Creative intuition

Do you trust your instincts?

I trust my instincts to a point, but then you have to be careful when you start to second guess yourself. I’m always thinking of that cartoon illustration of the miner giving up digging just before he reaches the gold. It’s really hard or almost impossible to know when to give up.

I think if you are giving something a go, like being a thriving artist, you should set yourself a realistic timeline before you start, and that’s when you use your instincts. Then apply yourself to what you think you’ll need to do to get there… realistically. Then you have to trust your instincts as you put in the hours, days, years and decades… because often these things take a long, long time.

About a year ago, I started uploading some of my illustrations to Red-bubble to be available on t-shirts, mugs and stickers. I uploaded, entered my description key words and promoted them often and the result was crickets.

Now one year later, I logged back into red-bubble because I was interested in what kind of art prints they can do. That’s when I discovered that I’d sold 2 t-shirts, After I’d completely given up on Red-Bubble. Sure these two sales earned me a whopping $10 and I can’t actually cash out until I get &20 😆 But the point is patience.

Now if I’d continued uploading art at a rate that I was in the beginning. I’d have hundreds of works available and who knows what numbers I would have sold by now. Maybe still just 2 but it’s definitely a numbers game combined with patience. But you definitely got to use your instincts. Firstly to realise the opportunity, and secondly to decide when you are just wasting your time.

It’s the kind of thing that keeps me awake at night. And the good thing is, if you make the wrong choice you’ll most probably never know.