There is something I am really great at. I do it a few times as I go about my day. That thing I’m talking about is self-loathing. Over the years, I’ve gotten pretty good and cutting myself down. Common phrases I use at times are things like “I’m not good enough at…” or “I suck at…” or “there’s no way I’ll be able to…” I often talk myself out of doing things before I even start them (or in the words of Chris Carrabba, “I can fail before I ever try”. If you got that reference, you too had a teen angst period in the early 2000s).
When I first started my college career, I was a graphic design major. I really enjoyed creating designs, taking pictures, and doing artsy things. The more that I continued though, I started to compare myself to other people and put my own work down. Eventually I took a web design class, which killed my pursuit of graphic design (God bless those of you reading this who enjoy writing / creating code. It made me feel like my brain is oozing out of my nose from boredom), and killed my want to be creative with it. Recently, I’ve began creating things again.
The first few times of making art came with a lot of self-loathing and “other people are so much better than me.”
This is the kind of self-loathing I'm talking about.
For some crazy reason, however, I kept at it. What I noticed is the more that I was creative, the less self-loathing and less self-doubt came with the creativity. So I decided to do a little research. As it turns out, creativity boosts confidence.
When making a piece of art that takes time, a person feels a great sense of accomplishment when it is completed. The more a person creates, it builds their self-confidence to become a great leader and are better able to achieve goals and get tasks done in a timely matter. Ultimately, the more a person does creatively, the more confident they become in who they are, as well as what they can accomplish and do in this world.
The downside to this is that there are barriers to creativity. The main three barriers to creativity are: fear of failure, doing something different, and of taking risks. The thing about creativity is that it involves risk. Some people may not fully understand what the art is trying to convey. Others may think the piece of art is crap. People will be critical of your art. In order to become a better artist, you have to be ok with these barriers. After this, the more we create, the more confident we become in our creativity. What anyone should strive for is confident creativity. The art that people want to see is what is honest and from the real you.