The Drawing Board #17

Some new essay ideas, Don't Get Attached to Your Work (An Essay)

Welcome to my newsletter where I share my personal creative process. I hope to inspire you to pick up a pen, paint brush or spatula and create something spectacular.

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Some new essay ideas:

One essay idea is about my journey to Brooklyn this week with my mom to pick up a signed copy of Alison Roman’s new book, Sweet Enough, that I preordered months ago. Like Jersey Baby, this essay is about the journey because traveling anywhere in New York City is a day-long adventure (mostly sitting in traffic).

My second essay idea is about today’s kids studying architecture. Instead of midterms and finals, architecture students present their imaginary building designs to a panel of professors and professionals. I’ve joined a few of these in the last few months at my alma mater. Not ONE of these students could draw. Nor present. Who’s to blame? COVID? The school? The whole generation of youngins who’s attention span was robbed by micro videos? Who knows. But I’ve been ranting about this to my close friends and family for a while. It’s got me fired up.

My last essay idea is about my sabbatical. It’s going to end soon. I’d like to share some sort of reflection. Maybe an annual review? It’s been a whole year. Also, this will be a contract I set with myself, to keep my creative practice thriving in my next chapter.

Which ideas are you curious to learn more about? I’d love to hear your thoughts and questions in the poll and comments section below.

Don't Get Attached to Your Work

I’m deep in cohort 10 of the online writing course Write of Passage. This week we focused on this prompt: What is your unique perspective?

Here’s my answer from the last cohort: Don’t get attached to your work.

As writers and creators, we often get attached to our first draft. But one of my architecture school professors showed me that a first draft is meant to be ripped apart, modified, and rebuilt over and over again. If you’re curious about his extreme methods and how I apply them to my own creative practice, read my essay below:

“He pulled out his favorite pair of scissors with a huge grin on his face. Snip, snip in the air, he warmed up his hands to do the unthinkable. He suddenly grabbed a paper study model, cut-off half of it, placed it upside down and declared, “There it is, this is your scheme.” The shock and horror in my classmate’s face is forever burned into my memory…”

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Thanks for reading!

Happy Creating, Elizabeth 🎨