Feelin' guilty about not drawing as much lately? [A Good Ship Illustration permission slip]

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Feelin' Guilty About Not Drawing as Much Lately?"
The Good Ship Illustration
Release Date: February 28, 2025

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In this introspective episode of The Good Ship Illustration, hosts Helen Stephens, Katie Chappell, and Tania Willis delve deep into the common struggle many illustrators face: feeling guilty about not drawing as much as they'd like. Through candid conversations, personal anecdotes, and shared experiences, the trio offers insightful perspectives and practical advice for navigating creative ebbs and flows.

1. Acknowledging Drawing Gaps

The episode kicks off with a heartfelt discussion between Tania Willis, Jane Porter, and Louise Lockhart about their experiences with intermittent drawing periods.

• Jane Porter opens the conversation by sharing her current phase of reduced sketchbook activity despite still working on illustrations professionally. She confesses, "I feel now like I need a break. And if I do draw anything, I'm drawing it secretly, quietly, and I don't want to share it" (00:28).

• Tania Willis relates by describing her "secret drawing phase," where she restrains from sharing her work publicly to preserve a personal connection with her art. She observes, "I think it is that... you just feel like you want to keep something back for yourself" (01:24).

2. The Pressure to Share and Its Impact

The conversation naturally segues into the pressures illustrators face to constantly produce and share their work, especially on social media platforms like Instagram.

• Jane Porter expresses the anxiety of sharing work, stating, "I ended up feeling like I'm gonna do a drawing and I'm gonna share this, so it better be good. And that feeling ruins it completely" (01:42).

• Louise Lockhart adds to the sentiment, explaining her struggles with balancing the desire to draw for pleasure versus the need to meet external expectations, "I need someone to force me, come and wave a bunch of notes in my face and say, you've got till Thursday, and I'll do it" (03:11).

3. Balancing Life’s Demands with Creative Aspirations

The hosts delve into the challenges of juggling personal responsibilities with maintaining a consistent drawing habit.

• Louise Lockhart candidly shares her tumultuous relationship with drawing amidst life's chaos: "I just want to snuggle up in bed with my pencils and draw and have a lovely time, but I'm kind of not letting myself. What, what's going on? I need therapy" (02:53).

• The trio discusses how major life events, such as moving houses or starting families, can inadvertently sideline creative pursuits, leading to feelings of inadequacy or guilt.

4. Reframing Identity Beyond Illustration

A pivotal moment in the conversation arises when the hosts explore the notion of self-worth tied to their identity as illustrators.

• Jane Porter provocatively muses, "What am I? I don't know. That doesn't matter at all. Isn't that a lovely idea?" (09:35), encouraging listeners to detach their self-identity from their professional output.

• Tania Willis echoes this sentiment, questioning the societal expectations placed on illustrators to constantly produce: "If you are an illustrator and you're not drawn for a while and you start getting a bit like, am I still an illustrator?" (09:21).

5. Navigating the Stress of Editorial Work

The discussion shifts to the specific challenges illustrators face within the editorial sector, particularly regarding tight deadlines and fair compensation.

• Louise Lockhart recounts her extensive experience in the editorial field, highlighting the relentless demands: "I spent about 25 years of my life just being on call and canceling things constantly" (07:16).

• The trio emphasizes the importance of setting boundaries with clients to protect mental health and ensure sustainable work practices. Louise advises, "You got to think, what are your boundaries in a job? I mean, I think that's so important" (12:18).

6. Implementing Coping Strategies and Finding Balance

Towards the episode's conclusion, the hosts offer practical strategies to mitigate guilt and foster a healthier relationship with drawing.

• Jane Porter suggests embracing periods of rest without self-judgment: "You’ve got to be realistic about it, haven't you?" (07:12).

• Louise Lockhart advocates for diversifying creative outlets to alleviate the burden of constant illustration: "Doing sewing and finding creativity in other forms, even cooking is such a joy to give time and creativity and value to other activities" (08:58).

• Tania Willis shares a personal anecdote about the challenges of balancing intensive work periods with the need for downtime, emphasizing self-compassion: "But in hindsight, duh, you've been drawn all day. It's like running all day and then going for a walk in the evening" (06:12).

7. Embracing a Flexible Creative Journey

In their final reflections, the hosts encourage listeners to adopt a more flexible and forgiving approach to their creative journeys.

• Jane Porter illustrates the liberation that comes with stepping back from the constant drive to produce: "It feels just as lovely as drawing. It feels like another creative outlet and it's really valuable" (08:35).

• They conclude with a lighthearted metaphor, likening the need for balance to the carefree nature of their pets: "Let's be like Billy. She's nice. She doesn't draw and she doesn't care. Should feel bad. Let's be more Billy." (12:57).

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Conclusion

This episode of The Good Ship Illustration resonates deeply with illustrators grappling with creative burnout and guilt. By openly discussing their vulnerabilities and sharing actionable advice, Helen, Katie, and Tania offer a compassionate roadmap for maintaining artistic passion without sacrificing personal well-being. The key takeaway emphasizes the importance of self-compassion, setting boundaries, and redefining one's identity beyond professional output—a timely and invaluable message for creatives navigating the complexities of a modern illustration career.

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Timestamp Reference:

• Each quoted segment in this summary is referenced with its corresponding timestamp from the podcast transcript for clarity and context.

Transcript

[Tanya]

You said you'd been having a good chat this morning.

[Jane Porter]

I went for a walk with picture bookmaker Jane Porter this morning and we started off this chat by talking about whether we'd had gaps where we didn't draw for a while. And we both agreed that we have. We've both. And I'm having one right now, actually. When I. When I say drawing, I mean drawing in a sketchbook. I'm still illustrating, but there's been periods in my life where I've been sketchbook crazy. I just want to do it all the time. It's my thing. I started the wash walk to see hashtag on Instagram. Drawing, drawing, drawing. Just love it, love it, love it. But since starting good shape and having that brilliant creative couple of years where I was drawing a lot and I was drawing for Instagram sometimes and sharing loads of sketches, I just. In the end, I feel now like I need a break. And if I do draw anything, I'm drawing it secretly, quietly, and I don't want to share it. What about you two? Have you had gaps in your drawing?

[Tanya]

Yeah, I feel like I'm in a bit of a secret drawing phase. And I think it is that. What's the word you keep scanning yourself. That's the normal word. Like you're sicken yourself if you share every single drawing you do online because you get to a point where, I don't know, you just feel like you want to keep something back for yourself, don't you?

[Jane Porter]

I think I ended up feeling like I'm gonna do a drawing and I'm gonna share this, so it better be good.

[Louise Lockhart]

Yeah.

[Jane Porter]

And that feeling ruins it completely. So I want to get back to the feeling of I don't really share very much that I do anymore. Then when I draw, it's just for its own sake.

[Louise Lockhart]

I realized the thing this morning that you have to draw so much to get back into it. I haven't drawn that much outside of drawing maps. God, I don't think. Oh, I have. I always draw when I go on holiday and try and do the big push. Right. This is for you. Just have fun, fun drawing. But the holiday never seems long enough. Just as you're about, you can see the improvement in the drawing. That's the end and it's back to normal life where I should still obviously keep drawing. But at the moment, having done a load of it feels like it's been such a business a year and a website a year, and I feel quite far removed from drawing. But I'm desperate to start this new project for myself, which has got this kind of push pull effect going on. I'm like, everything's going to be lovely when I settle down into my new studio and start drawing. And I really desperately want to draw, but life is either getting in the way or I'm allowing it to get in the way. And it's like having a weird relationship. I'm just like. I just want to snuggle up in bed with my pencils and draw and have a lovely time, but I'm kind of not letting myself. What, what's going on? I need therapy.

[Tanya]

It's so hard with time, though, isn't it? I feel like if you don't do something on purpose, you never do it.

[Louise Lockhart]

I don't do anything unless I'm forced to do it.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah.

[Louise Lockhart]

That's the horror. I need someone to force me, come and wave a bunch of notes in my face and say, you've got till Thursday, and I'll do it. Because, you know, my neural pathway for 30, 40 years has been. I would like an illustration. Here's your deadline. And this is a feed. And that's the only way I get things done.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah.

[Louise Lockhart]

So.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah. But I think it's. There's no point feeling guilty about it. Like, all of us, I think, still start. Since starting the good ship have drawn from life less than we did before. But I think that's because our creative energies have been used somewhere else and we do art club and that kind of itches that scratch a bit as well. And I think in my life, when I look back over my entire life, there are definitely been periods where I've drawn less. Like when I was a teenager and my social life was going mad, I drew less. Yeah. And those faces just come and go, don't they?

[Louise Lockhart]

Didn't you say within your sub stack you have. You had to stop berating yourself about that. You're lazy. You're not doing drawing because you're sorting the house out, you're sorting your family life out and doing so many other important things that. Because you're not nose to the grindstone, working like a lunatic.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah.

[Louise Lockhart]

Like you used to.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah.

[Louise Lockhart]

You feel guilty about it.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah. I've had to really have a word with myself about it. I'm just working like the average person.

[Louise Lockhart]

Yeah.

[Jane Porter]

And so I shouldn't feel bad about that.

[Louise Lockhart]

Wouldn't I say to you, like, every three months, I don't know how you do it.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah. You were always saying that. I don't know how I did it. Now I'm Glad to be off that treadmill.

[Louise Lockhart]

I'm glad you are as well. I just used to think sometimes it would scare me. I'd look at everything you were doing and think my brain would be frying by now. I would have blown up. But then I thought, you look at other people, think maybe they're made of different things. Like Louise Lockhart describing her year and moving a house and building a barn.

[Jane Porter]

I think that's it. There's periods in your life that. Where you feel totally on it and capable of it. And I definitely went through a phase of that, but now the house needs doing that, you know, I don't know what else. All of a sudden, other things in my life are a bit more of a priority. That's fine, isn't it?

[Tanya]

Energy levels are always different as well, aren't they? So go through, like, yeah, let's go. And then. Yeah.

[Jane Porter]

And you run a marathon and then you need to walk for a bit.

[Tanya]

Definitely. And also you have. When I had a baby, I had romantic ideas about maternity leave and just drawing errands. Snuggle. It doesn't happen. I did one draw when she was a newborn and then I drew her when she was maybe 18 months old. And also every drawing you do of your child doesn't look good enough because your child's perfect.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah. And every time you pick up a sketchbook and a pencil, they take it off you.

[Tanya]

Yeah, I wouldn't. I don't even get my pencils out anymore because she's. Yeah. You know, really posh, nice sketchbooks. And she'll just be like, I have a go, mommy. And then 30 pages of. Just a line through each page.

[Jane Porter]

I remember when you spoke to Jill Calder for. In the. I think it was in the Freak Flag course. Yeah. She says when she gets to the end of a huge project, if she's just done a massive project, she just goes on holiday and does not draw for weeks until she gets the urge again and then she starts again. I remember hearing that and thinking, few three.

[Louise Lockhart]

I think there's a lot of guilt surrounding it because you feel like sometimes it feels as though it's some sort of holy vocation you've taken up and you're meant to love drawing when you're working on paid illustration. And then you finish it and you go, just do a little sketch. Because I still love drawing.

[Jane Porter]

Especially started that Walk to Sea hashtag for a while when I wasn't drawing. I thought, I better keep that quiet. Find out I'm done.

[Tanya]

Well, the worst thing is if you're having a busy work time.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah.

[Tanya]

Drawing for work. So I had a time where I was doing loads, actually, recently, like the end of last year, when I felt a bit frazzled. I'd be drawing for, I know, six or seven hours at an event. And then I was like, I'll take a Jane Porter. Actually, again, I did the comics class. So I'd finish seven hours of drawing. I'd be on the train home trying to do the comics class. I was like, I like drawing, I like drawing. I like, like reminding myself. But then I was like, I'm just so tired, I don't want to draw anymore. And I felt, again, felt really bad and beat myself up about it. But in hindsight, duh, you've been drawn all day. It's like running all day and then going for a walk in the evening to the.

[Jane Porter]

You've got to be realistic about it, haven't you?

[Tanya]

Bossman's holiday.

[Louise Lockhart]

Yeah. And have a. Kind of. Sometimes have a pragmatic approach. I mean, I remember thinking in the peak of my career, editorial career. I don't think many people do, as we were talking earlier, do only editorial now because the pay is not great and it's really hard to live purely on that. And the turnover was kind of bad enough anyway that jobs would just pop in and they suddenly need you right there and then for three days. And can you meet a deadline by Friday? So I spent. I felt like I spent about 25 years of my life just being on call and canceling things constantly. And then I canceled stuff so much. I didn't book things anymore, like friends or holidays or theater or. I just didn't do any of those things. And I lived on an island. It took me a long while to get into town to do anything. So for a great chunk of time, I just was like, I'll sit by my computer and work and not do things like try and fit out the front room or change the broken toilet or, you know, these healthy things that you end up doing, and when you do them, you're like, this has taken a chunk of time out from work. Is this what other people do? Like they sort their house out or do their garden. So it's become as a bit of a revelation that you, You. You could do those things, but not in the same way as illustrators who are just there. I felt like a doormat, actually. I made myself into a doormat.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah.

[Louise Lockhart]

And I didn't have a lot of.

[Jane Porter]

It as well, because that eagerness to get work means you Just kind of put everything else in your life aside for this one goal. And for us it's paid off, hasn't it? It's been brilliant. I'm glad I did it, but I'm really glad to be out the other side and that I can now go and potter in the garden for a few days. And it feels just as lovely as drawing. It feels like another creative outlet and it's really valuable.

[Louise Lockhart]

Well, when you made your flags and things and you knew that you need to do something, you needed to kind of come off the work mania and do something calming, but you still needed to be creative. So doing sewing and finding creativity in other forms, even cooking is such a joy to give time and creativity and value to other activities. Instead of thinking, I just got to keep working.

[Jane Porter]

I think that's the thing.

[Tanya]

If you, you're like, I am an illustrator and you're not drawn for a while and you start getting a bit like, am I, am I still an illustrator? Because that's really tricky, isn't it?

[Jane Porter]

Yeah.

[Tanya]

Especially if you get your self worth from your work and making work and drawing.

[Jane Porter]

Isn't it a really lovely, freeing feeling if you think, am I an illustrator? Who cares?

[Tanya]

Yeah, it doesn't matter.

[Jane Porter]

What am I? I don't know. That doesn't matter at all. Isn't that a lovely idea?

[Louise Lockhart]

I like that one. Yeah. Because your identity is so much of that and being the artist. But I think sometimes just opting out to do something else instead and develop another part of yourself because you end up doing this, the same neural pathways over and over again, doing these same things that the rest of your life starts to dwindle, whether it's relationships or family or home. And you do need to give time back to that. I reckon drawing in a way that gets your illustration projects done really quickly is the, is the way forward. So if your style is highly wrought, highly rendered, don't come work in editorial because.

[Jane Porter]

Well, actually I just had a chat with somebody this morning who told me that she's been doing a long term magazine job. I don't know how long for. I didn't ask enough questions and I'm passing on half a story here, but she told me that in New Year she got an email saying, happy New Year. We're cutting your fee by 40% by no discussion, no choice, nothing. That's a, that's editorial work.

[Louise Lockhart]

But that, that was a U.S. job. U.S. job that's really grim and all we can hope is that it's brought it back to a UK Rate, because the American, but even the UK rates are not great now. So I think you, anyone who's working in editorial needs to develop a way of working that works with your secret day rate against the fee. Because really, if the fee's 350 for a quarter page, half page. I used to spend a week and a half on something like that. That's madness now to think of. Really, you could do a day and a half max.

[Tanya]

I was going to say half a day.

[Louise Lockhart]

Well, half a day, depending where you're at and what your exposure is. I mean, some people like the exposure of editorial, that it has some value as opposed to doing something that's going to go in a corporate report that no one will see. You could kind of say, all right, I'll give it two days. But really, a lot of people's rates, day rates are not far off that or. Or above it.

[Tanya]

Yeah, I always think with stuff like that, with the fast deadline. It's the stress cost as well, isn't it? Like the checking your emails all the time, making sure and like, and submitting it on time and then making sure.

[Jane Porter]

The other bits of your life.

[Tanya]

That's awful. And I've had jobs like that in the past where you think you're done and then you go for a day out to celebrate, you go for a cuppa and then you get an email on your phone.

[Louise Lockhart]

You're like, oh, I've got.

[Tanya]

I've got to edit this. Like, I remember going to Barter Books one day and I like, it's a very good bookshop, by the way. And then we were having a cup of tea and then I got this email from the client being like, oh, you need to change this thing, but you have to. We need it now, basically. So I had my laptop in the car trying to, like, edit this. So stressful. Yeah, we've really got.

[Louise Lockhart]

You got to think, what are your boundaries in a job? I mean, I think that's so important. Never do that now when something's finished, when it's over, you know, signed off, but you have to come back at you and say it isn't finished and they're in a hurry, therefore you must be in a hurry. No, it's not right. But when you're younger, you just capitulate.

[Tanya]

You just go with it.

[Jane Porter]

Yeah, I was just going to say, if you can hear panting, it's not me. Billy, Tanya's dog is on the biggest cushion you have ever seen in front of the stove. And the stove is lit. I think Billy's cooking.

[Tanya]

And a gently roasted border terrier.

[Louise Lockhart]

Yeah, that's the sound of a happy terrier panting away like a little roast beast. She's nice.

[Tanya]

She doesn't draw and she doesn't care. Should feel bad.

[Jane Porter]

Let's be like Billy.

[Tanya]

Yeah, Be more Billy.

[Jane Porter]

Lovely.

[Tanya]

Yeah. See you.

[Jane Porter]

Bye.

[Louise Lockhart]

It.