TLDR: Keep your day job.
Hey guys. Normally I post art tutorials in 2D Art, but want to ramble about something different today. These are my personal thoughts about creative block, and not just for art but for any kind of creative work. I'm not a life coach or therapist but understanding these things might help you with creative block. A bit informal but whatever.
1) Creative Block isn't that bad
Creative block itself isn't bad. Sure if creative work is your money maker, then it can become a problem if you're not doing the work that you were hired to do, but I see way too many artists on Twitter thinking the grind will make them happy and end up in a vicious cycle blaming themselves for not working, then overworking themselves to create stuff. And I get it, this modern society is all about the grind, and showing any sign of vulnerability makes us weak, and I hate it. I think this concept is super problematic. First, it makes everyone work way too much. Second, it makes everyone fear expressing their true feelings. And all this leads to a desperate feeling of needing to feel high status through the grind. Just take it easy, the grind is unhealthy and it's ok to take some time away from creativity.
2) Listen to Creative Block
The next thing is I advise you figure out the stresses your creative block is causing. You might think it will go away on it's own, but I've talked to artists who had this block for years. So don't downplay the stresses because they're important to understand and fix. I also think it's way too common with workaholics. Stress is there for a reason. It pushes us to do something. Sometimes it pushes us to do something bad, but sometimes good. When it pushes you to take care of messy stuff around the house, that's good. Or when it's telling you "Hey, you need to exercise man, or gal..." that's also pretty good. Maybe you need better sleep, or maybe you need to file taxes. So stress can be good, and you shouldn't always downplay it or shrug it off as it will become more of a problem later if you ignore it.
3) Stop competing so hard
So many people force themselves to create stuff to compete on social media, for jobs, and now even compete against automation, and it's not fun one bit. I'm not saying drop everything your doing and just be a couch potato but I'd suggest finding a balance between productivity and a healthy routine. You might think "What a loser, so lazy", but do you realize how many people who are willing to drink way too much caffeine, destroy their sleep (like me), and develop all kind of permanent hunchback health problems in order to compete in the industry. Is that a win? I disagree. I'd say that's exploiting hard workers' emotions.
4) If it's not your job, mostly create for fun.
If it's not your job, you don't always need to work so hard. It's good to try so that maybe you end up with a career out of it, but you don't always need to so you shouldn't always force yourself to. Figure out what you enjoy about creating, what creations you enjoy, why you enjoy those things, and maybe make a list if you can't remember them. Then try to base your creations around these ideas as they will often be more fun than drawing random stuff. Me personally this year, I'm really liking horror stuff, and I'm challenging myself to draw in linear perspective a lot more as it's something I always avoided before but nowadays feels the most rewarding when I complete these types of drawings. So all my drawings this year are based around those ideas. Eventually I might switch it up, but for now that's what I'm doing. But that's another thing though; just because you thing something is challenging to create, if you're out of other fun ideas, just go for it, be patient, and keep working on it until it's complete. When I do that, I just feel kind of proud my art rather than when I'm just doing simple quick art I've already mostly been doing years.
Conclusion
So those are all the things I can think of off the top of my head for this post. Thanks for reading and happy creating stuff.