Beginning to advanced artists enjoy the process of imagining. Coming up with the new, imagining the possibilities, thinking up something that can make people laugh and cry at the same time get’s artistic designers on a temporary high. Then the realization kicks in that to put those ideas on paper, film, or web would be work.

It’s easy to imagine. It’s hard to perspire. Yes, we artists have to turn product, and no artist feels like doing it when they aren’t motivated. When the high dies down after exercising the imagination, and the project you imagined looks like it may take weeks or months to complete, we give up the gumption and settle back down into our cushy chairs to imagine the next big possibility we won’t fulfill. Artists are dreamers. Dreams don’t usually come true.

The way to redemption is to be in the minority of dreamers. These dreamers are more like prophets. These artists want to complete their projects, get organized, want to meet deadlines…. These driven artists want something to show for the time they put in being creative in their cushy chairs; even if it means they will spend the majority of their time out of the chair. Something Seth Godin once said got me to realize our problem isn’t we aren’t creative enough. Our problem is we don’t create what we creatively cook up.

Artists that do become renown. The hard part—working for a living—does pay off eventually. If you don’t get things done, you won’t be known for much at all. Keep turning ideas into finished products and you will be known as a go-to artist.