Starving Artist No More

One of my coaching clients reached out to me this week regarding a task that she and I had discussed at length during a session a couple months ago, and she confessed to me that she hadn’t done it yet. What’s more, she wasn’t really sure why she hadn’t done it. There wasn’t anything stopping her or getting in her way. She told me, “I’m just not doing it, and I know I have to.”

Have you been there? Have you felt paralyzed in the face of something you know you need to do in your creative business, but you just can’t get it done for some reason? Have you found yourself procrastinating on tasks that need to get done, and not really knowing why you’re procrastinating, or how to stop that procrastinating? I know I have. I know this coaching client is definitely not alone, and neither are you! Today, let’s figure out together how to say goodbye to procrastination.

In this episode, you will learn:

In this episode, I mention two of my coaching programs, the Thriving Artists Academy and the Thriving Narrators Retreat. You can learn more about both opportunities on my website, www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com. The Thriving Narrators Retreat is August 22-25, 2024 in Cincinnati, OH. 

In this episode, I refer to two past episodes of this podcast:

I also mention this TED talk by Lori Gottlieb.  

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.

Every creative has moments in their career that are moments of celebration, moments of pure excitement. And usually, when I talk to artists about those moments, they think about the big career milestones: that huge award that they won or were nominated for, the incredible review they received, the prestigious fellowship they were awarded, the amazing project they won. These are all big, wonderful career events in your life as an artist business owner that absolutely should be celebrated. But they aren’t the only moments that deserve celebration. The problem with focusing only on those big, external indicators of career success is that they are almost always things controlled by other people, which by definition means they are rare and unpredictable. Instead, I want to encourage you to focus on celebrating the small wins in your creative life. After all, doing the work is the win. Let’s discuss.

In this episode, you will learn:

 In this episode, I mention the Thriving Narrators Retreat, which is August 22-25, 2024 in Cincinnati, OH. You can learn more about this exciting growth opportunity for audiobook narrators on my website, https://www.starvingartistnomore.com/thrivingnarratorsretreat.

I refer to several past episodes of this podcast:

I also share a quote from this X (aka Twitter) post by Billy Oppenheimer.

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.

Last week’s podcast episode was all about the importance of acknowledging the hard things in your life as a creative entrepreneur, but if you stop there, you’re only seeing part of the picture. Yes, much in the life of an artist is really difficult, but so much is amazing as well. We get to create for a living! We get to share our artistic ideas with the world! What a gift that is! But if we don’t take time to intentionally acknowledge those good things, we run the risk of not even noticing that they happened. Our brains are primed to pay attention to and remember the bad, not the good. In order to make sure we recognize and appreciate the good things that happen in our creative lives, we need to celebrate them. Today, we’ll talk about why that’s so important and how you can incorporate celebration into your creative process. Celebrations matter.

In this episode, you will learn:

 In this episode, I announced the Thriving Narrators Retreat DEI Scholarship. You can learn more about this scholarship on my website, https://www.starvingartistnomore.com/thrivingnarratorsretreat.

I also talked about the Thriving Narrators Retreat itself, which is August 22-25, 2024 in Cincinnati, OH. Again, you can learn more about this exciting growth opportunity for audiobook narrators on my website, https://www.starvingartistnomore.com/thrivingnarratorsretreat.

In this episode, I refer to two past episodes of this podcast:

I also mention several books that I have read and that I feel confident recommending for those who want more information: 

I share a quote from this TED talk given by Shawn Achor in 2011, and I reference this episode of the NPR Life Kit podcast, which is summarized here. 

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.

The life of a creative entrepreneur is a difficult one. From a culture that doesn’t value our artistic work, instead telling us we should starve, to the difficulty of dealing with business administration tasks that many of us were never formally educated to handle, the reality of being an artist business owner is not an easy one. You’ve picked a hard road, my friend. And one frequent reaction to this difficulty that I see in my colleagues and in my coaching clients is what I like to call the ostrich response: sticking your head in the sand and ignoring the hard things. If you ignore the things you don’t like, they’ll disappear, right? Oh if only it were that easy! Ignoring a problem doesn’t make it go away. It just allows it to fester. It’s not easy, but there is value in acknowledging the hard stuff. In today’s episode, we’re going to look at those hard things together.

In this episode, you will learn:

In this episode, I announced the Thriving Narrators Retreat DEI Scholarship. You can learn more about this scholarship on my website, https://www.starvingartistnomore.com/thrivingnarratorsretreat.

I also talked about the Thriving Narrators Retreat itself, which is August 22-25, 2024 in Cincinnati, OH. Again, you can learn more about this exciting growth opportunity for audiobook narrators on my website, https://www.starvingartistnomore.com/thrivingnarratorsretreat.

In this episode, I refer to one past episode, 038: The Price of Success is Failure. I also reference this TED talk by Lori Gottlieb. 

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.

I know you’ve been there. Your task list is overflowing, and you’re overwhelmed. You’ve got more to do than you can possibly complete in the time available. Perhaps you’re in a feast period in your creative career, meaning your project calendar is jampacked full of fabulous projects that you’re excited to work on. Which is great, except that it means all of your time is spent heads-down creating, with no time left over for the necessary administrative tasks that come with running a business. Or maybe life has gone sideways on you, and you’re dealing with time-consuming complications in your personal life, resulting in a tight squeeze on the time available for your business work, whether that’s creative tasks or administrative to-dos. Regardless of the reason, you’ve found yourself in a place where decisions need to be made. You can’t do everything. So what do you choose to do, and what do you choose to leave undone? How do you prioritize? How did you decide what really matters to you, and how do you make sure your actions reflect those values? Today, we’re going to look at some of those hard questions. We’re going to talk about where your priorities lie.

In this episode, you will learn:

In this episode, I announced the Thriving Narrators Retreat, which is August 22-25, 2024 in Cincinnati, OH. You can learn more about this exciting growth opportunity for audiobook narrators on my website, https://www.starvingartistnomore.com/thrivingnarratorsretreat.

I also mentioned the Thriving Artists Academy. You can learn more about this dynamic and supportive community on my  website, www.starvingartistnomore.com/thrivingartistsacademy.

In this episode, I refer to several past episodes of this podcast:

I also mention the Spoon Theory of chronic illness, and I share the Merriam-Webster definition of "priority."

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.

As this episode is originally being released, it’s the day after Christmas 2023. Last year, for the podcast episode between Christmas and New Year’s Day, I narrated a Christmas story for you, and truthfully, that episode is one of my favorite podcast episodes of the entire first season! I’d like to make that holiday storytelling habit a tradition here on the Starving Artist No More podcast. So today, I have another Christmas story to share with you: The Elves and the Shoemaker by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm.

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.

It’s Tuesday of the last workweek of 2023, and it’s a time when lots of us are thinking about what we’ve done over the past twelve months and what we’re looking forward to in the coming twelve months. Those kinds of looks backward and dreams forward can be really exciting! But it can also be really difficult to think back on the year gone by. If I’m being honest, I’d have to admit that while “yearly review time” can be exciting and motivating, it’s also a time when it’s really easy to get discouraged and to judge yourself for what did or didn’t happen in the past year. When those self-critical thoughts start creeping in and taking over your inner-monologue, what can you do? My recommendation: be a detective.

In this episode, you will learn:

In this episode, I mention the Thriving Artists Academy. You can learn more about this  dynamic and supportive community on my  website, www.starvingartistnomore.com/thrivingartistsacademy.

In this episode, I reference Merriam-Webster's definition for "curious," as well as to several past episodes of this podcast:

I also read the first stanza of "As You Go Through Life," a brief poem by 19th century American poet Ella Wheeler Wilcox. You can learn more about Wilcox here, and you can read the full poem here.

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.

As this episode is being originally released, it’s less than two weeks before Christmas 2023. In another four days, my husband, Arturo, will be off from work in his corporate job for the rest of the year. Yay for holiday vacations! And all over the world right now, people are making plans for the holidays and thinking about their New Year’s resolutions. Because being less than two weeks from Christmas means we’re also less than three weeks from the new year. What are you going to do in your creative work next year? What New Years resolutions do you have around your artistic business? What are you going to do to make your coming year one of creative joy and excitement? Let’s discuss.

In this episode, you will learn:

In this episode, I mention the Thriving Artists Academy. You can learn more about this  dynamic and supportive community on my  website, www.starvingartistnomore.com/thrivingartistsacademy.

In this episode, I also refer to several past episodes of this podcast:

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.

When you picture someone who is a successful artist or creative, what image does that bring to your mind? Perhaps someone who has won lots of competitions or awards in your creative industry. Perhaps someone who is very prolific in their artistry, so you see their work all over the place. Perhaps it’s someone who takes on really high profile projects, performing with the best ensembles or working with well-known clients or having their work profiled in The New York Times or People Magazine. Exactly what those external success markers look like varies a bit from one creative industry to another, but they are all exactly that: external indicators of what our culture has deemed success.

On the other hand, what if you envision yourself as successful? What image does that bring to mind?

So many artists I work with come to me with the idea that I’ll help them achieve some of those external indicators of success, but that’s not actually where fulfillment lies for any artist. You can have all of those external success markers, and even more, and not be fulfilled by your creative work. And like I always say, I am all about helping you build a creative business that meets your needs, that fulfills you holistically. Not a business that meets someone else’s needs, or that meets the needs of a generic description of success, but your needs. Success is a very personal thing. It is not a blanket descriptor or a general state of being. Success is a state of being that is particular to each individual. In today’s podcast episode, we’re going to discuss your personal definition of success.

In this episode, you will learn:

In this episode, I mention the upcoming free Dream Big workshop I am hosting on December 5, 2023. You can learn more about this free goal-setting workshop for creative entrepreneurs on the events page of my website, www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com/events.

In this episode, I mention the dictionary definition of "success," courtesy of Merriam-Webster. I also quote from the book From Individual to Empire by Laura Bull, which I highly recommend (and which we're going to study in 2024 in my new Thriving Artists Academy Book Club), and I mention Shawn Achor's TED talk on happiness. I also refer to one past episode of this podcast: 010: What You Need From Your Business. 

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.

We’re getting toward the end of the year, when people employed in corporate jobs are completing their yearly self-assessments in preparation for performance reviews in early January. My husband, Arturo, who you heard from in last week’s episode, turned in his 2023 self-assessment last week, just before Thanksgiving. And yes, I am a self-employed creative entrepreneur, not an employee of a large company like he is, but I’m doing my own self-assessment right now, too: thinking about what went well over the past year, what didn’t go so well, and how I want to use that data to move forward with joy and creativity into 2024. As I’m thinking about those things and reviewing my own actions (and inactions) over the past year, I’m struck over and over again by one overarching theme: as a creative entrepreneur, consistency is necessary, but consistency is also hard. Today, we’re going to focus in on consistency in our creative work and figure out how we can be more consistent together.

In this episode, you will learn:

In this episode, I mention the upcoming free Dream Big workshop I am hosting on December 5, 2023. You can learn more about this free goal-setting workshop for creative entrepreneurs on the events page of my website, www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com/events.

In this episode, I refer to several past episodes of this podcast:

A full transcript of this episode can be found here. Full transcripts of every episode will always be available at the Starving Artist No More Blog.

Thank you for listening. Please feel free to reach out to me at www.StarvingArtistNoMore.com, with any questions, comments, or feedback. I'd love to hear from you.