The Ugly First Draft

In my personal experience, (and according to some self-help gurus) the blank canvas is very intimidating. It happens when you start on anything new- every letter you type, every stroke of the brush seems to violently destroy the beauty of the blankness, the nothingness. To be worthy of taking up space, the very first attempt needs to be impressive, even if only to oneself, and often that's the hardest person to impress.

My antidote for the blank-canvas syndrome is to fall in love with the UGLY FIRST DRAFT. I'm trying to dismiss any notion that my work is going to be awe-inspiring at the very beginning. Accept, even expect that it's going to be shit, but the absolute only way to get a great version is to first have that shitty, ugly first version. It needs to be put somewhere before it can become itself.

The quick-dirty-prototype. Conceptual fidelity before visual fidelity. I preach these at work, but haven't been able to practice this in my personal pursuits of art and writing. That begins to get fixed now.

The second thing to love is ITERATION - something I trust myself with. Think about it, when you see works of other people in your profession, you likely have an immediate opinion on it. It's either great, or you know how it could better. Having great taste is literally how you got good at your line of work. Your work just needs well regulated doses of critism from yourself.

Here's my uggggly af first draft on nicheless. Now that the paper isn't blank anymore, and I can write (and iterate) freely.