Artists are butterflies, not robots, okay?  I love to float around from flower to flower, going where the wind takes me, letting the creative juices flow.  But I have discovered that, as a full-time artist who absolutely needs the creative playtime but also needs to run a business, I sometimes need to activate my executive functions. Sometimes I need some lists, some focus, and some “Get ‘er Done” energy.  In my private membership, Art Revenue Coaching, we’ve been talking about artist productivity a lot lately!  So many artists are like me, dare I say a tad bit flighty, imaginative, impulsive and distractible. It’s a real balancing act to cherish some of these qualities, but also push through my to-do lists in an effective manner. So today, I’m talking about the five hacks I do every day to keep me on track to accomplish the tasks I want to accomplish. 

Hack number one: envision your entire day

One of the things I have have found to be very helpful is to meditate and/or visualize my day first thing in the morning.  I’m an early riser. I love to sit, drink my coffee, and think about all sorts of things.  I put some real effort to imagining the ideal progression of the day as if it has already happened. 

Hack number two: understand the big picture

Then, I jump over to my rainbow Post-it wall.  It’s full of initiatives, ideas, lists and concepts.  I have big picture ideas to help focus the years, quarters, months, weeks and days.  Every single day I take a look at the week ahead. My wall includes quick popcorn tasks like “Pay the plumber,” but also “Film four vlogs!”  I organize my Post-its by urgency, and I put the ones I need to focus on at the top.

Hack number three: listen to your natural rhythms

The third thing I do to focus my day is work with my natural rhythms.  I have discovered that early mornings are great for sitting, thinking and writing.  Later mornings are great for my workouts.  I’m ready to tackle my to-do list and do some admin work by around eleven or noon.  I feel the creative energy spark up by two or three, and I can happily make art until eight or nine.  My husband is an early morning activator, and I used to always feel guilty that I was so slow in the morning, but now I realize it’s just my natural rhythm.  Now, I have a family and other obligations, so I can’t always live this ideal, natural schedule, but I do my best to honor it and work with it when I can.  

Hack number four: be realistic

I then have a continual challenge of trying to be realistic about what I can actually get done.  After being a full-time artist for ten or so years, you’d think I would have a better idea of time allotment with projects and tasks, but I radically overestimate what I think I can get done.  The result is I always feel behind and stressed because something that I assumed I could do in one hour actually took three days.  I’ve been trying to teach myself to have margins around my time, so if there is a project that needs more time, I can let it expand.

Hack number five: differentiate your to-do lists

The fifth and final thing I do to get stuff done in my busy art studio is something I recently learned, and it has been so helpful to my thinking! I make it a point to differentiate between practical to-dos, realistic to-dos and aspirational to-dos.  I learned this from one of my members in Art Revenue Coaching.  She said that if we always have “aspirational” things on our list, we will continually disappoint ourselves. Therefore, its helpful to take a hard look at the list, and be wise about what should, or should not, be on there.

If you have an interest in making good art and getting paid, the doors to my Art Revenue Coaching membership are opening soon!  You can learn more about this super cool program to support artists by visiting HERE, or by clicking the button below!