On February 12th, 2017, I asked what YOU wanted to add to your daily ritual.

In response, many of you publicly committed on Instagram to adding all sorts of beautiful habits to your lives, including meditation, writing, yoga, painting, reading, sketching, singing, playing an instrument, figure drawing, and so many more soul expanding activities.

I committed to creating art for at least one hour a day.

This was a habit I had sustained for 324 days in 2016, even while working a day gig that required frequent overnight travel.

Then life and my day gig took over, and I broke this daily habit. Once I stopped, it felt like climbing the tallest mountain to walk into my art studio.

So I didn’t, for over 2 months.  I had a million excuses why I didn’t have the time or energy, but the truth is that I wasn’t making it a priority, and the longer I didn’t do it, the harder it was to jump in and do even the simplest project.

I missed creating art EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.

In order to push myself back into the studio, I publicly declared on Instagram, along with many of you, that I was going to start, again, even though I had no idea how or where to begin.  As a result, I’ve been happier than I can remember being in over a year, AND I have created 7 new pieces of art for a new collection!

In the process, I’ve learned something important about how to turn daily creating into a sustainable habit.

Instead of forcing myself to do art EVERY day, which is what I did in 2016 to keep myself going, I’m being much kinder this time around. I’m allowing for “days off” from art if my day gig really needs my full attention, or if my brain feels fried from travel and my soul is screaming “DO absolutely nothing”. I’m working on listening to what I really need, following what I hear, and sometimes substituting other forms a self care for art, like meditation, journal writing, or naps!

So I HAVEN’T actually created EVERY day since February 13.

I’ve done something even better.

I created art for 30 of the past 35 days, when my both my body and spirit were open for the experience.  Although my intention is still to create EVERY day, I’m being so much kinder to myself this time around. Hopefully, this small adjustment to my daily ritual will transform (almost) daily art making into a long term sustainable habit.

So how about YOU?

I would love to hear how your self-commitment is going?

What have YOU learned in the process of adding a new daily habit to your life?

If you didn’t commit to a new ritual a month ago, what have you been thinking about adding NOW?

Please share, either here or on Instagram, to help reinforce the commitment we have collectively made to follow what our hearts are calling us to do.