The Value of Personal Projects

You might be a designer or painter or musician for your day job. Even if none of these are your profession,  you might spend a significant amount of time writing, drawing or painting for your boss or client. 

They have demands you are there to fulfill, and so most of your day might be spent meeting them. 

However, what do you really want to make or paint or create for yourself? What idea do you have that you want to throw down on a canvas and see come to life. These ideas may never get the money or recognition that you want, but they are there in your brain need to get out. This is your dream or personal project. It’s the thing you want to make for yourself that is near and dear to you. However how do we define “personal project”?

Define Personal Project?

The fact it is personal means it is yours and yours alone. You can say, draw, paint, make whatever you want to. That is the ideal goal behind the thing you want to make. Lots of times when I am at my day job, I will have an idea for a painting or a few and they go into a list that I have for myself. This is my “project list” or “idea list”. You might want to keep one for yourself in case you run out of inspirational ideas when you sit own to do work. When the time comes to start a new project and I don’t have an idea ready I look at the idea list to see if I can get any inspiration. This idea list fuels the personal project and can get you stared. The idea behind the personal project is that you create the thing that you want to see alive if someone gave you the time or the money to do so. Make the play, the song, the painting anything that you want to see alive and kicking and living. You are your won boss when it comes to the dream project so what you say goes. 

How Long Should it Take?

The answer is it should take a long as it takes. There is no real end timeframe that works for everyone.  When you are done you will “know” it for yourself. One summer, I was working for different companies, and I decided that after my next job had “ended” I was going to take several ,months off and just practice painting and drawing. This was a personal project I really wanted to see happen. I made the time and budgeted enough personal savings to see this come to light. In the end I spent about 8 months off from day job work, just to concentrate on getting better at drawing, and painting. I didn’t really preplan the length of time it would take to complete this for myself. I felt the time I put in was all valuable, because it meant a lot to me. It was my personal dream project for myself. In essence my dream project was not what I was making during those 8 months. My dream project was myself. I was putting time into myself to get where I wanted it to be, by practicing and getting better at the thing that I loved to do, which is drawing and painting.

What are some tings to take away from it?

Aside from piece of mind and the ability to nurture your self another hidden side benefit of the personal project is the fact you get to practice certain skillsets. For example if you want to make a personal project and write a book, you can take those 8 months off and put time into writing. Or if you want to make a play or a drawing, the hidden benefits are the experiences you get for doing the thing for yourself as your side project. At the end of the 8 months, I took off, I was better at anatomy finishing work from start to finish,  brainstorming idea concepts and making complete work. 

I was able to crank out more and more paintings because I put in the time investment to produce more of them. As a result I was further along skill-wise than had I not taken the 8 months off in the first place. 

You will also eventually see, the hidden benefits for the side project and the skills that you will gain while reaching your goals. You can then inject these skills back into client work (or your next side project).