The night before last night I finished up a commissioned piece for a friend of mine. It's been a while since I've completed something this large. Between moving, losing my job, and looking for a new one it's been a pretty stressful time and painting was stuffed into the backseat of my life.
Living a life without art starts to age you, but every time I tried picking up a brush I felt defeat even before starting. I just didn't feel the desire or inspiration or whatever whimsical, artsy word you could think of. It just wasn't there. Then I got a commission from someone.
I've discovered a trick to maintaining productivity: Set a timer solely dedicated to working on ONE project. That's what I did the other night, all I said was "Alexa, set timer for 1 hour" and the next thing I knew I had a finished product on my hands.
This trick works for pretty much anything. Need to clean your apartment? Organize your closet? Clear the kitchen? This will do it. You know me, I work with a sense of urgency, and if there's a deadline (even if its one I made for myself) you better believe I'm going to deliver.