September 18, 2022
It’s OK to Be a Hobbyist
Refresh the Soul 30-Day Challenge: Day 18
I love looking at and thinking about art. I’ve always wanted to have artistic skills, to be good at the visual arts. I also have never had great spatial/depth perception.
I think it can be hard sometimes to let yourself be a hobbyist and a casual one at that. We live in this weird culture of perfection like you shouldn’t be doing or sharing stuff that you’re not really good at — unless you want to make a joke of it and say you “nailed it” when you didn’t meet the standard someone else set.
It took a lot of pressure off me when I realized I could just let myself enjoy making art for the process, fun, relaxation, and even the social aspects of it. I don’t have to be “good at it.”
As someone enjoying a hobby, I know it’s also OK to use tools to guide me through a project. For example, I did the painting above with my mom one day as we watched a YouTube video from Let’s Make Art. We’ve done a lot of these projects, and some of them even have an outline you can trace with a pencil to get started.
I can still enjoy the process of painting without drawing my outline freehand. I can learn from the skill of the artists who make the step-by-step tutorials and start to integrate some understanding by following their guidance. My hand can start to feel like what it’s like to draw what I’m tracing.
Creating with art supplies is restful for me. It makes me feel good. If I learn something about how art is made and what makes a piece of art effective for the viewer (perspective, color theory, etc), so much better, but it’s OK for me just to have fun.
I also enjoy printing out coloring sheets or buying coloring books: I love to sit down and color, and I especially like using crayons as it’s less fussy than colored pencils. I do use colored pencils sometimes, too, but I like the broad strokes of crayons and find it extra-relaxing to color that way.
There will always be part of me that yearns to pick up more skills as an artist, but I’m OK with my super low-key hobbyist ways, too.
I’m inspired by my mom, who has been learning a lot about drawing and watercolor painting in her retirement. We can always develop our skills if we take the time to focus on them as a project. When we paint together, she gives me a lot of pointers from what she’s learned.
I like to think that one day I’ll spend more time working on my visual arts skills, too. We shall see. :)
P.S. I wrote a story for The Startup some months ago about the importance of encouragement when it comes to forms of creative expression like writing and art. Here’s the link:
This essay comes in response to the Refresh the Soul prompt which asks: What’s one skill you’ve always wanted to pick up? Why?
