The Art of Discipline

Have you ever watched someone draw a detailed picture start to finish?  I'm not talking about those time lapses that are popular on YouTube.  I'm talking about the sketching, the erasing, the coloring, the inking, the finishing, the whole thing.  It's unlikely that you have unless you were the one creating the picture.  Why?  Because IT'S BORING.  Especially if it's something repetitive, like scratch art.  One of the only ways someone can stare at a creation for hours is if they're actively involved in the process.  Even then, artists can grow weary of their work and speed up the process.  This inevitably results in works that look half done.

Because they are.

Once upon a time I was working on an art piece that I wanted to do right.  Start to finish.  Perfect.  But I knew the risk of speeding up was real, and the medium I was using at the time was unforgiving, so I didn't want to chance ruining the piece.  So I set a 30 minute timer.  When it went off, I stopped working on the picture.  I set it down and worked on it more on a different day.  The result was absolute perfection!  (I wish I could show it to you, but I gave it away without taking a picture.  Oops.)

It takes discipline to get a project done from start to finish without being tempted to hurry up.  Things take time, and it's worth getting them done right.

Another challenge is that you don't see the results of your work from the start.  Go back to those time lapse videos you've seen.  Do they start at the top of the picture and work their way down, perfectly laying down the exact colors like a printer?  Nope!  (If you have seen such a video, I'd like to see it!)  Generally they start with a sketch, have a reference picture, and slowly build up the layers over time.  They work in big strokes at the start and work their way down to smaller and finer details.

This can also be frustrating.  When you start with a literal stick figure with a few circles and lines that you erase and redraw 15 times, it becomes difficult to have confidence in yourself.  It looks bad, the finished product seems so far away, what if I mess up these foundations, I can't do it -- and the picture never gets done.

Writing is also like this.  You can plot it out, write out the character descriptions, daydream about the world all you want.  You can even write a story start to finish and it'll be "technically" done!  But just as paintings need layers and some parts need to be redone, so do books.  Reread, rewrite, learn more, look at it from a different angle, get some outside opinions, to get it as good as you can.

This is also discipline.  Discipline to not settle for the easier, earlier stages.  Discipline to keep going even when it doesn't look quite right.

ONE MORE STORY, and then I'm done with my monologue, I promise.

Watercolor is really easy to overwork.  And once you do, it ruins the paper.  Instead of getting beautiful, smooth colors that blend together into a gentle work of art, you get a grey fuzzy patch.  Add too many colors and it looks like a muddled mess instead of art.  You have to have a gentle touch and know when you need to stop messing with it and call it done.  Even when there's that ONE spot that still DOESN'T LOOK RIGHT.

Huff.

It takes discipline to know when to stop messing with your art and move on to the next project.

Now that I have "taught" you how discipline applies to art, let me try to apply it to myself.  Because I need more practice.