Almost 60 days ago, I decided to embark on a 30 day #retro #tech #series where I set out to #illustrate one item every single day for 30 days straight. It didn't go as planned, but I enjoyed every bit of it and I'm glad I finished it. Here's a few things I learnt in the #process:

01 

"I don't have #time" is a #myth. It's either you're interested in it enough to make time for it or not. I've always wanted to start something like this but i always told myself that i didn't have the time to do it because of client work & etc. One thing i realised though is that once i began the challenge and created a block in my calendar for it, everything else rearranged itself around that schedule. Of course, i made some sacrifices. But the point is that those things weren't as important to me as this challenge.

I was tired of monotonous client and corporate work and it was messing with me mentally. Sometimes, you should be able to give clients the middle finger and take care of your mind and your craft if it doesn't do that for you automatically. (not literally to their faces lol. Respect your clients).

The point is, i still did what i had to do every day at work to deliver at a level expected of me, but i treated this part of my day with the same level of importance I would treat client work (if not more important).

I saw an improvement in the quality of projects i was working on at the same time because working on this personal project opened me up to learn other things that i mixed into their stuff. Skills i wouldn't have discovered otherwise. Win-Win for everybody. yay

03
It wasn't a smooth journey from the first #illustration through to the 30th. I almost quit a few times and on other days i would go blank on what to illustrate. That gave me a different perspective on what consistency could also look like. In my case, consistency wasn't me showing up every day to put out an illustration. Consistency was me coming back to make a post after ghosting the project for 3 days because i was too lazy to create, several times.

Eventually it went from being a 30-day challenge to a 30-illustration challenge. This brings me to my next point. Deadlines are man-made illusions and rules are good, but break some every once in a while. I had a few set of rules for myself going into this, but I didn't hesitate to switch them around every once in a while whenever i'd realize i was being too hard on myself. 

The goal shifted from putting out one illustration a day to working on finishing 30 high quality #lllustrations exploring different #media, approaches, & styles while having fun. & that meant i could now finish this project in 56 days instead of 30 days because i started to have fun with it.