Imposters and Process

A look at how I tackle new projects

We write from aspiration and antagonism, as well as from experience
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Essay VII, Prudence

Hello, Authentic Humans Who Sometimes Feel Fake!

Look. I didn’t set out to write about imposter syndrome today. I planned to show you some behind-the-scenes stuff on an exciting new project I’m working on—and I will still do that later on down the page.

However, this week, I read some incredible posts about the pretzels we tie ourselves in as artists (and as humans) because of our doubts, and I saw a connection between that feeling and my creative process.

My friends

Nishant Jain

and

Molly Ringle

were much more eloquent about this stuff in their posts this week:

250. You were not supposed to cure your Imposter's Syndrome

My giraffe team is on it

Because of these two posts, I was most definitely not going to cover imposter syndrome. I agree with them. It’s not something to cure, but something to live with and adapt to. Plus, who am I to talk about imposter syndrome when I’m so frequently in its grips—and maybe I’m not talented enough or enough of a real artist to have real imposter syndrome—I am a genuine imposter, not an imposter imposter like Nishant and Molly.

Then, I read the Emerson quote at the top of this post, and I figured maybe I should write a little about overcoming imposter syndrome, not out of any experience, but out of my aspiration to work in the face of imposter syndrome.

A haiku comic I made a couple of years ago as a reminder to myself shows that this is a career-long struggle for me:

I have a lot of confidence in my ability as a writer, most of the time. I have been a working writer for 12 years, and I have lots of evidence that I know how to write, including kind reviews, lots of payments for my writing services, and great professional feedback.

However, occasionally, I still wonder if I’m any good at this and how I should even start a new project.

My real weakness is my illustration skills. See, when it comes to visual arts, I’m 100% self-taught, and I do things very strangely. I make these bizarre collage comics and have no idea what I’m doing. I know it's all wrong and that nobody really likes my art; the internet is just full of very kind people. But soon, they will have enough of me and my dumb comics, and that will be that.

When my friend Chad Boykin asked me to collaborate with him on a project of Kaiju Haiku comics, where he would write the haiku and I would create the art, I was excited and stymied.

This is our second collaboration, and Chad is a longtime reader of this newsletter. My rational brain tells me he knows what he’s getting into working with me.

But my lizard brain is sacred of making something awful and letting him down. I’m mostly worried that he’ll be too nice to say that something sucks.

The way I get through this is by making myself follow a process.

Below the paywall, I will show you some of the visuals of my process. The rough outline of the process is this:

1. Surround myself with possible visual influences. Surf the net, look at books, go to museums, and watch old movies.

2. Make some horrible initial sketches to test out layouts and motifs.

3. Make a test collage illustration

4. Create a few elements to collage into comics

5. Start the damn work of illustrating Chad’s haiku

By the time I get to the actual doing, I still feel like a faker, but I have enough ideas to tell myself I can fake it until I make it. It’s in the doing of the work that I start to feel some sense of ease, though I know I will never be able to leave my imposter thoughts behind me.

That’s partly because I’m neurospicy (ADHD, Generalized Anxiety Disorder), but mostly it’s because I’m human.

It’s human to feel frail in the face of the awesome powers of creation.

Click the link or image below to learn more about the Kaiju Haiku process. If you add yourself to the list, you will get publication news when Kaiju Haiku is closer to publication and a handful of exclusive behind-the-scenes updates. Paid members of this newsletter will get some behind-the-scenes action below the paywall on this page!

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