Mark E Shellshear.

The cost of success is always a lot more than we think. Your Art that is truly you, is when you are painting in spite of the fear. Always risking rejection. Always risking ridicule. Prepared to pay the price of pain and persistence. Committed to self belief and deliberate work. Your Art is for those who love it, no one can get everyone to like their work. But you can paint for your collectors, your supporters who love your Art, you only make it for them. Success is always painting you.

Your tomorrows depend on what you do today. All of us in our daily life plant seeds and the result of this planting is seen in our tomorrows. So to build a good tomorrow plant the right seeds now, do not wait for your tomorrows depend on it. Three infectious seeds you do not want to plant, excuses, laziness and breaking your word. Do not use excuses to do average work. Do not let laziness stop today's painting. Do not compromise your word, it’s all you have. All these are very easy habits to fall into but are disastrous to your good future. Build good positive work habits that build a strong tomorrow.

When you have a business and you need to get your employees to do the work you want them to do, the question is, “ How can I make this person want to do it?” Now that is the only way we will get the best out of people by them wanting to do it. Now when it comes to us personally I know that there are things I should do, I could do but I don’t do it, why is that? Because of the story I tell myself. For myself and many Artists what we do is we argue for our limitations and when we do, we get to keep them. Many Artists don’t want to learn to sell and market their work, so they say that their paintings sell themselves? That’s the story they tell themselves and it is not true and is arguing for their limitations and they never learn to sell because of the story they tell themselves. Many Artists do not learn new skills when it would help their Art business enormously, but they say “ No, I cannot learn to do that.” and they are right because of the story they are telling t...

If you focus on an event, an exhibition that has a start and a finish and you make it the reason that you are an Artist and then if it fails it is hard to get up and start again. If you focus on your end goals, then the event is just part of the process not the end game. So many Artists focus everything on the event and if they have a failed show or only a few sales in an exhibition they then want to give up because they are focusing everything on the event and when setbacks come they are devastated. Focus on the end game, you Art career and not one event, failed shows are just part of the Art business. It happens and it does amaze me how many Artists think every show is going to be a great success and when it doesn’t happen you must accept that that as part of being an Artist and focus on your whole career not just that one event. Events are to learn from. What we did right and how we can improve and repeat the success. What we did wrong, we cannot do again, lea...

Take the pressure off your self you do not have to paint a masterpiece every time you pick up the brush. So many Artists place themselves under so much pressure by doing this, because the story they are telling themselves is not true. The fear in us wants us to never try and do anything challenging, different or outside the box, it wants us to be safe, quiet and average, so the best way to get you to do that is to tell you that you must make every painting a masterpiece. If you do that you will put yourself under so much pressure that you will become so discouraged at not being able to produce a masterpiece or the perfect painting, that you will eventually find every time you go to paint you will get painters block or the fear of the white canvas and you will stand and say “ I don’t know what to paint!” The thief wins. So never try to paint your masterpiece or the perfect painting, because it will never happen, you will never be satisfied with what you do the thief...

In yesterdays blog I spoke about the Art road that we are on, our road. Now to be a trail blazer we must focus on the trail not the obstacles around us. If we focus on the obstacles, the trees, the rivers, creeks, gullies mountains and cliffs, all the hard stuff then that will be all we will see and it will become very depressing and self defeating because we have focused on all the problems not the trail we are blazing. In the Art business you can focus on the Art path you are making or on all the problems, the road blocks and obstacles, the failures and why you cannot do something and that will be all you will see and it is depressing and will pull you down and you will constantly doubt yourself and struggle. If you focus on your Art trail it will make all the difference. Focus on what you are doing and can do. Focus on the small successes you have each day, ticking off your list. Focus on the long game you Art career. Don’t focus on what could go wrong or what might happen becaus...

I believe that Artists are trail blazers not map followers. As we set our goals and begin to work towards them so we make the Art road we will walk on. A new Art road, our road, not anyone else's road, our own individual original road made for me, by me, for me to walk on, yes others my follow and walk on my road but it is my road, no map used. As we trail blaze there will be dry creek beds to cross, wide open plains to walk across, very high mountains to stand upon in wonderment and very deep, dark valleys where we will feel very alone, but it is all part of trail blazing, walking on our Art road. As you work hard at your Art and your Art Business you are building your road. Never stop, never give up, never say I quit. If you give up in the deep dark valleys you will miss the promise of the mountain top, and the beauty of the wild flowers on the plains and the victory of arriving at your destination, your accomplished goals. Working hard at Art produces the...