You can't fail The Artist's Way
Read essays from people who fell off The Artist's Way wagon, and find community with others who didn't do it perfectly, but are still getting it done.
When I first tried The Artist’s Way I stopped about two weeks in after missing a few days of morning pages. Julia Cameron said to write every morning, and I had not, so I had “failed.” To get the full experience, I’d surely need to start again from the very beginning. It was an overwhelming task so I just put it away for good. By demanding I do it perfectly I had a great excuse never to try it again. By holding myself to an impossible standard, I conveniently had a way to throw in the towel.
It took a few more years to give The Artist’s Way another shot, and this time around I asked my newsletter readers to join me in the process to help hold me accountable. And it worked! I finished it, alongside so many of you, and grew and learned so much from the process. Did I do it perfectly? No. I skipped a day of morning pages here and there, but I kept going anyway. And I consider it a successful attempt, one that allowed me forgiveness and helped me finish the workbook without burning out.
This year, many group members fell behind and are still working their way through the book. This is an intense, emotional, artistic marathon. It’s supposed to be hard. Most people try many times to get through it. The initial attempts aren’t failures. They’re preparation.
Today we’re so lucky to get to read wonderful, moving, insightful essays from members of this community who write from their own perspectives about not finishing The Artist’s Way — and why that doesn’t make you a failure. I love what these writers have to say, and I hope you’ll read them all as you consider doing The Artist’s Way, or reflect on your own experience with it.
You Don’t Have to Be Perfect, You Just Have To Enjoy the Process
by Snigdha Bansal
I grew up in a house with a heavy emphasis on being creative. My mum would sing me lullabies she’d written herself, and make costumes from scratch for talent performances at school. She’d cheer me on when I drew picture charts to help my brother learn the alphabet.
As I grew older, I got pulled toward many different creative outlets — writing, music, art. But when it became clear I wasn’t gifted at all my interests, my parents and teachers stopped encouraging me. I was left questioning if my creativity deserved a spot among others who were clearly much better at art or music. I wanted to be good at whatever I took up instantly and couldn’t enjoy the process anymore.
A few years ago, at 21, I left my life back in India to start a new one in Europe. It took some years to finish my master’s degree and find a well-paying job that’d let me live here. Last year, when I’d just started feeling settled in my new life, I was hit by what Julia Cameron refers to as “this dream, this feeling, this urge, this desire” to revive my creativity. On many days, I felt like if I didn’t create anything with all the ideas racing around my mind, I would explode. But deterred by self-doubt and the excellent artists I saw around myself, I remained blocked.
In hindsight, that’s when I first saw synchronicity in action. In a conversation with my boss, who’d recently taken burnout leave, she told me she was doing Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way.
I couldn't believe something like this even existed. The fact that we were allowed to be creative simply as a way of being was beyond me. And because it still seemed too good to be true, I couldn’t keep up. In one year, I tried to embark on this journey twice, only to fail somewhere around the fourth-week mark. I was lacking the faith that Cameron deems so important to this experience.
Then, synchronicity worked its magic again. While hanging out on Substack, I chanced upon Ali’s Little Things. When in a few months she posted about doing The Artist’s Way together, I knew this was my chance.
Being a people pleaser (in recovery), I’m aware that doing things as part of a group keeps me accountable, and I’m less likely to want to disappoint others while also putting time and effort into a project. After the initial Zoom meeting, I made a promise to myself that I’d make it to the end this time.
In Week 1 I had a breakthrough, as if a sign from the “Creator” that I was ready. I realized a huge cause of my perpetual dissatisfaction with myself was that I didn’t put my 100% into things I wanted to do — whether that was writing, drawing or even bouldering — because I was afraid of failure. Just this realization was enough to push me further than I’d ever gone. I began to spend evenings writing, I picked up the paintbrush after three years, I tried boulders I knew I wouldn’t be able to finish, just to enjoy the process.
Every day, I was taking one more step toward my inner artist, who until recently had been locked out of my reach. I loved responding to Ali’s community posts every week and reading everyone else’s comments. I was unstoppable.
Then Week 7 came around. And life happened. In my day job as a copywriter, I was put on an exciting but exhausting project that involved dealing with a lot of internal politics and working extra hours. It left me drained and I felt like I was crawling to bed every night, with no time or energy to do my pages or tasks.
I knew that TAW was slipping out of my grasp once again, but there was little I could do to save it. In a last attempt to get back in, I posted an SOS on the community chat. Ali responded with encouragement and shared the experiences of many others who were in a similar boat.
“The process ebbs and flows, like life. Some weeks will be easy, others will be hard,” she said. And it hit home.
In Week 9, talking about recovering a sense of compassion for yourself and your inner artist, Cameron writes, “The need to be a great artist makes it hard to be an artist. The need to produce a great work of art makes it hard to produce any art at all.”
To me, this is a metaphor for The Artist’s Way, as well as any creative endeavor in general. If we only set off to do it perfectly, there’s a very low chance we will ever make it to the end. Life happens to all of us, even to those following strict routines in preparation for a marathon or The Artist’s Way. Knowing I wasn’t the only one struggling with falling off also took away the shame that comes with it.
As I make my way to creative recovery, the greatest lesson so far has been to think less and do more. In Week 1 itself, Cameron tells us, “Remember that in order to recover as an artist, you must be willing to be a bad artist… By being willing to be a bad artist, you have a chance to be an artist, and perhaps, over time, a very good one.”
I’m now beginning to feel the sheer joy of creating something, even if it’s bad. I’m finding myself ready to do away with the fear of not being perfect, to put my words out there in the world, to go to dance classes even if I look like a noob, to finish projects I start even if I fall off.
When I don’t finish things I’ve started, they just stay inside me. There’s a high chance they’ll die with me. But things I’ve finished will live on — like this essay. It’s now out on the internet for you to read and wonder why it suddenly took a morbid turn.
Did I mention one of the things that’s synchronously found me recently is the desire to try my hand at comedy?
Snigdha Bansal is a writer, journalist, and overall wordy person. She has written personal essays and features for VICE, Business Insider, Stylist Magazine, and more. Currently, she's working on launching a Substack called Spilled Guts. — a newsletter that'll explore the complex relationships we have with hunger, eating, and our bodies through the lens of chronic illness.
On Choosing Grace by Jillian Cardillo
Three days into week four (media deprivation week) and I was back wasting time on Reddit, reading probably made-up stories about bad family drama instead of working on my own creative needs. Why am I like this? Why can’t I do my tasks, my morning pages (which I hadn’t done since the previous Friday), my artist’s date (which I had yet to do)? I couldn’t even make it three days without social media. I was mad at myself. I was also, I realized, not in the right head space for any of this. It felt like a struggle.
At that point, I was in my second to last week at a job that left me overwhelmed, exhausted, and burnt out. How could I be creative, how could I go on this healing journey, when I could barely sit on my couch and pay attention to an episode of General Hospital (that was about as much thinking as I could handle). I felt like I was failing – myself, my creativity, and The Artist’s Way. I realized I had a choice — I could beat myself up about how terrible I was at everything, a predetermined failure, who blew it yet again — my default in these situations — or I could think back to the morning pages I did do and realize I wanted to try something new: Showing myself grace.
I chose grace.
I realized that then, at that moment, while I was still at that job, I didn’t have room for The Artist’s Way. And that was ok. So I quit. Temporarily. Then, the Monday after I left the job, I started over. Week One. From scratch, forgiving and forgetting all the dates I’d stood myself up on, the pages I didn’t write, the Reddit black holes I’d given my time to. This time, I was ready. It felt different. It felt like what I was supposed to be doing. I did my pages every day. I did my tasks. I took myself out on an Artist’s Date every week. I started to feel the ideas flowing, coming to me easily.
I’m on my own timeline now, and it’s the right one for me. I’m on week seven now. Yesterday, on my Artist’s Date at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC, two older men were talking while looking at a painting next to me. I wasn’t paying attention to them – I was lost in my thoughts, thinking about the article I wanted to write, the comedy video I wanted to make, and wondering how I was going to do all of this – until one of them said, loudly, “synchronicity.” My head shot up. I was asking how I was going to achieve all the creativity that’s been unlocked and I got my answer. I’m glad I showed myself some grace.
Jillian Cardillo is a writer and comedian living in Washington, DC. Her Substack exploring approaching middle age as a Millennial and taking on the gig economy is launching soon.
Failing Onwards by Albe Gilmore
I stopped doing The Artist Way around week 8, which means I might not “recover a sense of strength.” At the risk of sounding arrogant, I haven’t learned much from The Artist Way. I haven’t learned nothing: I still consider it a useful tool. It provided many good reminders: I am allowed to work towards my dreams, even if the outcome might be very different in the end. I am not helpless anymore. It’s ok to tell your colleagues “I’m leaving work early, I have a date with myself. You wouldn’t get it, it’s an Artist thing.” But no big revelation came from the readings or doing the exercises. For instance, during week 6, “Recovering a sense of abundance,” the exercise that boils down to budgeting is a little redundant because I have to buy groceries in Canada in 2024. Of course, I haven’t finished the book, so who knows what I’ve missed.
This summer, I will celebrate ten years sober. I’ve learned that recovery is not linear. I know relapsing is not necessarily a failure, but a rehearsal for success. Not finishing The Artists’ Way doesn’t feel like a failure – more like one step in a longer process. I’m planning on doing it again, this time with a friend. Someone who likes me enough to listen to me ramble, and for whom I can do the same. I’m excited to see what happens in that more intimate setting. Maybe I will get the inspiration to write a book on creativity in which I teach people to cut the toothpaste tube to get more out of life. The Brokeass Way.
To find out how racy synchronicity was for Albe, or if you like reading about zombies, TV shows, and more, find her on her Substack.
Turning The Artist’s Way’s schedule into one that works for you, by Mazsi Jávorszky:
This is my second time with The Artist’s Way. The first time I also did it with Ali and her followers here on Little Things and after the 12 weeks concluded, I was burnt out. All that revelation I encountered while I wrote my morning pages and read each week’s readings led me to severe anxiety and me leaving a well-paying job, and eventually my software engineering career. It was a shock to say the least but the beginning of a much-needed transformation.
Now I’m feeling much better. I still write my pages every day though not first thing in the morning. I have little kids and I prioritise sleep so I’m not the kind of gal who’s going to wake up at 5 am. Last year I had no agenda with The Artist’s Way, I was just curious. But this year, my aim was to supercharge my creativity. I wanted to be more confident, more authentic, bolder, and take steps towards my artistic dreams. I have started Whatever, my Substack since and I did things I feared doing for so long. Like singing and dancing, just because I want to while I unload the dishwasher. Yes, I was afraid of doing them before even when I was alone.
I have made adjustments this year though. I decided that I can’t do this at such a fast pace and I don’t want to rush through the whole thing like I did last year. I take my time with each week, the second week took 2.5 weeks, the third week 3 weeks. The reading/media deprivation week was only one week because it was brutal for me. I deleted Instagram and I did not read anything, not even books or substack posts. I didn’t really miss Instagram, only Florence Given’s lovely reels (check her out!) but reading was different. I had such an intense urge to read every book on my bookshelf and I was super irritated throughout that week. Books are my safe spaces, they provided comfort throughout my whole life so taking them away made me feel unsafe. But it was still a valuable experience.
I’m now finishing week 6 and I’m okay with it. I don’t think I’m behind. I’m immersing myself in the themes and doing most of the tasks, sometimes on the assigned week, sometimes a few weeks later when I arrive at the mental/spiritual place to do them. It’s more gentle, loving, and delicious doing it this way.
A lot of great things happened inside me in the past 12 weeks due to The Artist’s Way, but sometimes it is still a struggle. I still can’t plan an artist date consciously ahead of time and I’m working on believing that I can get paid for my writing. I’m also finishing up my Yoga instructor training and it’s the same with that, too. I still have lingering ideas about how I should be only paid for hard work, work that I don’t enjoy doing. I am now better equipped to deal with these anxieties though. Writing my pages is a lifeline and it helps me to be more (self-)compassionate and gives me time and space to pause and check-in. I would recommend every person on the planet to go through this and the world would be a much better and lovelier place to be.💖
Mazsi is a Hungarian writer based in Budapest who writes “Whatever” on Substack. You can follow her on Instagram here, and you can read more about her journey with The Artist’s Way here.
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I had attempted the artist way twice before over the years, but never made it to week 3 even haha, BUT since I started again inspired by you and this community I just broke into week 3!
I loved reading this. Albe's line about wanting to write a book about creativity that focuses on the "brokeass way" made me laugh. But I would also buy that book!