Mark E Shellshear.

Tell yourself regularly that you are a better Artist than you think you are. Successful Artists are not super human they are just like you. Successful Artists are not more intelligent than you they are just like you. There is nothing magical about a becoming a successful Artist. Successful Artists do not trust there success to luck and chance. Successful Artists believe in themselves and the Art they create. They don’t say I will fail, they say I will succeed. They would never say I am not good enough, they are always looking for improvement to be better than they are. If our thoughts define us and most of the time we become what we think about the most. It is just as easy to think about what you can do rather than what you can’t do. Picasso started out an unknown Artist just like we all do and later he became Picasso. He believed in himself completely and in his ability and he never wavered. Picasso did not talk himself out of being the great Picasso, h...

Yesterday in my video we talked about “ How can I do this better?” Certainly one way we can do it better is to imagine what we want to accomplish and do it. Unfortunately most people talk themselves out of it before they even start. They have imagined their big dream and then they start, “ This probably won’t work.” “ Who am I to think I am good enough to do that.” “ Who am I fooling.” “ They will all think I am stupid.” Many talk themselves out of it even before anyone else has a chance to do it. Most are stopped by themselves, not held back by others. Self defeat happens more than someone else defeating us. Instead of saying, “It probably won’t work” say “ I can do this, I am a talented Artist, I am good enough and I can do this.” You can do it and be all you want to be. Do it, trust your gift allow it to flow. Believe in yourself and your gift and let it happen. Get out of the way and speak positive words to yourself, don’t self sabotage. Beli...

You can teach a thousand who want to be taught but you cannot convince one who will not listen and does not like you and that is the reason they will not listen. All of us in all we do the key is getting people to like us because if they like you then they will listen to you. That is the key to selling our Art, if people like you, they will listen to you and trust you and most likely buy from you. Now not everyone will like us or our Art, that’s a given but we must do all we can to endear ourselves to others. Create wonderful original Art and work on the better you, a better smile, on your pleasing personality and always be as friendly as you can, get rid of bad habits like arguing and criticism and learn to see the best in every situation, it may not work out exactly as you want all the time but as long as you have given it your best effort, that’s enough. If people like you most likely they will like your Art and buy from you. It’s not guaranteed but you have a...

Your miracle comes from taking one step at a time. Work produces the miracle, one day at a time. But it must be work that has purpose, a direction and be achievable within a certain time frame. Our progress needs to be measured as we want be be able to look back and see how much we have improved. Therefore we must be accountable to our goals so we know where we are in the journey to achieve them. Without accountability there will be no purpose or drive to achieve those goals they will remain wishful thinking and we will just meander on. Accountability is the key to productivity, we can easily measure our day by what we produced and our daily list will clearly show us that, is everything ticked off? Achieving daily small goals takes us closer to accomplishing our bigger goals.

Your collectors and strangers do not see your fears, insecurities or inhibitions, you see that, they see a talented, gifted Artist. One of the most important things that you can learn to do is to accept that your collectors do not see your failings they only see you the Artist. We need also to see ourselves also as the Artist and not see all our failings and weaknesses, because these can become a self sabotaging story. If we are wise we will focus on the person and Artist that we want to become and be working hard on overcoming those liabilities and getting better and better every day. Focus on the Artist you want to become and tell yourself that story, make the changes and you will become that Artist.

He asked me what about you, you seem to understand the Art business. I said not for a long time I believed in the Artist myth that you would be discovered but it didn’t happen, then in the early 90’s I had no sales and I thought that something was missing that I had not been told, that there was a secret. So decided that I wanted to go and work in Galleries because in those days they were doing well and making money so I got involved in Galleries, it was so different and I learned what the secret was and it was so simple. Do a course in public speaking so you would be confident in front of strangers and learn to sell, it is a skill anyone can learn it is not a divine gift. Salespeople are not born they learned a skill, selling and they learned public speaking that is the great secret, so simple but it was no secret at all because all I had to do was ask, but I thought that there was a magic formula and there wasn’t, I just had to learn some new skills.

When I was young in between jobs I worked in a sawmill. I worked as the tailor out once, that’s the guy who pulls the log through the saw and holds it straight. It was so hard to do and I made so many mistakes. When we finished I spoke to the saw man and asked why it looked so easy when other guy who did it? He looked at me and said, “ It’s always easy if you know how.” I never forgot that piece of wisdom, it’s easy if you know how. What are you finding hard to do in your Art practice? Find the needed information and lean it. Because knowledge properly learned and put into practice turns into a skill. Once you have the skill it’s easy to do, because you know how.