Balancing Act, August Review

This year, I'm holding nothing back in a series called 'Balancing Act' by sharing the behind the scenes insights into balancing commitments and creativity with tips to help you make time for your Art.

This is how I balanced August.

August and Adjusting the Volume.

Everywhere we turn there’s noise - the noise of social media, politicians, notifications on our phones, the voice in our head and, for the past few weeks for me, the studio.

You see, our studio shares a floor with a wide range of artists, from florists, painters, musicians, advocates to potters and more. But there’s one unit that doesn’t create music, they appear to solely make noise.

It makes tuning out to think deeply and create more challenging, but not impossible.

The troubling part of the noise is not that it creates a distraction - much more dangerous than that is its ability to provide us with a reason to hide. Because if you feed into the noise and use it as an excuse to consume your attention, you’re hiding from doing the hard work that matters.

You’re giving into the comfortable hit of social media or TV over building your business, the morning lie-in over the physical or mental work-out. Choosing clickbait headlines over fact-checking or seeking out articles that share news in a more balanced way.

The excuse to say that the studio is too loud to do the work, rather than just getting up earlier and leaving earlier before the racket begins, investing in some earplugs or finding a solution to resolve the issue!

The excuse that the phone notifications are beeping, the email alerts are coming through and that we might miss out on something, rather than turning that thing on silent, setting a time to reply, ignoring our addiction and getting down to our work.

The excuse to say our internal noise is right – that we’re not good enough, we can’t, shouldn’t, don’t have time or whatever it shouts, rather than choosing to take action to silence and prove the voice wrong.

Are you hiding behind the noise and how can you adjust the volume to focus on what matters?

Inside the Studio:

Week beginning 5th: Real work in the studio started and updating the website with new events for the Autumn/Winter term.

Week beginning 12th: Our first Summer weekly course began at Songbird Ceramics with the majority of time spent in the studio.

Week beginning 19th: Met up with a few contacts, old and new, spent time in the studio and made a piece for an upcoming exhibition.

Week beginning 26th: Studio and diary heating up with meetings about upcoming projects, completing solo show work and portraits.

Next Month: September moves full force into the busiest season of the year - two public art projects, all term time classes starting back and finalising work for the launch of the solo show.

Balancing Act Quick Links:

If you’re just catching this series now, here’s what’s happened so far:

January Tactic: Balance and Accountability
January Review: White Space
February Tactic: Define the Pace
February Review: Wrestling Resistance
March Tactic: Action Versus Reaction
March Review: The Knock-on Effect
April Tactic: Go Wide or Go Deep
April Review: Honouring the Intrinsic
May Tactic: Sow a Mustdo Seed
May Review: Honour the Shipping Process
June Tactic: The 3 letter word
June Review: Mid-Year Check-In
July Tactic: How to Say yes to your Art
July Review: Fill The Leak
August Tactic: What do Art and Yoga have in Common?
August Review: Adjust the Volume.
September Tactic: 20 before 20.
September Review: Sprints and Strolls
October Tactic: 8 Artist Body Systems:
October Review: Working IN or ON your Art
November Tactic: The Creative Rollercoaster.
November Review: Check Your Diet
December Tactic: Small Things, Repeated
December Review: What’s Next?

What about you?

Let me know in the comments below how you found this month, what you’ve created, or what you’re struggling with and particularly if the internal or external noise is pulling your attention.

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