So, you've picked up something creative, whether it be painting, sculpture, drawing or so on. And you love the process, but you're always trying to make things in order to get better and create the art you really want to create. For years I thought I wasn't good enough to create the surreal, strange images that I would imagine, and so they never left my brain, and I just continued to make whatever I was "good at" at the time, waiting until I felt confident enough in my artistic skills to create the things I truly wanted to. Then I picked up oil painting, and about 40 paintings in (yes, it took a few months!) I created a piece as an "instagram challenge"; and funny coincidence, it resonated with me. From then, I started to create more of these strange images, and now I feel confident and amazing about creating them and showing them off.

So, why aren't you creating your own art?

You're Waiting Until your Painting Skills are Good Enough

The reality is, you can always do small studies on the side to try and improve your painting skills. It's your own art, so you are "good enough" just as is! It's also more satisfying to grow your art skills through creating something meaningful to you.

You Want your Art to be Perfect before you use your "Good Ideas"

And ideas are, in reality, quite fruitful, so there's no point in saving a painting idea until your skills are "enough". It's easy to think that you'll never have another idea as good, or better, than your current one; but the reality is, ideas are all around us (which is why keeping a notebook or making notes on your phone is a good idea!) so it's better to create more ideas than to have the first one turn out brilliant!

You Don't Want to Show Your Real Art to Others because it's too Personal

Sometimes, because our art feels very personal, we don't want to create it so it can't be seen by others. If this is the case for you, either question why you don't want your personal feelings to be seen by anyone, or make your art more mysterious so that the meaning can be interpreted in a number of ways, and grow from there. It is nerve wrecking to show your heart on a wall, but so very worth it!

You Think Other People Won't Like your Art

If this is the case, why are you creating art for other people? Even if this is a concern, there's always a niche that will truly "get" your art, and it's more important to connect with these niches than to be impressive to the masses. Hyper realistic celebrity portraits are something I see a lot of nowadays on social media, and as talented as these artists are, I wonder are they creating their own art, and how many people resonate on a deep level with these artworks, if any.

Paintings created before I started painting what I wanted to paint!

And here's why you SHOULD be creating your own art....

It'll Connect you with Others in a much more Significant Way

It's much more important to create art that connects you with people than to create art that looks the best to a critic. Art is a form of communication after all, and what's the point if you're not communicating with your true voice?

Your Art will Sing stronger to you (and to others)

Artworks that are created from passion are always more appealing in some unique way. Wouldn't you prefer to look at paintings created from genuine passion for the subject rather than from a desire for the art to be "appealing"?

It's a much more enjoyable process

Creating art is a lengthy process, so why not make it enjoyable and do what calls to you? I enjoy painting with vibrant underpaintings that peek out through the paint because it gives me a sense of delight. Why not try something crazy if it calls to you?

Life is short!!!

Enough said; carpe diem!

These are paintings created after I started creating what I wanted to; the one on the top right is the first one, and it inspired me to create more strange surrealist paintings!

So, if you're not creating your own (real!) art already, why not?

Who cares if the first few don't turn out like masterpieces?

Create. Your own. Goddamn. Art.

What kind of art are you going to start creating? Comment below!