From the Inspirational Thought Unit
"Some people get 20 years of experience, while others get one year of experience...twenty times in a row." from Angela Duckworth's book GRIT
I've been working professionally since 1998. October marks my 22 year anniversary of my first big-boy job at an animation studio. I have learned A TON over the years. However, I have seen my work stagnate in the last decade. I feel like I got to a level of proficiency in craft where I could make things happen on a schedule, but the huge leaps in ability were few and far apart. I feel like I've been running on a treadmill. Getting a workout, but not moving anywhere. I have grown a lot in time management, organizational skills, marketing, and business practices. But my craft has suffered in the process.
I decided to take up the practice of Kaizen. This is the Japanese practice of resisting the plateau of arrested development. The literal translation is "continuous improvement." One who practices kaizen isn't satisfied with taking on a new art piece or a project that they've done before, but is consistently putting themselves in uncomfortable situations where they must learn something new in order to get out of it.
Kaizen is "a positive state of mind, not a negative one. It's not looking backward with dissatisfaction. It's looking forward, wanting to grow." - Hester Lacey from GRIT
As we enter the last few months of 2020 it might be a good time to reflect on the last few years and evaluate whether you're getting years of experience, or the same experience over and over and over again.
For me I reviewed my work and decided to learn a 3D software. To figure out how to incorporate it into my illustration/concept art workflow. I feel like a baby learning this stuff, but each time I sit down with the software I have those wonderful A HA moments. Makes me excited to level up once I fight through this learning curve.
-Jake