her words, no matter how small that action might be? It helped her to keep on track and recognise any progress she made, discuss any concerns that might arise and had someone to celebrate her successes, no matter how small or big they were.

Emma says, “I was able to explore my mistakes and successes without freaking out. I took a step back to be more objective about what I was doing and being honest about what was working and what wasn’t working. It let me rebuild something far more ‘me’ and with enthusiasm. The whole process enabled me to set goals and thoughts to paper and focus on what to do next.”

The primary challenge for me was how to keep up with Emma as the inspiration freely flowed making it difficult to concentrate on her grasshopper mind jumping from idea to idea. It was like a green light had been switched on, and Emma had her foot hard down on the gas pedal. I needed to put the brakes on a little to slow her down to keep focused on what she wanted. I was worried that this slowing down might take the joy out of the process for her. It could have been easy for me to have gotten carried away with her enthusiasm and forgotten my role, asking "Is this idea moving you towards where you want to go, or away?"

At the end of our working time together I remarked to Emma, “You've grown in confidence, it comes shining through when you talk about yourself as an artist. You seem more comfortable showing people your work and talking proudly about it. You have been working hard on building your skills, researching new studio spaces and especially focusing on one area of your artwork to create a cohesive collection.”

Her remaining challenges were still the time restrictions with her 'day job', the not big enough studio and how to feel more assured in selling her artwork.

For Emma, she came away feeling like her confidence was building a little each week. She was more comfortable with her skills and more at ease calling herself an artist. She found having someone to talk to who was a creative themselves, understanding where she was coming from encouraging and supportive.

"I now have a clearer focus on what I want to achieve, how to go about it and the renewed commitment to make it happen.”

Three learning points.

1. No matter how much time, whether thirty minutes a week or three days a week to be creative, some progress can always happen. Work with the time you have available. It can be helpful to double the time you think something will take or half what you expect to do in that time by breaking tasks into smaller bite sizes. Cut yourself some slack and be kinder to yourself, your not a robot.

2. Creating more and more artwork can be another form of procrastination. It can be putting off finding buyers for your current work, fear of taking that first step if selling your work is what you want. Ask yourself, what artwork do you already have that is ready to go, but you are holding back because you think it's not good enough yet. What little things do you need to do for it to be ready to go? Now, make space in your calendar and do that before you do anything else.

3. Rember that comparing yourself to others can be a sign that you have self-doubt in your abilities and work. Build self-belief by focusing on improving yourself and not comparing yourself to others. We all have different strengths, find yours and play to them. What your audience wants is more of you, not a watered-down version of someone else. Be proud of what you create, and others will follow your lead.

Three self-coaching questions.

1. If you could buy yourself a bit of confidence, what would that be?

Here's a quick visualisation to try. Maybe close your eyes and visualise yourself going into 'The Confidence Shop' and asking the shop assistant ‘I would like to buy some confidence, please.' Be patient and let the image pop into your mind. What is handed to you? Alternatively, look around you. What catches your eye? What meaning does this have for you and what is your intuition telling you is needed to upgrade your confidence.

2. What would you be, do, have if you didn't have those limiting beliefs?

Some limiting thoughts are, it's not good enough yet, I might fail, my work will be rejected, something bad might happen, what are yours. Keep a notebook near you and write down what automatically pops into your head especially when you are working. Ask are these thoughts 100% true?

3. What do you need to let go off to be or feel more confidently creative?

Often we think we need more off something to be braver, but sometimes we need less, less putting ourselves down, less procrastination, less perfectionism, less buying new materials we don't need. Now, go ahead and write a 'stop doing' list and regularly check you're not falling back into old habits.