Failure and Lions (Patreon)

I was really surprised by how well these lions came out.
I'd had a run of ill-fated and time consuming experiments.










And was starting to worry that I'd forgotten how this whole art thing worked.

But I was determined to get back on the horse and told myself I'd just try to sketch these lions for a half hour and if it was terrible or I only got a little done, all I'd lost was a half hour.
But when the timer went off, I had this



And I loved it! Look at those adorable faces!

Fittingly, as I worked on this I was listening to a podcast called Out  on the Wire, a podcast about making podcasts, but also stories in  general.

The  episode I was listening to was called The Dark Forest. It was focused  on the part of your process where you get lost and hate your work and  yourself and (often) give up. 

Surprisingly, one of the interviewees said that this is a great sign! Wildly paraphrased, he said 

"This  always makes me think of The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. I heard an  interview with George Lucas who said 'This movie was great. It was the easiest to make. The first take was always perfect.' And I thought 'uh  oh!' 

Because if it isn't hard to make, it's probably not going to be  very good. I've been working long enough that I can recognize this feeling as a sign that it's going well. It still sucks. I still hate this feeling. But I know that if I'm not going through it, I'm just  making the 4th Indiana Jones movie."

I hope that story makes you feel as good as it made me feel.