Your entire week is scheduled to the minute with sending portfolios to potential galleries, packing and shipping art, organizing your online portfolio images, sending PR to local calendars for an upcoming show, meeting a client to discuss a commission, networking events, answering emails, filing your taxes, and taking a class or two. It's all good stuff!

But before all that busy-ness begins, you are looking forward to four uninterrupted hours in your studio this afternoon.

Your creative juices are flowing. You can't wait to get that paintbrush in your hand. Or feel the clay slip between your fingers.

Then the phone rings.

And you spend the whole afternoon in the vet's office. Or helping your mother get her air conditioner fixed.

And it's not always bad stuff. An old friend calls out of the blue: she's in town and you spend the rest of the day having fun!

Still, you've missed the one time in the week when you could work in your studio uninterrupted. And you start to feel like you are getting behind. Things are stacking up, and you now resent the portfolio sending, and the email answering because it's keeping you from creating.

Frustration.

(you can start doing these right away!)

1. Begin your week by choosing just 3 things that absolutely positively have to get done this week. (you'll probably get way more than this done, but give yourself some slack and identify the top 3).

2. Leave gaps in your schedule. Sounds easy, doesn't it? As artists, we can usually set our own work schedule. Sometimes it seems we think we aren't working hard enough (taking our craft seriously enough) unless we schedule in at least an 8 hour workday. (hey, it works for corporate, right? Hmmm, maybe not)

Try relaxed scheduling — no more than 6 hours each day. That doesn't mean you won't work longer, just that you've allowed some spaciousness in your day for the unforeseen.

3. Choose four hours each week to take off completely.

This does not mean taking the afternoon off to clean the house, or run errands, or file papers.

This is just for you. A complete break.

Switch off, go for a long walk, take a nap, or go see that movie you've been meaning to.

Module ONE of ArtDates is all about time, and how we really can't manage time (it keeps on going no matter what we tell it to do). 

We dig a lot deeper into this idea of relaxed scheduling, and how to batch your tasks efficiently to create less time reacting to your to-do list and more time in your studio making art.

Click here to read more about ArtDates (pre-registration is open now)

Lori Theriault makes beautiful pots you can use every day. I know this for 2 reasons.

1. It says so right there on the Crazy Green Studios website I helped her build.

2. I use one of her bowls every day.

Lori is a functional potter who gets it.

Notice that her website has pictures of her pottery WITH food. She's even got some yummy recipes over there, like Mocha Stout Braised Root Mash

Lori can be found at The Village Potters in Asheville's River Arts District.

Nelle Fastman Pingree: Asheville, North Carolina
Visit Nelle at these upcoming venues:
Crafty Feast, Saturday, April 28, 2012, Columbia Convention Center, Columbia, SC
Celebration Israel, Sunday, April 29, 2012, Beth Israel Synagogue, Asheville, NC

Barbara Fisher: Asheville NC
"Mind Over Matter", Upstairs Artspace, Tryon NC, Opens May 25.

Lynn Stanley: Fairview, NC: New Artist Geek website! Silverpoem Studio

Join ArtDates today!