Creative Anxiety

I find that almost always somewhere in the creative process I suffer from creative anxiety.  Maybe it's picking out colors for a third colorway of a familiar design, maybe it's assessing my skillset for the ability to create the shape or feeling I envisioned.  It may be that I doubt my ability to find the right scale and balance for the finished piece to be pleasing.

Sometimes of course it goes right and a piece I love is born.  I find this most often with a focal that speaks to me and a small vignette like Bell Mabel.  There were of course still design decisions but one of the things in favor of smaller work is that the investment of time in things that didn't work is much less.

I imagine that other artists in the medium of beads or other artistic expressions have a better ability to envision the final result so their time is not invested in failure.  I'm pretty sure except for a rare few this is probably not the case. I suspect thaf failed design decisions along the way have led up to better decision making that inform the design process.  If I look back my design work has certainly improved from my early days of beading.

I'm not sure why I insist that it is failure for me to go along a path that doesn't result in finished work that I love.  I've certainly watched my husband make three and four prototypes on his quest for the best outcome.  Perhaps that box of beaded bits and bobs that didn't work out should be considered my prototype box.  Every once in awhile something emerges from that box that has found it's time to be successful.

Sometimes a piece that I started out thinking was trite becomes a favorite, which just goes to show that my thought process about a piece's lovabililty is not always spot on.

As my time becomes more available for the exploration of different artistic endeavors I think my creative anxiety is being triggered because I am starting out at the bottom of several learning curves.  I'd like to try to manage this feeling so as not to be overwhelmed by it.   

Many of the things I am trying,  I am using other peoples design sensibilities and engineering skills so in that case my job is to just be the best technician that I can be.  I think this is true of the English paper piecing I am doing from a kit, but not true of shrink plastic designs I have been making.  Perhaps keeping a mix of the two will keep the feelings manageable.

Do you suffer from creative anxiety and if so, what tools have you found useful in managing it?