Cynthia Oswald

Surface Design, Fine Art + Branding for Creatives

Creative Business/Business Insights

How to Use Passion Projects to Find Your Style

Using Passion Projects to Find Your Style

I’m coming up on a decade of running my small art and design business. I can still remember what it felt like to finally make the decision to start living my life—I was single, had a mortgage, and big dreams. I was restless and felt my heart pulling me in a different direction. Something had to change in order for me to get closer to where I was really meant to be. 

I still remember the stack of books I read about intuition, self-discovery, and intention. On a personal level I knew I wanted to get married and have kids, so one of the books was called “Getting to ‘I Do’”—laugh all you want but it’s how I met my husband (a story for a different day)! And on a professional level, I had big dreams but no clue how to actually connect the dots. Especially because I was interested in a lot of different directions and not sure which way to go. 

I hear a lot of stories about stumbling across the perfect career path, or finding the perfect offering and niching down. That is not my story. My story has a lot of twists and turns. It’s about following my intuition and not the popular opinion. It’s about carving my own path and really following hard after what lights me up. When things feel misaligned, it means assessing how close I am to where I belong and course correcting. And now, nearly a decade later, I am blown away by the work I get to do almost daily. I’m finally able to embrace my true passions—professional design and fine art—and integrate them both into my career.  I’m still carving a path for myself and things are always changing and evolving, but I feel more aligned than I ever have. 

Maybe you can relate to where I am now. Or maybe you’re really resonating with how I felt early in my professional and personal life. Either way, I grew a lot through my journey of exploring my passions and infusing them into my work, so I want to share a few pivotal lessons I learned along the way. 

3 Lessons I Learned From Putting Passion to Work

1. Embrace every part of yourself

Do not fall prey to the popular opinion of niching down. If that feels aligned, great. Go for it. But if it’s making you feel constrained, it’s okay to buck the system and do something different. It wasn’t until I finally let go of that restraint that I fully discovered my ultimate love is combining the two things I love. So embrace every part of yourself, your talent, and your passions—and don’t feel like you have to “niche down” and ignore something that lights you up! 

2. Let your style be influenced by what you’re passionate about 

By understanding your motives, strengths, and what you’re passionate about, you naturally attach a driving force behind what you create. That driving force becomes an undercurrent to what you are creating. When you create work that relates to your interests, it shows—people connect with it, and suddenly your style begins to emerge. So don’t forget to embrace your passions and let it guide your creative exploration. 

3. Embrace failure

Failure can feel so deflating as a creative, especially when you put your heart and soul into the work. It feels deeply personal. Knowing that you are going to come up against it often and embracing it as part of the process will enable you to keep moving forward when it smacks you in the face. I still struggle with this one. Each time I’m rejected my thoughts sound something like this “What’s the point? Just give up. No one cares. Etc.” But try your best to see the opportunity that lies ahead and don’t get stuck in the cycle of self-doubt. After all, most of the success stories you hear are about someone who persevered through rejection and discovered a beautiful opportunity in spite of many “failures”. 

These 3 things—embracing each part of myself, allowing my interests to guide my work, and embracing failure—have led me to where I am today. To a design style that feels uniquely me and to a career that’s more fulfilling than I ever could have imagined. 

So, if you’re on a similar journey, I want to challenge you with 3 steps to take to start nurturing your passion. 

3 Challenges to Embrace Your Journey to Put Passion to Work

  1. Make a list of the top ten memories you hold and spend time reflecting what makes them unique or special.
  2. Begin a daily creative practice—keep it simple and doable. The key is to commit to 30 days or more so that you can begin to find marks or subject matter that feel aligned with your natural tendencies.
  3. Begin a passion project that you’ve always desired to bring to life, create time in your schedule to work on it, and set a goal for when to share with those around you! 

Be patient with yourself during this process, and embrace the unexpected twists and turns. It’s a journey after all! 

I hope this encourages you and inspires you to trust your gut, follow your design intuition, and truly embrace your passions. From someone who’s on the other side of that journey, trust me, it’s worth the process! 

Transform your space into a sanctuary of peace and natural beauty. Explore my collection of original art, linen wall hangings, and bespoke wallpaper, each piece crafted to inspire tranquility and well-being. Interested in a custom creation that perfectly matches your vision? Let’s collaborate to bring your unique idea to life. Reach out today to discover how we can enhance your environment with art that resonates with the soul. Together, we’ll create a space that reflects the beauty of nature and the essence of your personal style.

Visit my shop here

What I Learned From The 100-Day Project

The Making of The Portals Collection:

25 Days of Minis dropping daily December 1-25, 2021

In May of 2020 I completed my Master of Fine Arts in Communication Design. During my three years of graduate school I spent time combining my love of design with fine art. How could I use each of my projects to blend my love of multiple mediums while communicating a message that has meaning to me? I took passion projects to the next level by blending my love of watercolor, branding, and surface design into projects that allowed me to use each of those skillsets.

Victory Garden Lettering
Root Vegetables Pattern, © Cynthia Oswald
Pictured above: A graduate project where I tied together a watercolor painting of root vegetables into a branding project to revive the Victory Garden. I created a logo, patterns, recipe cards, seed packaging, and an instruction booklet.

When I graduated in the middle of a pandemic I found myself really leaning into creating for art’s sake vs. communicating a special message. I’ve always seen so much magic in the movement and layering of shadows. When shadows overlap in nature compositions emerge that are playful, unintentional, surprising, and meditative. I had a desire to just add paint to the page with those thoughts in mind. I didn’t want a specific reference. I wanted to play. What emerged was a piece that I loved creating as much as I loved the final result—that was a new experience for me. I struggled through it but there were so many valuable lessons that I couldn’t experience by painting from a reference. It freed my hand to make decisions based on instinct and that was something I had previously resisted. Suddenly, I was able to create entire collections by thinking about a reference and using intuition to create the composition. It was a playful dance that I not only enjoyed, but it came to me much more naturally. Almost like learning to trust your intuition in any area of life.

Pictured above: A collection of fruit trees created using intuition to guide the composition.

I kept finding myself with a brush in hand—early in the morning, during Leona’s naps, and late in the evening—I was painting more finished works than ever before. I decided to finish off the last 100 days of 2020 with the 100 day project. I would complete 100 tiny watercolor painting—2.5″ x 2.5″. The entire collection would be based off of intuition—creating tiny original compositions using references in my mind. By day 9 a landscape emerged from the page, created from nothing except the references in my mind. They continued to unfold. Once in awhile I would take inspiration from a specific place but most of the composition emerged organically. What I realized is they all reminded me of some time and place that has made a lasting impression.

Cynthia Oswald Watercolor Landscape, Day 75
Day 75: Sold
Cynthia Oswald Watercolor Landscape, Day 34
Day 34: Sold
Cynthia Oswald Watercolor Landscape, Day 100
Day 99: Sold
Cynthia Oswald Watercolor Italian Landscape
Day 58: Sold
Cynthia Oswald Watercolor Landscape, Day 99
Day 100: Available
Day 24: Available
Pictured above: A few of my favorite landscapes that emerged from the 100 Day Project

In those moments that I was isolated during the pandemic I found myself traveling through space and time to many treasured memories that brought me hope and a feeling of possibility. When it came time to decide what I would paint for the 25 Days of Minis 2021 Collection I decided to go back to the idea of these landscapes and dive a little deeper. I gathered resources from my travels and began thinking about why these moments matter so much to me. What do they actually signify? Why do they light me up? Much like traveling, I’m currently slowing down quite a bit to care for a newborn. In the quiet moments before Viola was born I traveled back in time to places that bring me hope, possibility, and a sense of peace. My goal was to recreate those feelings for my collectors. I hope you enjoy!

Transform your space into a sanctuary of peace and natural beauty. Explore my collection of original art, linen wall hangings, and bespoke wallpaper, each piece crafted to inspire tranquility and well-being. Interested in a custom creation that perfectly matches your vision? Let’s collaborate to bring your unique idea to life. Reach out today to discover how we can enhance your environment with art that resonates with the soul. Together, we’ll create a space that reflects the beauty of nature and the essence of your personal style.

Visit my shop here

Emerging Media: Interactive Spaces, Essential Oil Product Display

Project Summary

The goal of this project was to create an interactive space featuring some of the benefits and ideas for how to use five different essential oils—lavender, grapefruit, rosemary, peppermint, and eucalyptus. There is little room on the packaging itself, and the font sizes are very small, so this was an effort to create a useful resource for consumers considering purchasing essential oils. I created watercolor illustrations for each oil on the display. I then used the watercolors as inspiration for the label design and the interactive space. The image was projected onto the frame once a user picked up one essential oil, showcasing the benefits and ideas for how to use that particular oil. The photocells read a higher light value once the essential oils were picked up, which triggered the projection to change. This was done using an Arduino and Processing. The code is below.

Background/Initial Idea

I originally wanted to use a Muse headset and diffuse essential oils depending on the readings from the headset. With some research, I quickly figured out this may have major kinks. The other issue was that I wanted to create something useful and visually pleasing. I went with the interactive product display instead.

original sketch for interactive display
Initial sketch for the display
Photocells in the display
Photocells in the display
Essential oils in display
Essential oils resting in the interactive display
Display frame interactive with projector
Essential Oils on interactive display, turned on
Peppermint Essential Oil display
Peppermint Essential Oil moved from photocell

Arduino
One by one tested the photocells with the Arduino
Projector
Tested the designs on the projector
Essential Oil label designs
Essential Oil label designs
Eucalyptus Essential Oil moved from photocell
Eucalyptus Essential Oil moved from photocell
Grapefruit Essential Oil display
Grapefruit Essential Oil moved from photocell

Breadboard
One by one tested the photocells with the Arduino
Display Frame
Display Frame turned off
Essential Oils Interactive Space
Essential Oils on interactive display, turned on
Lavender Essential Oil display
Lavender Essential Oil moved from photocell
Rosemary Essential Oil display
Rosemary Essential Oil moved from photocell

Tools used to complete this project

1. Arduino
2. Photocells
3. Projector
4. Laptop
5. Processing
6. Illustrator
7. Photoshop
8. InDesign

Code

Arduino:
Arduino Code for photocells
int cell0, cell1, cell2, cell3, cell4;

void setup() {
// We’ll send debugging information via the Serial monitor
Serial.begin(9600);
}

void loop() {
// read all the values, save the result in their own variables
cell0 = analogRead(0);
cell1 = analogRead(1);
cell2 = analogRead(2);
cell3 = analogRead(3);
cell4 = analogRead(4);

// print the line over serial so processing can read it
Serial.print(cell0);
Serial.print(“,”);
Serial.print(cell1);
Serial.print(“,”);
Serial.print(cell2);
Serial.print(“,”);
Serial.print(cell3);
Serial.print(“,”);
Serial.println(cell4); // this one has to be a println so the line ends

delay(100);
}

Processing:
Processing code
Processing code

import processing.serial.*;

int lf = 10; // Linefeed in ASCII
String myString = null;
Serial myPort; // The serial port
int big;
float r;
PImage img;
PImage grapefruit;
PImage rosemary;
PImage mint;
PImage lavender;
PImage eucalyptus;

void setup() {

fullScreen();
// List all the available serial ports
printArray(Serial.list());
// Open the port you are using at the rate you want:
myPort = new Serial(this, Serial.list()[1], 9600);
myPort.clear();
// Throw out the first reading, in case we started reading
// in the middle of a string from the sender.
myString = myPort.readStringUntil(lf);
myString = null;
big=0;
r=0;
img = loadImage(“img.jpg”);
grapefruit = loadImage(“grapefruit.jpg”);
rosemary = loadImage(“rosemary.jpg”);
mint = loadImage(“mint.jpg”);
lavender = loadImage(“lavender.jpg”);
eucalyptus = loadImage(“eucalyptus.jpg”);
}

void draw() {
while (myPort.available () > 0) {
myString = myPort.readStringUntil(lf);
if (myString != null) {
println(myString);
String s = trim(myString);
if (s != ” “) {
try {
String[] values=s.split(“,”);

int zero = Integer.parseInt(values[0]);
println(“zero : ” + zero);

int one = Integer.parseInt(values[1]);
println(“one : ” + one);

int two = Integer.parseInt(values[2]);
println(“two : ” + two);

int three = Integer.parseInt(values[3]);
println(“three : ” + three);

int four = Integer.parseInt(values[4]);
println(“four : ” + four);

image(img, 0, 0);

if (zero>100) {
image(grapefruit, 0, 0);
}
if (one>100) {
image(rosemary, 0, 0);
}
if (two>100) {
image(mint, 0, 0);
}
if (three>100) {
image(eucalyptus, 0, 0);
}
if (four>100) {
image(lavender, 0, 0);
}
}
catch (Exception e) {
}
}
}
}

}

Alt Summit Key Takeaways

From Joanna Gaines to Jessica Hische and everything in between:

Alt Summit has come up in a number of conversations over the last few years. This year, two of my awesome clients were planning to speak at the event—Emily Marko, a Visual Problem Solver and Goal-Setting Guru and Aimee LaLiberte, a Profit First Professional and Virtual CFO. The fact that these two ladies were making an appearance piqued my interest in a whole new way. I do a lot of research and development in order to stay aware of trends and technology within my industry for my customers and my own business. I didn’t necessarily need another set of courses to absorb. I do, however, need to meet business owners doing amazing things. All that said, the minute I found out that Joanna Gaines was the opening keynote speaker I knew that these were my kind of people.

Day 1

The main message that Joanna delivered can be summed up in a quote she stated during the keynote, “Do what you love doing, be passionate about it, and stay true to who you are.” It’s easy for all of us to get off track but very important to recenter ourselves in order to remain true to who we are—both in our business and in our lives. The other truly amazing tidbit from Joanna’s keynote was her publicly thanking the Founder of Alt Summit and Design Mom, Gabrielle Blair, for featuring Joanna on her blog, designmom.com. The original post in 2012 caught the eyes of HGTV and therefore Fixer Upper was born. A lot has transpired in 7 short years. That story, coupled with Joanna’s honesty, inspired me for the week.

Next, I found myself at a panel titled, How to License Your Creative Work. If you didn’t know this already, I’m currently working on this exact idea for my own work. Molly Hatch spoke about her humble beginnings as a studio potter. She was showing her work in a gallery in NYC when a buyer strolled past and thought her work would fit in well at Anthropologie. She spoke about staying focused on what you are making and honing in on your creativity. I found this so encouraging, partly because working with Anthropologie is a dream of mine and the idea that you can stay connected to your creative work by licensing your projects really inspires me. I’ve always needed a balance between my own creative projects and customer collaborations. The idea of monetizing my own creative projects seems like the next logical move.

I finished off the day with another motivating creative panel about selling yourself, or your work as a creative. This reiterated the messages I had heard all day. In between sessions, at the pool, in the hallways, shuttles, and just about everywhere I met amazing women paving their own way. I have to admit that I felt uncomfortable bringing along our daughter until I looked around the room Monday morning and saw so many babies. Moms are incredible. I met a woman who had her 2-week old daughter along and was so relaxed (baby #4). I aspire to be more like her.

Day 2

I hopped on a shuttle in the morning and headed over to the Saguaro where I joined a group of ladies for an SEO Q&A. I mostly went to this session to make sure that I’m doing the best work for my customers and my own website. I learned about a few new tools and was assured that I’m on the right path. SEO continues to fascinate me. If you have a website and you haven’t tapped into the power of SEO I would suggest creating a strategy sooner than later. There are ways to start small and build overtime. There are so many free tools available. I was introduced to SEM Rush, Keyword Tool, and reintroduced to Moz during this session. All of which have free resources that you can start implementing today. The sky is the limit with SEO so my suggestion is to first make sure your site is set up properly and then take one step at a time. Stay in for the long haul.

Cynthia Oswald Palm Springs Alt Summit

Photography is a huge part of the Alt Summit experience. There are professional photographers everywhere. On day two I had a couple of photography sessions. I had head shots in the Flash Truck (pictured above on the right) and a portrait session with Claudia Reyes (pictured above on the left). Both sessions produced a wide variety of images that I’m sure I’ll utilize throughout the next year or more. I’m not sure if this is intentional but the level of confidence and camaraderie that one experiences at this event is unparalleled. I felt this and heard others share the same sentiment. By the end of day two, I started to ease into being away from home and I was really enjoying myself. Did I mention that I fell in love with Palm Springs and the surrounding area? The photos below are from Indian Canyons just outside of the city.

Palm Springs Desert Bloom
Palm Springs Desert

One thing I will say is that you have to prepare yourself for the fear of missing out. There are so many overlapping sessions. Additionally, you’ll need an hour or two per day to digest the content you absorbed and the people you met. Which brings me to the next session I attended, a Roundtable by Emily Marko, that was about Intentional Action Planning. She guided us through a 3-step process that allows you to review and learn from your experiences while creating an action plan for going forward. You can use her process on many different areas of your life—health, financial, work, community, social, etc. She suggested that you could even use this process to digest experiences such as Alt Summit. I love how she couples visuals with her process and I look forward to taking her Relaunch Course in the near future.

Day 3

In the morning of day 3 I headed to a panel that I was really excited about—From Opportunity to Impact: How We Can Use Our Platforms For Good. There were 5 women on this panel, all whose individual missions related to the greater good. I’ve struggled with how to attach my brand to the causes that I’m passionate about so this was an excellent panel for me to absorb. I had two main takeaways from this. First, it is important to use your voice to share what matters to you. Secondly, connect with your feelings and use that opportunity for good. These immediately prompted me into action. I work with Chester County Women’s Services to provide assistance with their graphic design needs. I asked them recently to share other needs. I learned that many children in my local area don’t have jackets to keep them warm in the winter. I’ll be collecting gently used jackets very soon for next winter. If you’re interested in learning more, email me here. I’ll also be connecting with other non-profits that I support and find out how I can become an advocate for their message. I want to send a special thank you to these ladies for sharing their mission and prompting myself and many others to action—Amy Webb, Archel Bernard, Elizabeth Quintal, Nole Garey, and Sara Chambers.

Following this very intentional mission-driven panel I found myself at another panel: How You Can Use Social Media to Invent Your Career, Make Friends, And Go On Crazy Adventures. I haven’t made any fast friends from social media alone but after hearing this panel I was intrigued. The idea that you can find others who have common interests through social media platforms, like Instagram, definitely seems possible. They also shared about how their businesses took off from using social media. The main lesson that can be learned from this is you should absolutely share what you are passionate about. It will resonate with your people. The panel covered Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest. These days I’m most interested in the power of Pinterest, due to the SEO implications. I learned about the Pinterest 100—which forecasts 2019’s top emerging trends. You can also check out a monthly trending update here. When you are pinning, be mindful of the titles and descriptions of your pins for SEO purposes. I would venture to say that it matters on Instagram too. For any content that is searchable online SEO should be considered.

Following lunch, I went to another keynote given by Garance Doré. I’ve been a fan of Garance for about 8 years now. I first stumbled across her beautiful fashion illustrations around 2011. I have some of her prints hanging in my office. Her message was raw and timely. She spoke about how being addicted to her business caused her body and soul to suffer. Her following was accustomed to seeing a version of her and at some point, that version changed—yet she wanted to remain on-brand. When you, as an individual, are the brand this can be a struggle. “Resist the pressure to be an image of something,” Garance shared. She also talked about how it is important to look around when you are bored and see what actually inspires you. Her message perfectly tied into Joanna’s keynote. It’s so easy to get caught up in how others perceive you. Once this happens you are veering off your path. That’s where inspiration can help guide you. Connecting with what lights you up can help to guide your next move.

The final session I attended on day 3 was an email workshop: Next Level Emails — Using Automation to Get New & Repeat Business. This workshop was full of great information. The most important thing you can do for your email subscribers is to provide exclusive, valuable content. Create content that has value to your list by answering the questions they are asking, creating downloadable resources/guides that will help them, or share beautiful and meaningful illustrations or writing that resonate with your audience. Don’t try and sell them. Do them a service. Alternatively, if you are providing valuable content to a large number of subscribers you could charge a minimal fee for a paid subscription. Did you know about Ann Friedman’s email newsletter subscription? It’s $5 per year. Another way to decide what your next step will be is to look at emails you enjoy reading/opening. What can you glean from them?

Day 4

By day 4 I was ready to move to Palm Springs. The weather at the end of March is absolutely perfect. Did I mention that the desert was in full bloom? I was inspired to create and ready to actually take a vacation. The final workshop I attended was: Business Planning—Tips and Tricks to Manage Your Business Financials. Aimee LaLiberte delivered up so much meaningful content is less than an hour. She walked us through our money mindset, what tools we need in our accounting stack, what our next financial moves should be, how to get a hold of our personal and business spending, how to save for taxes, and creating and implementing a business revenue goal sheet using the Profit First method. Aimee runs a Virtual CFO and Bookkeeping service and she just opened up a YouTube channel where she’ll be sharing more of this great advice.

My fear of missing out was at a height as I decided to take time off from the Summit to visit Joshua Tree National Park in the middle of the day. My husband, Steven, and I just wanted to see if it was worth coming back to and of course, we weren’t disappointed. Next time we are in the area we plan on staying overnight so we can stargaze. I made Steven promise that we would be back in time for the closing keynote.

Joshua Tree Steven and Leona

Jessica Hische was announced as the closing keynote the week prior to Alt Summit. I was beyond excited! Jessica’s work is a huge inspiration for me. She is an incredible lettering artist originally from PA. She worked with my favorite designer, Louise Fili, and she’s pregnant with her third kiddo. Anyone who has more than one child is basically my hero right now. Having Leona has opened my eyes to the challenges of parenting. I recently described it as walking into an SAT test unprepared, every single day. I know that might be extreme, but for someone who loves planning and being prepared (me), it literally does feel that way at times. Jessica’s honesty about motherhood, hormones, and breastfeeding all rang true. She talked about how her capacity to create has changed since becoming a mom. In order to continue doing her best work and spend time with her family, she had to get clear on her focus. She asked some important questions that I still need to work through: What are my true strengths? How can I leverage my strengths? What do I truly love to do? In other words, what is my superpower? I think we can all benefit from running through those questions from time to time. It’s easy to become an expert in so many areas with online learning at our fingertips. Focus on what you love doing, remain on your true path despite outside influences, and create work that is meaningful to you.

Designing Your Career for Happiness

Designing Your Career for Happiness

It was the summer of 2013 … I was approaching 30 years old and I started getting restless. My career was taking off. I was the Director of Web Design and e-Business Development at a high-end printing company. We worked with museums, galleries, and many well-known artists to develop their websites and printed promotional materials. We were in the process of rebranding our Studio’s website when things started taking a turn for me. I began taking notice to what made me most happy. I especially enjoyed doodling during customer service calls. Or when my co-worker, Brendan, would give life to a dying bug by sketching a speech bubble which read, “Where have you been all of my life? It’s almost over …” or “I’m dying to see you!” He would leave them on our officemate’s desk as a warm welcome. The hilarity was perfection. This makes it sounds like I was a slacker, but that wasn’t the case at all. I just knew I could be enjoying my work life a little more. So I started to discuss this idea with Brendan, “You know those people—the people who are always happy? I want to be more like that.” I knew that what had originally attracted me to a creative career was somehow lost over time. I wish I could tell you that I opened an Oreo and voila, my career changed in an instant but that’s not how it worked. Instead I’m going to give you some practical advice and references you can use to design your creative career for happiness.
dead bug illustration Oswald

Step 1. Make a decision to change.

Don’t just accept things as they are. Instead be bold enough to make changes. I have a friend who is an exceptional artist, illustrator, and designer—her talent and abilities far outweigh my own. She’s always commenting on how lucky I am to get the jobs I get. Luck has zero to do with it. Accepting things as they are keeps you small. It’s so easy to get comfortable and let fear get the best of you. If your initial reason to be in the creative field has become lost, it is time to make a change. For each person this will look different. I suggest digging through your local bookstore for some inspiration. What finally kicked me in the rear was Jen Sincero’s book You Are a Badass®: How to Stop Doubting Your Greatness and Start Living an Awesome Life. The yellow book cover and the word “Badass” immediately made me happy so I went with it. Jen’s whimsical sense of humor and storytelling sucked me right in and I began taking action.

“When you up-level your idea of what’s possible, and decide to really go for it, you open yourself up to the means to accomplish it as well.”

— Jen Sincero1

Jen made it clear that I needed to make a bunch of uncomfortable life choices and stick with them. So I did.

Step 2. Identify what makes your heart sing.

In a world where we can be “all the things” it’s hard to narrow your focus and your expertise. I knew that I wanted to spend more time illustrating but that’s all I could really muster up. How in the world was I going to transition from a Director of Web Design to creating brilliant illustrations? What do I even want to illustrate? These were—and sometimes still are—the questions roaming in my brain. One way to identify what makes your heart sing is to think back on a time when you created something that made you happy. You love this “passion project” for its final form, and you enjoyed the entire process of creating it. Remember it by writing it down.2 It could be as simple as a napkin doodle or more complex like the invention of a portable computer accessory. You may not be able to recall these moments right away. In fact, I recommend asking yourself this question and then sleeping on it—maybe even for a few weeks. As you recall events jot them down so you don’t forget. Spending time focusing on and remembering what makes you happy will not only help you figure out what you should be doing but it will attract more of what you love in your creative career. For me it ended up being a blend of food and illustration. I landed a part time job where I created watercolor illustrations of food which allowed me to grow my business on the side.
botanical watercolor illustration veggies vegetables

Step 3. Write out your creative goals.

When you have a project to complete it’s easy to create a task list. You envision the final product and then work backwards—creating a schedule based on everything that is needed to get you to the final. When you’re redesigning your creative career to cultivate more happiness in your life don’t worry about having an elaborate Gantt chart. Take time to figure out what it looks like. Create a schedule or a list of goals if you need it, but I like to think this process is a bit more magical than a to-do list. Why not use your intuition to start the process? Ask yourself what you truly want out of your creative career and see what comes up over the next few months.

While I was at a conference in San Fransisco I visited Muir Woods National Park. It is such an incredibly beautiful place. After being awed by the enormous trees and how the light moved through the forest, I visited the gift shop to see what the local artists had to offer. I came across this beautiful little container. The top piece had been carved from the wood of the forest and inside was a little piece of paper that read, “The Legend of the Dreambox (often attributed to Lemuria) suggests writing down your fondest dream, greatest desire, strongest wish on a small piece of paper and putting that paper in a Dreambox and placing it beside your bed. Every evening as you retire and every morning as you rise hold your Dreambox and think of your dream believing with all your heart that it is so. Legend has it if done faithfully … your dream will come true.” Since then I’ve filled out two sheets of paper front and back full of my greatest desires. The first page has 15 different work and life desires that I wrote in 2013. All but 2 of them have been achieved. Ranging from paying off my debt and running my own creative business from home, to meeting/marrying the man of my dreams. I’m not sure it’s the “Dreambox” per-say or the mere fact that I simply wrote them down and had faith they would happen.

Step 4. Work on your passion projects.

What would happen if you spent time designing or illustrating for your own happiness—creating passion projects? Creatives are highly passionate individuals. Otherwise why would we subject ourselves to a career whose financial stability coined the phrase “starving artist”? We live and breathe to create. It wakes us up in the middle of the night. As designers we start our career inspired by our inner creativity. When we fill every last ounce of our working hours on client work we sometimes lose our initial inspiration. It’s worth carving out the time to create for yourself whether you are planning to make money or to simply gratify yourself. Jessica Hische launched her lettering career by working on her “Daily Drop Caps”—a true labor of love. She’s created a successful career by making the time to explore her own interests.

“The work you do while you’re procrastinating is probably the work you should be doing the rest of your life.”

—Jessica Hische3

My own personal projects receive twice the amount of attention as my client-related posts. I don’t know if the audience can sense my excitement or if they genuinely like what they see. Either way it’s clear to me that when I show passion for what I’m working on my customers are excited too. Nine times out of ten I generate more business from those posts. Slowly but surely I’m seeing my project list grow into work that I’m excited about. After 2 years at my part time job I was able to launch my creative business working from home doing what I love. It wasn’t until I took inspired action toward understanding my creative preferences that my career started to shift. While I can’t accredit one specific passion project I have a big list of tiny projects that made a notable difference.

Step 5. Move forward with perspiration and positivity.

Almost every time I create a time consuming piece of art I get to the midway point and think what’s the point? I enjoy the creation process it’s just that I can’t quite see how the piece is going to turn out and I’m not sure if it’s what I initially envisioned. Self doubt and fear start to cloud my judgement. I have to intentionally cheer myself forward. Something tells me I’m not alone here. The good news is that studies show creative people tend to have the ability to delay gratification.4 Thomas Edison conducted 2,004 experiments, using different materials before he invented a working lightbulb. Which explains his quote, “Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration.”

So then how do we move forward and perspire? Through positivity. It’s so easy to give up and get distracted. It’s crucial to stay connected to your initial inspiration. When you begin a project envision how it will make you feel to complete it. Write it down so you can recite it when you lose sight of your original goal. Maintaining a positive attitude takes intentional practice. When you hear the tired, old sayings of negativity playing out in your mind use them as a trigger to remember the positive. Overtime it will become much easier. Not only will the attitude shift help you complete more work but you will expand your reach. In Stephen Covey’s book Seven Habits of Highly Effective People the first habit is being proactive. He shares specifically how proactive people have a positive energy and how that benefits their reach—in other words their audience. “Proactive people focus their efforts in the Circle of Influence. They work on things they can do something about. The nature of their energy is positive, enlarging and magnifying, causing their Circle of Influence to increase.”5 When in doubt focus on what you can do right now in this moment and keep moving forward.

Let’s recap.

The first step is identifying that a change is needed. Don’t get overwhelmed by the tiny details of getting from point A to point B. Designers are planners so we tend to turn everything into a project to-do list. Start out by just recognizing that a change is needed and sit with it for a bit. Take notice of the little things that make you happy in your everyday life. Your brain will start thinking creatively for you in the background. Write your perfect day-in-the-life, or list major accomplishments or desires and keep them somewhere close by to review them when you start feeling lost. Start chipping away at your career dreams by working on passion projects that make your heart sing! This will lighten your mood and help your business thrive. Customers love seeing what you are doing outside of work and might even hire you to create something similar for them. Stay aware of the negative self talk and turn those stories into positive ones. When you are lost just do what you can with what you have in any given moment.

When Brendan started cutting out speech bubbles and placing them next to the dying bugs he was certainly living in the moment. The belly laughter that followed will never be forgotten. I’m still confused as to why there were dying bugs in our office anyway? The building was clean. The office was clean. I like to think they were dropping dead in our office to illustrate the impending doom if we chose to stay there. What hints are showing up in your life that it is time to make a change? They could be as subtle as a dying bug or as big as not having your mortgage payment. Make the decision to change and trust in the process.

SOURCES:
1 Sincero, Jen. You Are A Badass, How To Stop Doubting Your Greatness and Start Living An Awesome Life. S.l., Running Press, 2017.

2 Robert S. Kaplan (Author). What You’re Really Meant to Do: A Road Map for Reaching Your Unique Potential. 21 Sept. 2017. Referencing pages 69-70

3 Hische, Jessica. “Procrastiworking Poster.” Jessica Hische, buystufffrom.jessicahische.com/product/procrastiworking-poster. Accessed 18 Sept. 2017.

4 Dacey, John S., et al. Understanding Creativity: The Interplay of Biological, Psychological, and Social Factors. San Francisco, Jossey-Bass, 1998.

5 Covey, Stephen R. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Provo, UT, Franklin Covey, 1998.

Blend more of what you love into your work!

How to infuse your passion into your work:

About 5 years ago I came across the book What You’re Really Meant To Do: A Roadmap For Reaching Your Unique Potential by Robert Steven Kaplan. In one exercise he mentions the idea of identifying what makes your heart sing by looking back to an early memory of doing something that made you really happy. It could be anything from talking to a stranger to exploring nature. I gave myself time to think through a number of memories that make me happy. I still remember the first time I decided I to pursue a career in the arts. I was in third grade and I drew an impala for a project illustrating Kenyan wildlife.

The common themes in my memories were creativity, nature, and people—specifically seeing the good in others. What I learned is that I could incorporate more of what I love into my work in two ways. First and foremost, making opportunities to work with customers whose mission and values resonate with my own. This would make it easy to see the good in what they are doing and support them 100%. Secondly, I could use my free time to explore projects that are meaningful to me. This doesn’t necessarily transfer to a monetary value but it does help display who I am in work and life—which ultimately helps my brand story.

Last year I made a commitment to carve out time to work on projects that interest me just for the sake of exploring. I started with creating a pattern collection—something I’ve desired to do for years now. Below is a short video that illustrates the pattern-making process I went through and some of the story behind in case you’re interested. I’d love to hear about what you are doing to blend what you love into your work. Feel free to share!

Passion Projects from Cynthia Oswald on Vimeo.

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