Both the creative act and the creative life require confidence. And life can rob you of confidence.
Let’s say a teacher constantly humiliates you in front of the entire third-grade class. How much confidence is stolen from you during that excruciating year? How many other robberies occur during our childhood and our adulthood? Over time, how much confidence remains? If you’ve been robbed of confidence, you may experience an inability to conceive of and follow through on creative projects, a tendency to procrastinate, a fear of messes and of the unknown, and other assorted creativity killers.
Consider the following. A painter opens his email and is thrilled to find a note from someone who owns a nice gallery in a faraway city. The note explains that the gallery owner has visited the painter’s website and loves the painter’s work but can’t find the painter’s prices posted. What, the gallery owner wonders, are the artist’s prices?
This question sends the artist into a tizzy, since he has no idea if his prices are perhaps ridiculously high or, quite possibly, ridiculously low (which is why he has avoided posting them on his site). He stews about the matter for several days, feeling his usual lack of confidence grow exponentially. Finally he visits his best friend, a successful artist with a great deal of confidence. “What should I do?” the painter cries. “I know I’m blowing this opportunity by not replying, but I don’t know what to say!”
His friend shakes his head and laughs. “Get me the gallery’s phone number,” he says. The painter does that. His friend picks up the phone, dials, and says, “I represent Jack Sprat. You emailed him about his prices. We are setting new prices this year and would love your input. His recent works, the ones you saw on his site, are each two feet by three feet. How would you consider pricing them?” The painter watches as his friend listens, occasionally nods, and finally says, “Thanks! We’ll follow up on that in a day or two.”
When his friend hangs up, the painter almost leaps on him. “What did he say?” he cries. “That he would be inclined to charge $4,800 retail,” his friend replies, “and that he would like to try out two of your paintings, the blue one and the red one.” The painter is beside himself with joy. Then, suddenly, he exclaims, “How did you do that? You just picked up the phone and called!” At this, his friend shakes his head. “Jack,” he says, “how could you not do that? These things are incredibly simple…unless anxiety turns them into monsters!”
Confidence throughout the Creative Process
Not sure what confidence actually looks like as it applies to the creative act and the creative process? Here is a thumbnail sketch of the ten stages involved:
1. Wishing. I’m conceptualizing wishing as a kind of precontemplation stage in which you haven’t really decided that you mean to create and haven’t bought into the rigors of the creative process and are still wishing that creating could somehow be easier. You dabble at making art, you don’t find your efforts very satisfying, you don’t feel that you go deep all that often, and so on.
The confidence that you need to manifest during this stage of the process is the confidence that you are equal to the rigors of creating. If you don’t confidently accept the reality of process, the reality of difficulty, and the reality of effort, and if you can’t say with confidence, “Yes, I agree to all that!,” you may never really get started.
2. Incubation/contemplation. During this second stage of the process, you need to remain open to what wants to come rather than defensively settling on a first idea or on an easy idea. The task is remaining open and not settling for something that relieves your anxiety and your discomfort. The confidence needed here is the confidence to stay open.
3. Choosing your next subject. You can call this a stage or a moment, but however you conceptualize it, choosing is a crucial part of the creative process. In this stage you have to decide what you are working on, and then work on it with energy and intention. At some point you need the confidence to say, “I am ready to work on this.” You need the confidence to name a project clearly (even if that naming is “Now I go to the blank canvas without a preconceived idea and just start”), to commit to it, and to make sure that you aren’t leaking confidence even as you choose this project.
4. Starting your work. When you launch a new creative work, you start with certain ideas, certain hopes and enthusiasms, and certain doubts and fears — that is, you start with an array of thoughts and feelings, some positive and some negative. The confidence you need at that moment is the confidence that you can weather all those thoughts and feelings and the confidence to go into the unknown.
5. Working. Once you are actually working on your creative project, you enter into the long process of fits and starts, ups and downs, excellent moments and terrible moments — the gamut of human experiences that attach to real work. For this stage you need the confidence that you can deal with your doubts and resistances and the confidence that you can handle whatever the work throws at you.
6. Completing. At some point you will be close to completing the work. It is often hard to complete what we start because then we are obliged to appraise it, deal with the rigors of showing and selling, enter into the void of being without a new project, and so on. The confidence required during this stage is the confidence to weather the very ideas of appraisal, criticism, rejection, disappointment, and everything else that we fear will be coming our way once we announce that the work is done, and the confidence to actually be finished.
7. Showing. If we are creating work that we intend to send out into the world, then the time comes when we must show it. The confidence needed here is not only the confidence to weather the ideas of appraisal, criticism, rejection, and disappointment but also the confidence to weather the reality of appraisal, criticism, rejection, and disappointment. Like so many other manifestations of confidence, the basic confidence here sounds like “Bring it on!” You are agreeing to let the world do its thing and announcing that you can survive any blows the world delivers.
8. Selling. A confident seller can negotiate, think on her feet, make pitches and presentations, advocate for her work, and explain why her work is wanted. You don’t have to be overconfident, exuberant, or over-the-top — you simply need to be a calmly confident seller, someone who first makes a thing and then sells it in a businesslike fashion.
9. New incubation and contemplation. While you are showing and selling your completed works, you are also incubating and contemplating new projects and starting the process all over again. The confidence required here is the confidence that you have more good ideas in you. Sometimes we feel as if the thing we just finished contained everything we had to say and that now we are creatively bereft, even doomed. You want to confidently assert that you have plenty more to say and do — even if you don’t know what that something is quite yet.
10. Simultaneous and shifting states and stages. I’ve made the creative process sound neat and linear, but usually it is anything but. Often we are stalled on one thing, contemplating another thing, trying to sell a third thing, and so on. Much in our creative life goes on simultaneously and shifts from moment to moment. The confidence needed throughout the process is the quiet, confident belief that you can stay organized, successfully handle all the thoughts and feelings going on inside you, get your work done, and manage everything. This is a juggler’s confidence — it is you announcing, “You bet that I can keep all these balls in the air!”
Manifest confidence throughout the creative process. Failing to manifest confidence in any stage will stall the process.
Confidence and Boundary Issues
Often a creative person’s lack of confidence plays itself out as boundary issues, that is, as the way she gives herself away to other people or as the way she enters into volatile relationships with them.
As artists, we require solitude, probably more than the next person. But we also require human warmth, friendships, and marketplace advocacy. Life can grow too cold if we live it completely alone, and our career suffers if we avoid interactions with the people who might help us and who might appreciate our art. So, although we may consider ourselves introverts and feel happiest keeping ourselves company, we have many interpersonal needs — and we want to meet them from a place of confidence.
How should we relate to our fellow artists, to gallery owners, to potential collectors, to publishers, and to the other people whose cooperation, consideration, and sometimes friendship we seek? We achieve these things by doing a good job of balancing genuine warmth and intimacy with healthy self-protection. It will not benefit us to consider other people the enemy and to interact with them aggressively or defensively, but it will also not benefit us to naively and unques- tioningly put our complete trust in our fellow human beings. People can love one another, and they can also harm one another. Virtually every shade of interaction, from the kindest to the cruelest, is part of the human repertoire. So we do have to be careful — but we also want to feel confident that our relationships can work.
One painter complained to me that her friends, the organizations where she volunteered her time, her family members, and the few gallery owners with whom she dealt regularly took advantage of her. I asked her what role she played in this unfortunate dynamic. She responded at length, but she never really answered the question. I wondered aloud if her very communication style — as evidenced by the way she had just responded to me — had developed over time to spare her from saying things directly and clearly. I wondered if she spoke evasively and at length to save herself from saying short, sweet, strong, confident things. She pondered this for a long moment and then agreed.
She admitted that she had a terrible time saying no to people or directly announcing what she wanted and needed. This inability, which she could easily trace to childhood dynamics, resulted in people walking all over her. In therapy, we might have explored the childhood part at great length; since this was coaching, I went directly to the solution. I asked her to try speaking in sentences of no more than six or seven words and to say in those sentences exactly what she meant.
Then we role-played. The first issue that came up was the way her husband, who had retired early, kept visiting her in her studio to chat about inconsequential matters. I asked her to craft a sentence of seven words or fewer that would communicate what she wanted to say to him: that her painting time was precious to her. Her first efforts were grotesquely long, apologetic, and weak. Finally, after many tries, she arrived at “I can’t chat much while I’m working.”
“Can you say that to him?” I asked.
“Yes,” she replied.
“How does it feel?” I continued.
“Very, very scary.”
Next we role-played a problem she was having with the fellow who did some printing work for her. He was the only person in her area equipped to do this work, and she liked both the work he did and his prices. But he was always inappropriate with her, saying things like “Most husbands don’t understand their artist wives.”
“What do you want to say to him?” I asked.
Having just practiced, she was now quicker to respond. “I need you to stop that,” she said. “I am coming here to have prints made, period.” She laughed. “That’s two sentences, and one’s a little long. But that’s the idea, right?”
“That’s exactly the idea,” I agreed.
When we say that a person has boundary issues, we mean that he is doing one or the other of two inappropriate things: that he is insufficiently protecting his own being or that he is aggressively intruding on others. A constant apologist has one kind of boundary issue; a stalker has another. As an artist, you want to be mindful of how you relate to others and opt for the kind of strength that allows you to advocate for yourself and that protects you from the assaults of others.
This is your work; no one else can do it for you. By the stances you take, by the words you use, by the vibe you give off, you let people know that you will not be anybody’s dishrag. You manifest your confidence by doing a good job at maintaining appropriate boundaries with all those with whom you interact.
Presenting Your Artist Self with Confidence
You may feel quite confident in many areas of your life but find yourself much weaker than you would like when you get to the canvas or when you need to talk to a gallery owner. A reasonable amount of general confidence isn’t enough for an artist who wants to succeed. You need more than general confidence — you need confidence as an artist.
What happens if you aren’t really confident as an artist? You may start relying on your first ideas and not go deep; you may flee the encounter completely; you may think small rather than large; you may give up at the first hint of trouble (which will come sooner rather than later); you may avoid the marketplace. Simply by not feeling confident enough in your abilities as an artist and in your abilities as a salesperson, you may do yourself and your career a great deal of harm.
What should you be confident about? It doesn’t have to be that a given project will succeed: you don’t really want to attach to outcomes. It doesn’t have to be that somehow you can avoid missteps, mistakes, and messes: nobody can avoid any of that, and that isn’t how the process works anyway. What you should be confident about is that you are a legitimate human being with the right to be and the power to create. If you can find a way to feel confident about your legitimacy and your powerfulness, you will work better and sell better.
You may not actually feel very confident as you paint or write, as you advocate for your work, or as you present your work to prospective buyers, but even if you aren’t feeling confident, you should keep confidence in mind as an aspiration. Aim for confidence, just as you aim for excellence in the work itself. It is that aura of confidence that propels one person past another in the marketplace. When someone is confident in his approach, you listen; when he hems and haws and shifts his feet, you look for the exit. When you portray yourself as not really counting, you’re likely to be dismissed out of hand.
Apologizing for your work, hiding from potential buyers, avoiding marketplace interactions, dismissing yourself as soon as you can (as if beating others to the punch): these are all bad habits that you will want to change. To change a habit means to work on it for months and even years, not for just a few minutes. It is unlikely that, for example, you can suddenly start taking the opportunities offered to you just by snapping your fingers, if previously you have been unable to take them. You need to be on a lifelong strengthening program, a self-coaching regimen in which each day you remind yourself that you intend to manifest your strength and your confidence.
Remember: It is one thing to be quiet; it is another to be meek. It is one thing to be modest; it is another to be self-disparaging. It is one thing to be principled; it is another to live by the principle that everybody else comes first. You want to step out of the shadows and risk standing up for your work and your future. Maybe you doubt your work: either stop doubting it or create work that you doubt less. Maybe you doubt yourself: stop doubting yourself and, over time, create a version of yourself that you have no reason to doubt.
Present yourself with strength. If doing this doesn’t come naturally to you, practice. Practice in your mind, in the mirror, or with an art buddy. Practice saying, “I love my new work.” Practice saying, “If your gallery has an opening for one new artist, it should be me, and here’s why.” Practice saying, “I know that you collect contemporary surrealists, and I’m pushing the surrealism envelope, so you must visit my studio!” Practice saying, “Let me describe the nine ways in which I will be an asset to your gallery.” Practice saying, “I am doing excellent work, and you should really take a look.”
It is not just what you say — it is how you look at the world, how you think, and what you do. Either you are looking for opportunities to show your artwork or you aren’t. Either you are mulling over new marketing ideas or you aren’t. Either you are thinking about your next sales opportunities or you aren’t. Either you are calculating what might work in the marketplace or you aren’t. You are either a player in the game or a spectator in the stands. Either you are taking real action or you are fantasizing about what lucky break might come your way.
All this translates into a way of presenting yourself that is professional, savvy, energetic, proactive, eager, and decisive. Your intentions are clear: you intend to succeed. Your handshake is firm. You have people to interest and customers to acquire. Your first thoughts aren’t “What should I say?” and “Where’s the exit?” You know what to say, and you know where you mean to be: right here, right now, representing yourself in the brightest light possible.
Even if you don’t actually feel confident, try to act confident. You may find yourself growing into that role and that persona!
Perhaps you want to begin some new creative projects or attempt some new ways of promoting yourself, but something is holding you back. Here are ten tips for expanding your repertoire of creative projects and/or your self-promotional efforts. If you do these things, your confidence will grow.
1. Know what you currently do. Because our lives rush along, providing us with little chance to catch up with ourselves, often we don’t really know what we’ve been attempting or accomplishing. When was the last time you had a conversation with yourself about what sort of art you’re making or what sort of marketing efforts you’re attempting? It’s harder to know what new things to try if you don’t know what current things you’re doing. Settle in and spend some real time discerning your current situation.
2. Detach from the idea that there is one way to do things. In part because it reduces our anxiety, we often decide to do things one way — paint one sort of painting, market in one particular way — and refuse to think about the desirability of other art or other marketing efforts that we might make. Maybe you think that only the gallery scene is for you and that marketing your art online is beneath your dignity. Try to let go of the idea that there is just one way to do things. Find the courage to investigate other ways of making art and marketing art, even those that at first glance look completely uncongenial. You might discover that one of these ways ignites some passion in you and instantly increases your confidence.
3. Investigate your dislikes. If you dislike realistic painting, why do you dislike it? If you dislike abstract painting, why do you dislike it? If you dislike talking to gallery owners, why do you dislike this type of interaction? If you dislike studio visits, why do you dislike them? We often make snap judgments about our likes and dislikes and subsequently never investigate them, responding instead with a knee-jerk reaction. Take a good, hard look at the things you claim to dislike and see if they really are so unlikeable. Turning some of those dislikes into likes may prove the exact equivalent of rekindling your desire and increasing your confidence.
4. Investigate your fears. We often hide from ourselves the fact that something is scaring us or making us anxious. Maybe we have real fears that our drawing skills aren’t up to snuff. So we keep dodging that painful information and paint abstractly, not because we genuinely want to paint abstractly but because we know that our realistic paintings wouldn’t measure up. It is very brave work, and very valuable work, to look your fears and anxieties in the eye. Only then will you understand your true situation. That understanding is bound to open the door to courageous new efforts — and new confidence.
5. Articulate your possibilities. What new art do you want to attempt? What new marketing efforts do you want to try? If you don’t name them, it’s unlikely you’ll be able to pursue them. If, on the other hand, you can say clearly to yourself that you want to try your hand at some Calderesque mobiles or that you want to learn how to affiliate market your paintings, that clarity of expression will help you move in new directions — and make you both more enthusiastic and more confident.
6. Make a strong choice. Let’s say that you want to make several kinds of art: some sculptures, a multimedia project, some monoprintings, and a new style that involves personal history. It is exciting to want to do many things, but it can also prove paralyzing to have too many simultaneous choices. Choose something strongly without second-guessing whether it is the best choice and without grieving that you can’t do x or y because you are doing z. Until we make strong choices of this sort, we tend not to get anything done. It may be exciting to imagine doing a lot of things, but it is actually more exciting to really do one thing — and making that strong choice is a confidence booster.
7. Stretch in a new direction. If you’re moving in a genuinely new direction, that movement is likely to feel risky as well as exciting. Risky things actually feel risky in the body. Don’t be surprised if your stomach gets queasy or your palms sweat — and don’t use those feelings as an excuse to stop what you’re attempting. Instead say, “Okay, I’m making myself anxious here — and that’s okay. Onward!” If you’ve been painting your whole life and now you’re starting to sculpt, isn’t it likely that will feel like a stretch? Accept that reality!
8. Accept being a beginner. If you are trying something genuinely new to you — for example, you are moving from watercolors to acrylics or moving from studio visits to gallery efforts — you must accept that you are a beginner and that you will stammer more than you would like, stub your toe more than you would like, and on some days feel completely lost at sea. Do not let these realities become the excuses you use to return to more familiar ways. Expect them, accept them, and persevere! And maybe inject some beginner’s passion into the process! Paradoxically enough, accepting that you are a beginner when you are a beginner will increase your confidence.
9. Accept the reality of learning curves. Not only are you a genuine beginner at this new painting style or marketing technique, but you will also have to endure the learning curve that comes with any new effort. Just picture the learning curve required to go from your first piano lessons to playing Bach at Lincoln Center. Don’t let the fact that a learning curve is coming daunt you or deter you. Accept the reality, forgive yourself on the days when you make “too little” progress, and keep the payoff in mind — your growth and success as an artist. You might even want to generate some enthusiasm and love for the very idea of a learning curve!
10. Parlay what you already know. Even though you may be a beginner at some new painting technique, composing style, or marketing strategy, you are not a beginner at life. You can parlay all that you’ve learned over the years and make your current experience that much easier. Remind yourself that you know a lot and that you intend to bring all that knowledge to your efforts, and you will do a much better job of maintaining your enthusiasm, optimism, focus, and confidence.
Confidence and Anxiety Management
It’s often the case that even when we’re reasonably confident on the inside, when it comes to accessing that confidence for some specific reason, like getting on with our painting or contacting a particular gallery, we can’t seem to get there. Either we proceed very weakly, or we decide not to proceed at all.
What has typically happened is the following. We really did want to work on our painting or contact that gallery, and we knew that we should do that work because it served our meaning needs and matched our intentions. But as soon as we got ready, something welled up in us: that old culprit, anxiety.
Anxiety is the great stopper and the great silencer. We get a little scared, a little doubtful, a little worried; we start to produce stress hormones in our body and all sorts of queasy, uncomfortable feelings; and suddenly our intention flies right out the window.
Most people are not very smart about anxiety, even though anxiety has repeatedly visited them. Instead of embracing that we are human, that we get anxious, and that we need to manage our anxiety or make our meaning despite our anxiety, we often act surprised that “something has happened” — namely, that our very inexact warning system against danger has leaped into operation. Why are we still surprised that we get anxious?
It is time to stop being surprised. It is time to become an anxiety master. If, being honest with yourself, you know that anxiety is a problem for you, that it robs you of confidence, and that it has gotten in the way of manifesting your intentions more times than you care to remember, now is the time to take responsibility for learning how to deal with that anxiety.
Unaddressed anxiety robs us of confidence. In order to regain the confidence that is “this close” to being available to you, you need to realize that anxiety is the culprit and announce to yourself either that you will manage it using the anxiety-management techniques I hope you will learn or that you will do what you need to do while still feeling anxious. We would not have wanted Eisenhower to stop planning D-day because he was feeling too anxious. Do not allow yourself to stop creating or to stop selling because you are feeling anxious.
Of course, better than just white-knuckling the situation is being able to reduce your anxiety or even, for that moment at least, eliminating it entirely. You want to manifest the courage necessary to get on with your art and your career even if you are feeling anxious; but even better is not to have to feel so anxious in the first place. This is possible!
In my book Mastering Creative Anxiety I describe more than twenty categories of anxiety-management strategies, everything from breathing techniques to cognitive techniques to relaxation techniques to discharge techniques. You can employ calming guided visualizations; you can use the technique called “disidentification” that’s employed in a branch of therapy known as psychosynthesis; you can create useful ceremonies and rituals; you can learn how to reorient away from anxiety-producing stimuli. There are many, many techniques and strategies you can try!
But it isn’t enough to read a book and nod your head in agreement as you recognize your situation. Rather, you want to choose one or two of the strategies offered and practice them and own them so that they are available to you when you grow anxious. You may want to run through the whole menu first and try out each one, at least a little bit, to see which one or two seem most congenial to you. Then commit to really learning and practicing the one or two you find most helpful.
Practice your new favorite anxiety-management strategy every day. Create situations in your mind’s eye that you know are going to make you anxious, and, again in your mind’s eye, see yourself using your anxiety-management strategy and effectively reducing your anxiety. This kind of visual rehearsal can prove very effective in helping you finally get a better grip on your anxiety — and increase your confidence.
Many productive, brilliant artists are anxious people. They nevertheless manage to manifest the confidence and courage they need to create and sell — sometimes by quelling their anxiety in harmful ways, such as drinking too much. If you work at really learning and owning a few useful anxiety-management strategies and becoming a personal-anxiety expert, you may discover that you have proved the exception: you’ve become an artist who can deal with anxiety in effective, nonharmful ways and who can manifest the confidence you need whether or not you are feeling anxious.
All people come with a past and a personality. Marsha was no exception. Her sister’s accidental death at the age of twelve, and her family’s collapse after that terrible tragedy, robbed Marsha of something vital: joy, confidence, and hope for her future. It also seemed to rob her of her health. She suffered from a chronic earache, and it made painting, which was the light of her life, painful and difficult. So she produced little — lovely things, but only occasional things.
At one point several of these occasional things had accumulated. Marsha was then in her late twenties. She had a friend by the name of Meredith who had a friend by the name of Valerie. Valerie ran a small, prestigious gallery, and Meredith suggested that Valerie see Marsha’s work. A studio visit was arranged. Valerie arrived. Marsha, her ear aching and her nerves raw, awkwardly showed Valerie around. It didn’t take long, and soon Valerie left. Something about that visit and the ensuing silence provoked Marsha to come and see me.
“How did the visit go?” I asked after we were settled.
“It was pleasant. Fine.”
“What did she say?”
“That she liked my work a lot.”
“And?”
“And what?”
“Did you ask her if she wanted to give you a show?”
“No! She didn’t seem that interested.”
“She said that she liked your work a lot. But she didn’t seem that interested?”
“Exactly. I sensed that she was just being polite. She didn’t have much to say about my work as she was looking at it.”
“What did she say? Besides that she liked it a lot?”
“Oh, she said this and that. She thought that I had a tremendous color sense, that I had a unique perspective, things like that.”
“And that sounded like mere politeness?”
“Well, she didn’t say that she loved anything! And she didn’t…I don’t know…have a lot to say.”
I almost smiled. “What would you have said to Van Gogh about Starry Night ?” I asked after a moment.
Marsha shrugged. “I don’t know. That I loved it.”
“And? What else?”
“I don’t know. Maybe nothing.”
“Not ‘What an interesting way to paint stars’?”
“No. God, no!”
“Not ‘How much you’ve crammed into a small canvas!’?”
“No!”
“And since you would have stood there mute or nearly mute, he should have taken that to mean that you were just being polite when you said you loved it?”
She frowned.
“Maybe she really liked my work,” she said after a long moment.
“So you’ll get in touch with her?”
Marsha closed right down.
“Well…”
“Yes?”
“My paintings are of very different sizes. They wouldn’t make for a coherent show.”
“So, you’re mind-reading again?”
“Mind-reading? No. I just know how shows work.”
“Is that right? There’s a show at the Modern.” I mentioned the name of a well-known artist. “You’ve seen it?”
“Yes.”
“What are the sizes of the paintings in that show?”
Marsha thought about that. “Every size under the sun. Miniatures. Huge things.”
“And so?”
“She’s famous. She can get away with different sizes.”
“I see. She started out famous?”
“And all her early works were of one size?”
“No. I’m sure they weren’t.”
“So you’ll get in touch with Valerie?”
“I’ve taken too long to get back to her,” she said. “I missed that train.”
“And you know that how?”
“Just intuition. I’m extremely intuitive.”
“How long has it been?”
“A month. Almost two.”
“Do you want a show?”
That stopped her. After a bit she said, “Maybe I don’t.” It was a very breezy answer. “I’m not sure her gallery is really right for me. I should go check it out again. Plus, it’s so expensive to frame things — she didn’t say who would have to pay for the framing. I’m sure it would have to be me. I don’t know if I want to pay for the framing and then not sell anything and get more depressed. So, no, probably not, probably I don’t want a show at her gallery.”
“I see. But the same issues would arise with any gallery. So you don’t want a show at any gallery?”
She thought about that. Suddenly she brightened. “Yes, I think that’s right! I think that I don’t actually want a gallery show. I think that I want something different — a more human way to show my work. Maybe some sort of collective effort — maybe I should start a group gallery in an alternative space. But I don’t have the strength for that. So I would have to find a group that already exists. But the ones that already exist are probably cliquish, and I don’t do that well with groups…”
We continued in this vein until the end of the session. I plugged away at wondering aloud how it could be a bad thing to contact Valerie and secure a show at Valerie’s good gallery. Marsha countered each suggestion with her reasons why such a show was either a bad idea or a complete impossibility. At the end of the session she smiled a small, wry smile, as if to say, “I’m really difficult, aren’t I?” Or maybe her smile meant, “I think I won. How’s that for a victory?”
Had we made any progress? Marsha was certainly not a changed person. Still, because we had been talking about the right things, I would have bet that a seed was planted. If we had been witness to her inner dialogue, I’m sure we would have overheard a conversation between her frightened, irritable, stubbornly negative everyday voice and that other voice, the one that guided the painting, appreciated life, and would have loved a little success.
I had high hopes for our next meeting.
Increasing Your Confidence
Describe in your own words what you are going to do to increase your confidence. Here are some suggestions to get you started:
• You might begin by identifying some situations in which you manifested your confidence and some situations in which your confidence failed you. What made the difference in each case?
• You might discuss with yourself the idea of acting confident even if you don’t feel confident.
• You might create a personal list of efforts you are going to make to increase your confidence — your own game plan.
However you tackle this challenge, please tackle it. Virtually every creative person needs more confidence than he or she is manifesting. Your best life in the arts is dependent on your confidence level.