This is key no.1 — retraining and sharpening your sense of sight.

You may think that you’re seeing, but what you’re accustomed to is closer to “looking.”

You see, seeing is the act if really taking something in, and allowing your mind to perceive it as it is, not as you think it is.

The problem starts when you try to use your normal, “everyday” sense of sight when you sit down to draw.



That’s a mistake.

We’re visually bombarded with a world of infinite detail. Our brains have learned that many of those details are irrelevant to our survival, and thus millions of them are ignored, or at the very least they’re minimized.

In order to develop your ability to draw, you’ll have to exercise your sense of sight.

The best way to do this is to consciously tap into it. When you mentally override the brain’s tendency to glaze over things, you’ll notice a deeper connection and understanding of whatever it is you’re seeing.

Often times all those details that we’ve been unconsciously suppressing start to rush back. This is a bit of a shock, especially when it comes to drawing, but there’s an easy fix for that.









Squint.











That’s right. I’m talking about narrowing the amount of light that’s entering your pupil by partially closing your eyelid

(Do you feel like a piece of bio-technology that’s learning to run it’s OS yet?)

Things will invariably become blurry. Everything that was becoming rather detailed is now the opposite.

Now, at first this may seem like a paradox. Why would you unlock the ability to see more detail than ever, only to squint those details into large, blurry shapes?



The reason is that your sense of sight has now expanded. You’ve learned to see details and you’ve learned to see simply. What was once a very narrow bandwidth of everyday observance is now a spectrum of sight.

I’ll elaborate upon how to use these new visionary powers below, but in short, you’ll want to squint at your subject/reference for the large masses and their relationships to one another, and only gradually begin to add detail as those masses are laid in accurately.

For now, let’s hand you the other keys.

2. Don’t Associate Your Self Worth With Drawing

Or for that matter, the act of drawing, or the outcome of drawing.

Not even with the response or lack of response from a finished drawing.

Here’s the deal, we all have a tendency to be too self critical. It’s a fact of human life.

Those who are drawn to creative pursuits are especially susceptible.

When you’re too fixated on whether you’ll succeed or not, or what others will think of you, you’ve already lost.



Not only will you lose the ability to tap your full potential (i.e. self sabotage)



But you’ll also destroy a great deal of the joy that the process is trying to give you.



You can learn to draw. That’s a given. It’s not about whether or not you’ve been lucky to start early, have great teachers, or get blessed with “talent.”

The problem lies in letting internal and external factors stir up the inner critic.

Once your inner critic goes off the rails, it’s essentially time to put down your pencil. You’ll stop seeing at your full potential, you’ll mechanically work your way through, and you’ll be disappointed at the end.

Instead of giving the inner critic any food or fodder, just take the time to refocus yourself on the sheer fortune that you’re drawing. Develop immense respect, sincerity, and gratitude for the mere act.



Detach from results, and hold fast to the process.





3. Think in the abstract.