How setbacks fuel artistic growth
As an artist, the path to creative success is rarely a straight line!
Anyone who has been an artist for even a short time will know that frustration and moments of uncertainty and self-doubt are never far away. We can become disheartened when we don’t see the results we want, or when we compare our art to someone else’s.
In short, it can take a long time to find success as an artist and we often want to fast track the difficulties to get to the good stuff!
But, what if we stopped seeing failures or setbacks as a roadblock to achieving our goals, but instead saw setbacks as vital stepping stones to our growth as artists?
The setbacks we face as artists
This October marks 5 months since I started pitching my portfolio to some of my ‘dream’ companies. I have sent over 20 pitches (plus a number of follow up emails and DMs on Instagram) and would you like to know what my results have been?
(At this point I’d LOVE to be telling you that I had multiple companies fighting to license my art on their products and I had the difficult task of choosing which one I was going to pick! But sadly, no…)
I have had two emails saying no thanks, and the rest have been unanswered.
This has been disheartening given the time and work it has taken to send these pitches, and yet I know from blogs I have read and podcasts I have listened to that this is a fairly usual story for artists trying to break into bigger art licensing deals.
I’m sure you can resonate with the example above and perhaps you have had similar setbacks in your own journey.
[I have had a couple of smaller licensing opportunities come along during this time for which I am very grateful but they haven't come as a result of my pitches]
Some of the setbacks common to us as artists include:
- Creating art we are not happy with
- Receiving criticism or negative comments about our work
- Failing to gain traction on social media
- Encountering technical difficulties in our business
- Struggling to find the time to work on our art and business
When we face setbacks and failures like this we have a choice to make.
We can give up and tell ourselves our art is not good enough, we’re never going to succeed, it’s all too hard…
OR
We can learn from our setbacks or ‘failures’ and use them as an opportunity to improve, learn and grow.
Reframing setbacks as learning opportunities
It can take a lot of mental energy to be ‘happy’ about a setback, but actually setbacks and failures are so integral to our growth!
Setbacks are GOOD for us!
- They ensure we keep working and improving
- They build resilience
- They help us identify our goals
- They foster our problem solving skills
- They help us to empathise with others
Ultimately, if we deal with them correctly, setbacks help us to become better artists and are an integral part of the journey.
I’m sure you won’t find an artist you consider to be successful who has had a smooth run from the start. They will have had their fair share of bad art, failed products, and risks they took that didn’t pay off!
But I think they would be the first to admit, it was often the failures that propelled them into more growth because they had to pivot, or try something new.
Seeing a setback or failure as a path to future growth is a key step in embracing them as part of your artistic journey.
Practically how do we deal with a setback when it comes our way?
Once you have accepted that a setback can actually be a good thing, the next important thing is to actively learn from this setback so you can grow and improve.
There are a few steps you can take to identify your learning points.
You can work through these steps yourself on a piece of paper, or if you'd like this framework in a simple workbook form I've created a 4 page PDF which you can download for free by signing up to my mailing list below.
It will help you to identify the causes of your own setbacks and what you can practically learn from them.
Read on so you know how it works!
Firstly once you have a particular setback or failure in mind, try and identify the reasons you may not be succeeding in this area.
This could feel a bit uncomfortable and might seem very self-critical, but you’re not identifying these things so you can beat yourself up, you’re doing it so you can learn and grow, so give yourself the freedom to admit or identify things you could do better!
In the example I shared above where I was not succeeding with my pitch emails I have noted down a number of reasons why this may be the case.
- Perhaps my style of art is not what those particular companies are looking for right now
- Perhaps the standard of my art isn’t good enough yet
- Perhaps my pitch emails aren’t attracting the attention of art directors
- Perhaps the companies I am pitching to do not have spaces for new artists right now
There are many more reasons I could list, but it is important to identify as many possible reasons as you can think of, even if you don’t know which ones are the actual cause.
Secondly, it’s helpful to identify which of these reasons are in your control and which are not.
Again, using my own example, if the standard of my art is not yet good enough, this is something I can control (with more time and practice), but if these particular companies aren’t looking for new artists at the moment, there’s not so much I can do about that.
Cut yourself some slack from the areas you have no control over. The bottom line is, the art world is competitive, and sometimes you are doing lots of things right, it’s just there are lots of other people doing it right too!
Thirdly, thoughtfully identify what you could do about each of these possible reasons for your setback. Remember, you might not know which reasons are actually the cause of the setback, but this stage will give you a number of action points to move forwards.
In my example, if the standard of my art is not yet good enough there are plenty of things I could do to take action on this point:
- Continue to create art regularly and pitch again in a few months
- Take some courses from more experienced artists and learn from them
- Take a look at other artists who have succeeded in securing licensing contracts and note down what they are doing that I am not
I actually find this stage of the process really exciting! It’s fun to problem solve and think about what you could do differently in order to achieve your goal, or rectify your setback.
This is where the learning happens!
Your experiences - good and bad - are all part of the journey and ultimately will make you a more experienced artist and business owner.
Fourthly, create your action plan!
Once you’ve finished these steps you should have a whole list of actionable steps to try in order to overcome your setback and move forwards with your goals.
Write yourself a detailed action plan of which steps you are going to take and in which order and regularly refer to this to check you are on track. I have included a sheet in the workbook for you to create your own action plan.
The bottom line is - artists who succeed in their industry are those who are continually learning, growing and pivoting. Identifying your action steps and writing an action plan will help you to do this!
Avoiding the comparison trap
It's important as you learn to embrace your own artistic journey not to be sidetracked by the ‘comparison trap’.
Comparing yourself with others can stop you from positively reflecting on your own setbacks and learning from them.
We invariably get a false sense of someone else’s journey from the internet. People generally only share their successes on social media and we don’t often get a glimpse into their setbacks and failures.
I’ve tried to be brave and share a couple of my setbacks here, but in reality we are mostly bombarded with other people’s successes when we scroll through Instagram or other artists’ websites!
When did you last hear on Instagram that someone came 810th on a spoonflower design challenge?! But yes that happened to me back in May 2023 and it propelled me to up my game.
After implementing some of these strategies, including a few months of consistent practice, I went on to achieve 2nd place in the January 2024 Wecloming Walls challenge.
But surprise surprise, I only posted about the 2nd place, and if you had seen that on my Instagram profile you might not have appreciated the hard work and multiple setbacks that preceded achieving my goal of getting in the top 10!
So this is just a long way round of saying that we generally only see other people’s successes which can lead us to the false assumption that they ONLY have successes, which can’t possibly be true.
We often compare ourselves to people who have had a lot more experience than we have.
When we are at the start of our journey as an artist (this could even mean a couple of years in!) it can be easy to compare ourselves to people who have been in the industry for 20 years or more!
We can look at all the success they have had and feel overwhelmed. But we forget that they would have started at the beginning too. It’s unlikely that all their success happened in their first few years.
Building your business as an artist is a long game and it seems to me it is all about persistent effort, resilience and a continued effort to learn and grow.
When we acknowledge these things it can help us to feel more positive about our own artistic journey but it can also free us to celebrate other people’s successes.
Nobody has a smooth ride to success and when other artists have a win in their journey we can acknowledge the hard work and resilience it must have taken them to get to that place and use it as inspiration to keep going on our own path to reach our goals!
Celebrating your successes
It's important too to celebrate your successes along the way!
If you can, write them down and keep a log of the times you have succeeded, or reached a goal, particularly if there have been challenges or setbacks to get there. That way you can enocurage yourself to push through your current setbacks and enjoy the journey!
I'd love to hear your thoughts on setbacks and failures. Do you find it easy to navigate setbacks in your art journey? Let me know in the comments!
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