I was making my very first video yesterday (I wrote this post back in June 2021, I’ve added a little note of my writing process at the end of this post). The video was just a short intro to the online workshop that I will be doing for the BC Culture Days. I thought it would be good practice for the real thing. First I wrote down what I would like to say in the video and asked my husband to help me record it.
My initial reaction upon seeing the recording was cringe! I sounded so weird and awkward! I have new found respect for actors and actresses. I sounded robotic and I couldn’t even remember my own script.
After a few takes and watching several videos of myself, I kind of got used to hearing my own voice. The mistakes I made were kind of funny too. I asked my husband to keep them in the video but he edited them out and compiled a reel of bloopers which was the best part. Too bad my husband deleted it.
It’s kind of scary to put myself out there like this at first, to record myself on video for the public to view. I asked my son and his friends to join me, not just to make the video more interesting but also to give me courage.
Then I remember I was also scared to put my comics on social media for people to see at first.
My friend sent me a video about Charles Schultz: The Untold Story of Charles M. Schulz, the maker of the comics Peanuts. That he learned to accept himself and believed that if thing were meant to be, it’d work out. He never gave up on his passion and kept trying even after multiple rejections.
A TED talk I watched about The strongest predictor for success is Grit. I guess if you love something, having grit is easier than if you don’t love it.
So making art has led me to putting myself out there, to open myself up more and having the courage to be vulnerable. All for the sake of love… because I love art!
Note: This post was written back in June 2021. I usually wrote down whatever I was thinking when I had the inspiration. I’ve learned that if I had an idea, if I don’t write it down right away, I usually lose the feeling or flow of it later. I could reconstruct it and write about the idea later but it’s just different or lacking somehow. I am happy that I wrote down my first manuscript for my picture book Emet’s Box in the early hours of the dawn. I wrote about that process in another blog post here. Now I know it’s better to write it down right away and edit later.