Motivation experiment days 22 & 23

Tree growing on a rock in a lake

Motivation experiment day 22 – drawn 12/05/2014

Time has gotten the better of me lately, and I haven’t followed up on writing about the progression of my motivation experiment since day 21. So here I am picking it up again.

On day 22 the idea for what I wanted to draw formed during the day. I was looking at a particular photo I have of a tree by a lake, and thought I would like to try to draw a tree by a lake, growing over a rock with the roots exposed over the surface of the rock.

Come day 23 I was out of ideas again, so fell back to an old standard exercise in shading I remember from art class in early high school:

Drawing of a green apple

Motivation experiment day 23 – drawn 13/05/2014

At this stage I was starting to feel like making myself do at least a simple drawing each days was forcing me to discover ideas that I would never have otherwise tried. And I was liking the results just often enough to keep me motivated to try something again the next day … and some days even looking forward with anticipation to the time I would spend drawing. Intrinsic motivation was starting to really set in.

About Paul McQueen

Dr Paul McQueen is a Clinical Psychologist, holding a Doctorate in Clinical Psychology from the University of Melbourne. He has experience working in both adult and child mental health services in Queensland and Victoria. Dr McQueen is comitted to providing high quality, evidence-based interventions for a range of mental health conditions. He specialises in the treatment of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder and Depression.

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