Today I did something brave. It’s probably not going to sound brave to a lot of you, but if you know me, then you know it was brave. I took a step out of my comfort zone and signed up for the Society for Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) New England Conference! I have decided to make this children’s book writing real and really make a go of it. Then I was super inspired, so I sat down and wrote three more children’s books that I actually really love and am excited about. I don’t want to say too much about them yet, but over the next few weeks and months, I plan to share snippets of the books and sketches for the illustrations. So I hope you’ll join me on this journey!
But it got me thinking back to being brave and things that scare us. In this case, sitting down and writing those stories had been on my heart for a while, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. When I examined the why of this, I realized it was fear. I was too scared to sit down and work on something I cared so much about for fear of failure, for fear of rejection, for fear of not being good enough. So I asked myself that age old question: what is the worst that could happen? I answered with all the usual replies: I might never be traditionally published. I could be rejected over and over again. I might not be good enough.
But those actually weren’t the worst that could happen. The worst thing that could happen would be that I never sat down to do something that I loved.
I am reminding myself over and over again that what really matters is the work: the doing, the practicing, the writing, the drawing. I love these stories. I love to illustrate. The real tragedy would be to never finish these stories, or worse, to never work on them at all. Yes, I want to get them published and it may take some rejection and feeling like I’m not good enough - and those are real fears! But at least I will have finished.
These are a few of my recent character illustrations,
done after taking an art class on drawing full figures (instead of just faces).