Most often, people who hire me want to become a creative success. Usually, that success is defined with a dollar amount. I counter that in order to call yourself an artist, all you need to do is make art. It doesn’t all need to be polished, published, or even finished, but assigning a dollar amount to it doesn’t make you any more or less of an artist. 

If you watch The Great British Bakeoff on Netflix, there’s a mini-competition in each episode called the technical challenge. The bakers are given a list of ingredients and very simple instructions, with very little guidance on how to combine the ingredients. That is what I’m giving you today, because this recipe looks different for every artist.

Make, Share, and Ask. That’s it. Make your art, share your art and skills and identity as an artist, and ask for sales, sponsors, collaboration, or whatever will help to grow your audience. Let this marinate and integrate.

I’m going on sabbatical! While I’m taking some time off from coaching in order to lean into my own artistry, feel free to connect with me on IG and join my mailing list!

Ready to start making art, making, money, and making an impact? Visit makingartistspodcast.com or connect with me on IG @thenancysun.

Music credit: Positive Experience by Sunny Tones

A Podcast Launch Bestie production

Hey artists, how are you doing?

In the event that you are listening to this episode, the day that it drops?

That means you are listening to this episode on giving to Tuesday.

. It is the first week after Black Friday, and I don't know how this year is gonna

go because it feels like Black Friday has already started before Thanksgiving.

But if it goes the way it has traditionally commercially gone,

and by traditionally, I just mean in my recent adult memory,

you might be in a season of buy.

And that might be buying for your friends, buying for your family,

and or even buying for yourself.

Treating yourself to the sales that you are.

Also treating your friends and family too, making investments in you, whether it be

in physical things for your own self care.

I would say services, experiences, perhaps even including coaching

for your own self care.

I say this because a lot of times the self care that we get sold is the bubble bath.

Self care is the skincare self care, which I will fully admit.

I fall.

that we often forget that self care can include things like feeding yourself

clothing yourself, putting money in your retirement savings account.

All of those more boring, qian banal things also can

fall under the bucket of self.

, and I'm talking about this today because a lot of people have already started

reaching out to me because they want to invest in coaching and specifically

coaching with me as a part of their self care for 2023 and y'all artists.

I am honored.

I'm honored.

Either you have found or discovered me, yourself, or other people have

pointed to me as a resource that you can use to get yourself supported.

This is exactly the kind of person that I want to be known to you as,

as somebody who can serve, support, and help you make your dreams come.

So right now I have been fielding a number of inquiries of people asking how

and when can they start working with me.

Perhaps because they want to put their self care dollars, their investment

dollars into this container as a way to invest in themselves and normally, At this

time, I would have something to offer you.

I am somebody who actually empowers the new beginnings of a new year.

I'm not at the effect or victim of, January 1st, 2023 energy.

Which is something that we discussed your relationship to time in the

previous podcast, time for the holidays.

So I welcome people who are riding the wave of novelty.

To make changes they haven't made before, run experiments they haven't

run before, including coaching, or if they already have familiarity

with coaching, coaching with me as a new or novel person to support them.

So while I normally would be accepting one-on-one clients and while I normally

have a group coaching program, the Making Artist's Mastermind, which

has been going so amazingly this year, I am so ridiculously proud

of this small, intimate, and mighty community that we have built in

that has supported each other.

Go for big dreams like creating the art they want in the mediums they want.

So we have writers, filmmakers, actors, all audaciously, getting more

auditions than they've ever gotten, more opportunities than they ever had, and who

are letting go of the survival mindset.

Of just playing for the next paycheck, whether that be from using the skill

that they've created, so they're writing talent per se, or from taking the focus

off of their survival job and day job to play full out in their creative career.

So I say this because normally at this part of the podcast, I

would share with you what I'm.

, and I'm actually going to be sharing with you that I am not

currently offering anything.

What now, . I'm actually going to take this opportunity at the

top of this podcast to announce that I am going on sabbatical.

For early 2023, I've been so inspired by the artists that I've supported

who have created time and space in their calendar for their creativity.

And I wanna give myself the same opportunity.

And this is not only an opportunity for me and my creativity, but also for

me to reinvent my coaching practice.

So I'm just gonna share what I mean by.

Now the praxis or the framework or the philosophy?

All of the above that I use to coach my clients are things that

I have seen work for the artists that I support and that I've seen.

Work for myself as an artist who has gone from a non fine arts, fancy

degree per human, to an auditioning actor, to a working actor, to an actor

that belongs to all of the relevant unions, to known actor, to industry

professionals, representatives, managers.

Agents, directors.

So I've already been coaching, lending this mindset of success

to my clients and seeing it work for them and produce results.

However, I wanna take this sabbatical to think about how I can

continue to up level my mindset.

and simplify the way I am communicating to my artists so that they can

continue to create the life of their dreams faster, more efficiently,

more effectively, and with more joy.

So, so I wanna spend this sabbatical not only with my creativity.

But also with my self coaching so that this way I can be a better

artist and a better coach for you.

I'm gonna put myself through the paces . As a client, I'm probably

gonna have my own creative adventure.

The highs and the lows and with that will probably come with a lot of empathy and

compassion, not only for myself, but all of the artists or the inner artists that I

have been and want to continue supporting.

So while I may not be offering you the direct immediate dopamine hit of

working together, , I want to encourage you to think and play long term.

Let's stay connected.

You can definitely feel free to stay in touch with me on Instagram at the

Nancy Sun as my Instagram handle, or visit making artists podcast.com.

So that's making Artists plural podcast.com to sign up for my mailing.

so that this way you can continue to experience the inspiration and motivation

while I am on sabbatical with the intention of allowing me to support

you wherever you are in your evolution when I return, and as a bonus, you'll

probably end up witnessing me on my.

Me being my own best client and the results I am creating in my life.

So you have a better sense of what to expect once we apply this

philosophy and process to yours.

I am so curious what life will have in store for me when I show up this way,

and I can't wait to share it with.

how this impacts.

What I'm going to talk about in today's episode is I want to give you

as much information as possible for you to apply exercise and practice.

Before we were able to connect in a coaching container, and this episode

is gonna be about probably what most people hire me for, which is

how do I become a creative success?

. First, I wanna define what they mean by creative success.

So you'll notice in the title of this episode, I put in dollar signs

in the word success because usually that's what my clients come to me for.

They want to be full-time creatives, they want to be professional creatives.

And what they mean by that is they want to get paid.

For their art or for their art skill.

And they wanna not only get paid, but paid enough to make a living to

fully replace their day job, their thrival job, their side income.

So there's probably even a dollar amount in your.

That you are making mean, ugh, this is what, what amount of money I want

to be making from or in partnership with my art that would have me

know that I am a creative success.

I am a full-time creative.

I am a professional, creative.

Now, the first thing I wanna say is, as your coach, this is not

how I actually define creative.

you will see from my communication about artists and art is all

you need to be doing or being or identifying as as an artist in order

to consider yourself successful is to be an artist who makes art.

If you make art, you are an artist that I actually think is the only.

real marker for artistic success.

And notice that I did not say finish art or I didn't say complete art.

I just said make it.

So start it.

Be in process with it.

You might actually be letting your subconscious or unconscious be

marinating and playing with ideas.

It might not have even hit the real world.

Or it might have hit the real world, but it might not yet be finished or complete.

And I wanna invite you to consider that being finished or complete, or making

money from your art is not necessarily inherent to you signing on permission

slip to call yourself an artist.

a metaphor that I'm gonna use is just the idea of family, right?

I identify as a daughter, I identify as a mother, I identify as a wife, and

I may not have recently spoken to my.

Actually, that's not true.

I have recently spoken to her and texted her, but it doesn't mean that I

am not a daughter if I'm not actively performing the activities that I think

a good daughter should be performing or a good mother or a good wife.

I am a mom Regardless of whether or not I am currently mothering, I am a wife.

Even if I am not like actively loving up on my husband , or I'm loving up on him in

this podcast, but he doesn't hear it, so I want you to consider that that is a way

that I support the humans that I coach, is by helping them expand, reframe their

idea of what it means to be an artist and what it means to be successful as.

So I'm just distinguishing that from what people come to me for, which I

would call scaling your art, right, is moving beyond the, if you make

art in the forest and no one's around to witness it, does it make a sound?

A lot of what people hire me for is to create an audience for their art to be.

In dialogue with other people about their art in a way that they appreciate

and enjoy, and where other people might start to invest in their art.

And that's gonna be the topic of today's conversation.

So I'm gonna give you the three simple steps all you need in order to create this

creative, financial, impactful success.

And I'm gonna give you a huge caveat upfront that while I give

you these simple steps, simple may not necessarily mean easy to you.

Because what I usually help a lot of clients with is there's a lot

of mind drama on each and every step that makes it complicated

and is what normally gets in the.

of artists having the creative fulfilled life that they want.

So I just wanna distinguish that while you are getting information in this podcast,

it ultimately will be up to you to turn that information into transformation.

And in fact, to some, the information might look in su.

And again, that's where I can come in as a coach beyond this podcast.

if you are a fan of the great British bakeoff, you can look at what I'm going to

give you as a technical challenge recipe.

Uh, if you don't watch Greek British Bakeoff, I'm just going to

explain to you what I'm referring.

So great British bakeoff or great British baking show, uh, on Netflix.

In the event that you are in the US is a competition in which amateur

bakers, so people who bake at home don't make money from their

baking professionally all compete.

To be, the winner of each season, and there are three mini

competitions within each episode.

And the technical challenge is a challenge that the two judges give in

which they provide a recipe with very simple instructions that all of the

bakers are to follow, and they will be judged on the quality of their.

and the recipe oftentimes is written in very simple sentences with no real regard

for how to combine the ingredients.

And a lot might be left to the imagination for each baker to fill in.

So for instance, sometimes they will just list the ingredient.

And then the, the recipe will just be, make the dough and that's it.

Or preheat oven, make the dough.

And so I'm gonna give you probably what some of you might think is

the make the dough equivalent to how to be a creative success.

And that's okay.

Just take in what you.

Do the best with what you got, and in the event that you need more support,

I will be here post sabbatical, but I wanna encourage you to practice some self

initiative resourcefulness and seeing how far and how much lemonade you can squeeze

out of this podcast, lemon and the recipe.

The three simple steps for creative success are simp.

, make, share, ask.

I will say it again.

Make, share, ask.

So we may have already covered the step of make, make art.

Use your creative craft, use your creative skill, your.

often, this is the first step in order for you to cultivate, accept, embrace,

embody your identity as an artist.

It will expand your belief that you will be able to deliver on the promise of any

creative product you are offering, whether it be copywriting or ghost writing.

So providing a creative service or it could.

Like writing a book, if you are used to even doing morning pages every day.

So morning pages are a writing practice introduced in the

Artist's Way by Julia Cameron.

It might expand your belief that you are the kind of person who can fill a

book of pages and be a published author.

So the first step often is, , which again, as referenced earlier, I have

as the all just check, check, check already makes you a successful artist.

And the second step is share.

So share your art.

share your identity as an artist.

Share your skill and craft widely expansively with any and all the humans.

Now again, just like the make step might be simple, it's not easy.

So can the act of seem very simple?

But that doesn't mean you have an easy time doing.

, this is where your thoughts about other people's judgements can come in.

This is where you might start to judge or cherry pick which people you think might

be worthy of witnessing you as an artist, or there may be people you are protecting

yourself from or protecting your art from.

And often this is a.

Which can start to complicate things or create drama is simply giving yourself

permission to share expansively, or let's go to the third step of Ask and Ask.

I personally leave as a very open-ended step because there

are so many things that artists.

Ask for, because it depends on where you are in your art making journey.

You can ask for collaborators, for instance, a lot of people

as an artist, what they want is community or the art that they're

making requires collaboration.

So I have a lot of theater makers, for example, I have a lot of,

movie makers and filmmakers.

I have a lot of actors, so performing artists oftentimes require collaboration,

either with a director, creative team or even with other actors.

Or in the act of asking, you might be asking people to invest.

. I have clients who are looking for producers for their work or who are

creating crowdfunding campaigns.

So they might be looking for a financial collaboration before they might be

asking someone, Hey, do you want to buy?

So the ask can be very open-ended of what it is you.

, and again, this is a step which can create a lot of drama.

What can I ask for?

Who can I ask for it from?

Who am I to ask for this thing?

Am I sure that I can't do this on my.

, wouldn't it actually make me a better artist if I could do it on my own,

prove that I could do it on my own?

Shouldn't I be picking up additional creative skills even though these

skills are outside of my area of genius?

These are just some questions, rhetorical, but it might have

a suggestion of an answer.

That I ends up stopping people from becoming a creative success

because they limit their ask.

They don't ask at all, or they're asking in the wrong way or to the wrong people.

But when you have these three steps in line, making, sharing, asking, you cannot.

create creative success without these three steps, which invite

you to be in collaboration with the universe and with other people.

You cannot experience this level of creative success in a vacuum.

So I wanna just give these to you today so that you can start marinating

on where it is that you are blocked, what it is that you need to believe.

What are the areas that you need to work on?

What are the actions that you need to take?

Maybe you're incredibly great at asking, but you're not making, and that usually

can affect your Ask when you don't know whether or not you can fulfill on it.

So I just want you to think about these three steps, this particular

cycle, and what your area for growth.

or how knowing these three steps might actually change your 2023 goal.

For instance, I have a lot of acting clients who think that they just

need to be making all the time, and when I share that all they

need to do is make, share and ask.

They realize that in order to be a successful working actor, They need

to do a better job and focus 2023 on sharing and asking, which some

might be, consider the business of Hollywood and the business of acting.

They realize they might have had the thought error that if you just focus on

your craft, that you will be discover.

and they realize they have not actually been creating opportunities for people

to discover them, which is what gets created from sharing and asking.

This is just one example of how you can start to evaluate whether or not you are

showing up for this formula and how it is working for you, but you can apply it

to any kind of artistry and any kind of.

make, share and ask.

So this is your, uh, technical challenge recipe for artistic creative success.

This is some information I hope might start leading you to transformation.

And I wanna invite you to not just be back footed and kind of hope that

you will absorb this episode through osmosis, but I wanna challenge you to be

very front footed and being a leader in integrating this so that you'll already

have some practice and facility with being a leader when we start coaching.

because that is one of the biggest skills that I support my artists cultivating,

is them being responsible, sovereign, and steward over their creative career.

So consider this your permission slip to start when I start, when

I'm on sabbatical from coaching and just being a fellow creative with.

Show up and be a fellow creative to yourself.

In fact, be a fellow coach to yourself.

so that this way I can support you at a higher elevation than exactly

where you might be right now.

And if you know any artist who might benefit from knowing the ingredients

in the secret sauce, definitely share this episode with them.

You can always subscribe, write, and review this episode or this entire

podcast, um, on Apple Podcasts or iTunes, or simply pass the link on to a friend.

They might need to have this kind of boiled down to the bear essentials so that

they can integrate it, so that they can integrate it into their creative pursuit.

and if you want to witness the fruits of my creative labor of me practicing

my own version of make share ask, definitely feel free to follow me on

Instagram and sign up for my mailing list.

I intend to share my creative epiphanies in real time so you have a sense of

how I am practicing what I preach and making new discoveries on how to share

this information with you even better, more effectively, and with greater ease.

Once the Making Artist Mastermind and my coaching practice is open

for you, So until next time, I hope you consider this podcast an

investment and self care for you.