Let me just get this out of the way first: Two weeks ago, I had a heart attack.
Sorry, I know that sounds a bit melodramatic. But I didn’t even know it at the time. For the rest of the following week, I thought I had a chest infection and just needed to take it easy.
Like most things that scare you, the reality isn’t as bad as you might think. People can have heart attacks and go on to live perfectly normal lives, run marathons even.
The mornings are the hardest time, when I wake up and remember that I’m ill again and still have a thousand and one things I need to do. Each day seems like a mountain I have to climb.
But I’ve been here before, and I know how to approach it. I know that mountain is too big to see all at once.
So I do the small things: Make sure I get out of bed and shower and shave, get dressed. Go for a short walk every day. Bit by bit, the mountain gets smaller.
It’s the same thing with practice. It’s daunting sometimes when you think about all you have to learn, all the improvements you need to make to get your work to where you want it to be. That mountain also is just too big to comprehend all at once.
The answer is the same: Do the small things. Just look at the next small step.
How I practice Drawing
Always, the first thing I do is to sharpen my charcoal pencil on some sandpaper.
A meditative five minutes or so is spent on this job, getting it to a fine point, cleaning off the dust and placing it in the holder if it’s getting short.
Then I just sit, and take a moment to feel grateful that I’m here, in my own space, with an opportunity to spend some time developing my drawing skills.
This part of the practice session is the most important, for me.
What I draw
What I do in a practice session varies, but it’s always very focused practice for a short amount of time.
At the moment, my favourite exercise is one called “Origin/Destination” from the excellent Language of Drawing programme from Anthony Waichulis.
This is actually the first exercise in the program, and strictly speaking I’m past this point in the program now, but I still do it every day (or at least, every day I don’t miss practice!)
It’s all about developing a controlled and confident line, and being able to connect two points (the origin point and the destination point) with a straight line. It’s surprisingly hard at first.
Here’s a quick video from a while back of me doing it, so you can see what it’s like.
Why I do this
I realise it may seem strange to some that I still put aside some time every day to practice what might be thought of as beginner skills. After all, I can do a pretty accurate block in these days anyway – accurate enough for my still life paintings, at least.
I do it because I believe that the basic, fundamental skills like this feed into everything you do. If I develop this skill, lots of other skills naturally develop at the same time.
I do it because every time I do it, it teaches me a little more about focus. And because gradually over time, I see a constant development of my control of my materials.
And I do it because now, after practising like this for several years (in various different ways with different exercises) I find I’ve come to a point where I love the practice for its own sake.
What I get from it
To me, it’s more than building skills. It’s a meditation. It’s an opportunity to slow down and be, it’s where I find the core of who I am.
Ultimately, I think practice is about rhythm. If you can get into a steady rhythm with it, repeat, repeat, repeat, you’ll wake up one day and find that your skills have developed well beyond what they were. You’ll be doing something, blocking in a painting maybe, and find suddenly that it’s not only much easier than it used to be, but that it’s better, too.
There are times when the pressure is high, when I know bills are coming due, when the bank balance is dwindling to next-to-nothing and the kids need to eat, that I’m tempted to leave the practice and get straight on with the work that earns money: working on videos, making small paintings for auction, whatever.
I don’t always win that battle. Sometimes I do miss practice. But more often than not, I do win it. Because I know that one thing is for sure: tomorrow will come. And when it does, I’d like to be a better artist than I am today.
A few millimetres more
Each practice session wears a few millimetres off those pencils, hardly noticeable. But look at them now. They’ve become a record of the development of my skill and of my commitment to myself to constantly improve.
And they teach me much more than drawing skills. This approach, this mindset works for anything you want to achieve. Right now, I’m walking for just a few minutes each day, getting my heart used to exercise again. When I wake up in the mornings, when my resolve is weakest, I just concentrate on getting downstairs and into the shower.
We may not be able to choose what happens to us much of the time, but we can choose how we deal with it. Once that decision is made, the most effective way to implement it – assuming you’ve made the right one – is just to take the next small step:
Sharpen your pencil.
Best wishes and thanks for reading,
Paul
P.S. I’m currently reading Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. He found meaning under the most unfavourable circumstances: internment in a Nazi concentration camp.
His message is that although we can’t choose our circumstances, we can choose how we react to them. We can decide to let them overwhelm us, or to persevere despite them. That this choice, if we make the right one, makes life meaningful and purposeful.
Most of us will never have to endure the kind of suffering that he did. But in small ways, we have the opportunity to make a positive decision many times every day.
We may not always make the right one; I don’t, always. But over time, those decisions make us who we are.
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thank you for this post. I’m sorry for the heart issue that has happened and I wish you a full recovery. Thank you for sharing what you’ve learned and a bit about your morning practice. I do a similar warm up drawing practice, and I’ve come to rather love it. These emails always come at the right time – for that I’m grateful. Thank you and keep up the great work.
Thank you, Paul! For the wisdom you model by listening to your body, and for the wisdom in your teaching. What I’ve learned with your guidance, I take with me in my own creative practice every day.
Hello Paul,
I’m new to your newsletter and delighted to see such a calming and grounding exercise which I intend to adopt. Thinkers like Frankl are more than appropriate reading in today’s times.
Very best wishes for complete recovery.
John
Great advice! I am very glad that you’re recovering well from your heart attack!
Hi Paul,
Sorry to have heard about your recent health issue – I’m happy and relieved to hear you’re ok and recovering!
Thanks for the advice on Origin/Destination exercises. I must say I’d done A LOT of these exercises over the years in an attempt to improve my drawing skills, along with filling reams of paper full of every kind of shape I could conceive. I don’t doubt that these sorts of exercises can help people in the beginning, but for me it resulted in just being able to draw lines and shapes well.
I’m lucky to know a few artists who I feel are very skilled and have been able to make a living from drawing and painting, and what I deem the best advice I got from almost all of them them, at least as far as it pertained to myself, was to take all the instruction videos and books I have (and I have a lot), store them out of sight, and just draw anything/everything that catches my eye as often as I can as well as I can manage. Yes, I’ll draw badly for a while, perhaps for a long time, but keeping at it persistently and diligently will inevitably result in the natural development of both skill and style crucial to any artist.
I’ve taken this advice and have found that both my skills at rendering objects and the quality of draws from my own imagination have developed in leaps and bounds over what I’d experienced when I kept to what I now feel had been an exercise in tedium and futility akin to spinning one’s tires in the snow – sometimes you just have to get out and push really, really hard.
Wishing you all the best, and thanking you for all the excellent insights and lovely artwork you’ve been sharing with your online community!
You always give so much and as so little ! My prayers for a good recovery and for greater returns in good health and in life !
Dear Paul, I am so sorry to hear you’ve had a heart attack, but, as usual, your stellar view of life will bring you back to a point of health and wellbeing–and will continue to inspire others! May each stroke of your pencil or swipe of your brush bring you peace!
Hi Paul,
Let me add my support and good thoughts to all the others of us who care about you and your gentle teaching ways, for a steady and satisfying recovery from this latest physical challenge. All the lessons you have shared are coming together and being put to the test, aren’t they? Easy does it…steady on…plus one that isn’t in your syllabus; letting in how much you matter to us.
Sincerely,
Anni
I’m sorry to hear about your illness. I’ve been following you for years and love your progression. Best wishes for your quick healing. And thank you for letting us share your journey.
Paul, I gasped when I read about your heart attack. I send you sincerest love (yes, it’s a real thing) and remind you, with great respect, to breathe deeply and above all, be kind to yourself. Kind to your drawing and learning self, and to your parent-partner self. You’re a champion and a hero. And sometimes it’s only the rest of the world can see the heroes. :))
Rooting for you. Xx Julie
I always save the emails you send me and don’t open them until I have time to read them and thoroughly enjoy and savor them. I’m sorry I waited to read this one … Like so many others I wish you a speedy recovery. I think the reply Anita Carter gave describe what I want to say the best .
Know we are rooting for you.
Your open heart and selfless attitude will certainly have its reward!
I´d like to share with you some profound, scientific and healing material which has been of tremendous help to me. Unfortunately, I received it in Spanish, but perhaps you can investigate a bit or have a spanish speaking friend who might be of help…
First, an emotional dictionary, that I found an interactive version in english.
http://www.sanateysana.com/diccionario.html#!/Emotional-Dictionary-in-ENGLISH/p/46332194/category=0
http://www.sanateysana.com/diccionarioemocional
and you might iook up into NLP, affective neuroscience.
Believe it or not, changes and tracking of attitudes, thoughts and feelings we are not aware of changes cells and heals.
MY WARMEST REGARDS AND GOOD WISHES!
Dear Paul, I always enjoy your perspective and your choice of what to put before us, here in cyberspace. I think this current lesson of Origin/Destination is a great way to start the day, because it does build skill and it gives one something manageable to do. So sorry to hear about your heart condition and will send my prayers your way for recovery and health.
Best to you, Jan
I’m so sorry that you are ill again Paul. I’d like to write something helpful but I don’t know what I can say other than I hope you feel well again soon. Best wishes.
Paul I am sorry to hear about your heart attack. This past year has been very difficult and yet you still find a way to continue to explore and share your passion for art. You are an inspiration. Thank you and good luck with your continued journey towards better health.
Ah Paul, sorry to hear what’s happened, I sincerely wish you better and stronger soon, and continuing thanks for all that you share of your skills and your self.
Paul,dear artist! You are the most sensititve artist I have ever known.Great heart,great kindness,patience,goodness and good artist as well.
I am out of practice for a couple of years,but my interest is always there,by reading you letters keep me alive because soon I will start to draw again.Not easy moving oversease,needed a great decision the hardest in my life.Keep well my preyers and thaughts are with you
Warmest regards from Susana K.
Hope you feel better, my friend.
Paul,
You’re the gift that keeps on giving. No matter what.
Thank you for caring so deeply about all of us and knowing that we experience joyful and bleak times, and appreciate encouragement. Like pencils, we are being used up and worn down and beautiful to behold. We make meaning from all of it.
Kathryn
I was shocked about the heart attack. Please take care of yourself.
Wishing you a full and speedy recovery.
thanks for this Paul, I teach art classes and I was saying to a student this past week that most people (inlluding me) want to draw and paint but few want to practice. I often tell folk about Yehudi Menuhin who in his later years was asked if he still practised every day, he said (if my memory is correct): ‘If I miss one
days practice I can tell, if I miss two days my friends can tell, if I miss three days the whole world can tell.’
Like eveyrone else I hope you recover well, you have a great attitude, I could learn from it myself
Dear Paul . Through a friend I just “found” you last week and my experience watching your video was fruitful. I came away with an entirely different perspective of colour relationships. Your explanation of the Munsel colour system had a penny drop moment for me, something that had been eluding me for ages became crystal clear. I was ecstatic and became an instant fan.
Needless to say I was alarmed when I heard that your heart misbehaved. I too have a heart issue and know well the lonely road that must be travelled each time I have an event. The road is somewhat familiar but each time I travel it, it is as if it were the first. It’s very lonely road initially but improves as we go.
I am heartened to know that you have your ducks in a row and are proceeding along your road to recovery well organized and prepared with a strong and positive attitude.
Wishing you a smooth recovery
With empathy, Sandra
Thanks for this, you couldn’t know how helpful it is just now. Always humbled by your generosity in your posts. Wishing you well, I’m off to draw some lines x
I just recently came across your blog and I am delighted with your teaching. This daily practice and the routine it involves, is very inspiring. I have a similar practice which, as you say, helps me tremendously to focus on what I am drawing.
Too bad I cant include a picture of it in these comments. If you tell me how I can do it or other means of sending it to you, I will send it.
Best regards,
I loved your message. I too am having struggles and it seems to go up and down. My biggest restpite is art, and with it I can do anything ! Thank you for sharing and wishes for a speedy recovery !
I wish you a full and speedy recovery. You are a great artist and a great art teacher !
I am a photographer. I used to be an illustrator in my early years from 25 to about 33 then I started photographing but I still used illustration as my most valuable education for photography. At 62 years of age I had a triple bypass. Didn’t see it coming because I was also an avid athlete. I am now 68 years old and consider my bypass surgery that led me to a deeper understanding of acceptance which has flourished into a new style of work.
More patient, more mature, and more heartfelt (no pun intended). I believe one can always realize gratitude as a result of tribulation. Good luck with your recovery and best wishes for your meditations.
Wow! Paul! I just got out of hospital with light heart attack! All I think about, is pAinting again! Thank you for your suggestions! I think I can manage this ! You always help me in my paintings! Be Well, My Friend! Helen
Hi Paul,
Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and meditation. I am truly sorry to hear about your health but happy you are aware and responding in a good way to it. I agree with you, often times you do not know what exactly is happening. I also want to thank you for the well thought exercise as meditation. It made me think about more and I realize practice is a great way to meditate. I was not aware of it until after I read your posting. It can be very relaxing and without realizing time has gone by quickly. Thanks for all the wisdom you are passing to us. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to have you in our lives. Thank you for all the encouragement we all get and much need at ont time or another.
I wish your full recovery and many more happy paintings! Many blessings your way my friend!
PAUL, I pray you get well soon and live a long happy and successful life. You are so focussed and its a great encouragment to read your write ups, it peps me up to do better everytime and never give up no matter what obstacles! Your simplicity is rare!
great to see you back. thank you for spending this time with us. youve already been a huge help to me
warmest regards, glenn
Dear Paul,
I got acquainted with your site recently through a friend in a painting course I’ve attended – and this is one of the best “profits” of that course…! My trust and appreciation to your lessons is developing from post to post, which is not self-understanding for me. I’ve made quite a ‘kilometrage’ with mainly frustrating art/drawing “teachers”, concluding that it is either impossible to teach drawing, or that these ‘teachers’ DO NOT WANT to teach. This left me doing the way be myself, to the best of my understanding and ability. So – it is great that your site came by my way: agreeing with more and more things you say, with your philosophy, and, of course, your step-by-step lessons. I do them with much love and devotion, though my artistic abilities are now often further.
The main reason sharing this with you now, is you mentioning Viktor Frankl. There is, among others, one more lesson to it: IF YOU DO HAVE A PURPOSE to live for, your chances of survival are much-much bigger than otherwise. You seem to have found your purpose and reason and meaning of life: your family, your art, your teaching. I hope, and am certain that all of these will shorten your way to full recovery! Some healthier lifestyle changes (food and excerise) might help as well.
…but for now: I get back to one more meditative exercise inspired by you, developing my skills!
Gabriella