don't give up

When my sister, Sarah, was a little girl, she didn't really care about anything other than drawing. She drew in the margins of her homework, on the underside of our dining room table, on the wall (until my mom stopped her), on junk mail, in countless sketchbooks (and some library books)--basically, on any blank (or mostly blank) surface. It wasn't all good, but that didn't stop her. It didn't matter. 

Drawing made her happy.

In college, she discovered that she also loved animation, and thus applied all of her time and energy to all-things-animating. Even though she knew it was a long shot, she applied to be in the animation program. And she got in. She has worked hard, taken risks, and has not given up. As a result, my kid sister--my hero--will graduate in May with a BFA in animation. 

But she knows this is just the beginning of a very long road to achieving her dream of working for a studio. In the mean time, she continues to hone her skills by freelancing and working on her professors' films. She attends animation conventions, armed with business cards and her portfolio, and solicits feedback from industry professionals to identify her strengths and areas of improvement. Home-girl is focused and driven!

Sarah's work has improved exponentially since she first started. I'm not surprised. She sketches every day. When she's not working on her film or freelance projects, she's sketching strangers at coffee shops, Disneyland, zoos--any place teeming with possible subjects. 

So, when I shared my doubts and insecurities about writing, she gave me good advice:

• Recognize your strengths
• Acknowledge your weaknesses
• Pick one area that you need to improve upon and focus on it--work at it. It's advice she learned from Bobby Podesta's blog. As a former Pixar animator, he is mainly talking about animation, but really, he could be talking about the creative process in general. It's good stuff, people. Read it! Be encouraged.

Then she told me to watch this video of Ira Glass talking about the creative process:

I understand that Sarah's advice to me is not new or original. A lot of bloggers and and well-respected writers have given similar advice. I just didn't think it could work for me like it had worked for them. I thought that in addition to a lot of hard work, they were just inherently more--more interesting, more well-read, more intelligent.

I needed to hear it from someone who was also doing the hard work, someone who hadn't "made it" yet.

Someone I could relate to.

If you don't have anyone to cheer you on and encourage you to pursue crazy-good dreams, let it be me.

Don't give up.