Compare and Despair

You know the feeling. You’re sensing a bit of a rut with your creativity, so you decide to take a look at some others’ work for a boost of inspiration. You start looking through Instagram, blogs, Facebook, or some other medium, and that sinking feeling creeps in. By the time you notice it, you are so far down the spiral, you don’t even know when inspiration was replaced with the feeling of overwhelming self-doubt. Now you don’t want to make anything at all. What’s the point? 

So what happened? Compare and despair happened. The minute you measure your own work to the work of others, the feeling of despair sets in.

There have been whole years that I let comparing get the best of me, and I didn’t engage in my creative pursuits. Now, when feel it coming on, it lasts no longer than an hour. This has taken a lot of practice to curb. I have found a few tried and true solutions to overcome the compare and despair monster. And I'd like to share them with you.