Collage for Coping and for Play

Now that it is May and World Collage Day is almost upon us (May 14!), I wanted to share an insight that I’ve discovered over the past three months.

First, we had Februllage, (@februllage), an entire month of collage prompts organized by Miss. Printed and Rhed Fawell. Then there was Marchollage, organized by Rachel Morris (@FiveByFiveCreativity) because Februllage became a lifeline for her after her parents’ passing. She created Marchollage to cope and to connect with other artists. She is not alone in creating collage as a coping method. I am one of them, and we are many. I was unable to participate in Marchollage because I signed up for CollageLab’s Spring Fling, a month long collage extravaganza, but I will definitely try to participate next year!

In getting to know the other artists who were participating in CollageLab’s Spring Fling, many of them had a similar story to mine and Rachel’s: crisis led them to collage. I began collage at the beginning of my struggles with mental health, and several participants and instructors in the Spring Fling echoed that they had taken up collage to cope with mental health issues, the pandemic, or personal crisis. Now that I am a part of the Pittsburgh Collage Collective (@pghcollagecollective on IG), several members have also said that collage helped them get through their mental health struggles, whether from circumstance, brain chemicals, or addiction.

Collage is mindfulness meditation in action. It’s very satisfying to take unlike parts and create something entirely new. The action of cutting requires all of your attention, as does the composing. It’s hard to think about anything else but the present moment when cutting, composing, or looking for that something yellow that needs to go just right there. It’s creating order from chaos, or the other way around. It’s also a way to play! In the Spring Fling, we learned about just playing to see what kinds of effects we could create with different materials. Collage can be anything that is attached to another thing, and the options are endless. No rules except your own. If you have been struggling in some way, tear something up and glue it back together. It may help a little. <3

A small collage I made just to play.

Productivity, Rest, And Other Tips

So I’m taking this Skillshare class on Productivity by Brooke Glaser and she said that your super productive days are usually followed by a day where you are not as productive. When I watched this lesson, I was like, oh my gosh, so true! She also said that as a creative entrepreneur, you need to take your weekends off to rest, do fun things, relax, etc, so that you can maximize your productivity during the week.

I took these things to heart. My super productive day was Friday. Saturday, I knew, would be unproductive and that would be okay because Weekend! So I ran some errands, did some fun web surfing, then I thought, what if I worked on project X for just a little bit? I’ve been a Photoshop girl for 20 years now, but I’ve been learning about Illustrator so I thought I would just draw my cute idea and it would be easy breezy because Simple Project.

I ended up running into a problem with no answer on the forums, it seemed, and I got incredibly frustrated to the point of wanting to cry if I was just a little closer to the edge. I figured out the solution after digging through every post about the topic that I could find. But I’m writing about this because I didn’t enjoy what I was doing anymore because I had expended so much physical and mental energy the day before, and I needed to do something fun and rest. I learned my lesson. And I will probably have to relearn it many times because I do love crossing things off my to do list and conquering tasks, no matter what day it is.

So, now for your reading pleasure, my list of other major productivity tips, as I have learned at this point:

1. Rest. (See above)

2. Do something you would normally do, but do it in a novel way (also from Brooke Glaser’s Skillshare class). If you have an ongoing project that starts to feel like a drag, mix it up! Do your work in a coffee shop or reserve a study room at the library. Take yourself to a picnic table at the park.

3. Play. In The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron, she emphasizes that our creative spirit thrives on play, and losing that ability is what causes artist’s block and emotional fatigue. Having fun is a form of taking care of yourself, and is what makes life livable. Take a class that sounds fun, do something you enjoyed as a child, go for a walk and look for interesting rocks, whatever you can think of. I recommend The Artist’s Way to anyone who pursues creative work or anyone who feels stuck in life, especially the audio book because her voice is so soothing.

4. Stretch and take breaks often. Repetitive strain injury is real. I have plantar fasciitis because I stood on one foot for too long while I was painting. Stretching, getting up and walking around (or sitting down, in my case), or getting a drink of water and playing on your phone for ten minutes are vital for your mental and physical health. Experts recommend taking some kind of break for your physical health every 20 minutes, and as someone who likes to be in the zone for three hours, I struggle with that. I’m still trying to find the right balance, but at least my body and mind get a break every so often, and hopefully more often as I figure out how to get in the zone as soon as I sit down to work.

5. The Pomodoro Technique. When I’m doing something more administrative than artsy and my to do list is extremely long, I start at the top, set a timer for 20 minutes, and tackle each thing for that amount of time, rotating until I finish as many as I can. And also taking breaks every two chunks of time to keep my brain from getting fatigued.

6. Scheduling two to three major tasks each day, and then tackling smaller things after those major things are complete. No need to overload oneself. This is the method of the Flourish planner by Bonnie Christine, surface pattern designer and lover of productivity. When she first started her creative journey, she resolved to do at least one thing each day that would bring her closer to her goals. And if you think about it, that’s 30-31 things a month, 365 things a year. That’s a lot of productivity! Two to three tasks are manageable, but if you can only do one because life happens, you’re still making progress.

Those are my methods for now. I am not done with my Skillshare class, so there are many more things to learn, but these have helped me and will continue to help me. My major goal now is to focus on three things: making time for rest and play, pattern design, and my second coloring book. Let’s see how this goes! What are some of your favorite productivity tips?